With the growth of the web as well and mobile and tablet apps, it is no surprise that educational institutions have been popping up with the goal of teaching app development in schools. As an example, in 2010 a scheme called "The App School" was set up in Manchester comissioned by the Cultural Strategy Team at Manchester City with the objective of teaching mobile app development skills to children to improve their employability.
We were sad to see that as of this month The App School website is no more, which is a real shame seeings that it was originally envisaged to use a franchise-like model where similar schools could be set up in other areas. Being in the mobile app development industry ourselves, we think this sort of scheme was a step in the right direction, and would certainly like to see such initiatives in other places such as here in Brimingham.
We have a bit of experience with schemes in Birmingham and have actively supported initiatives such as the BSEEN program which was a university lead program for incubating entrepreneurship in the city. One of the characteristics of this type of initiative is that the funding tends to be over a short period of time (1-3 years), meaning that they are destined to end if the programs aren't designed to be revenue generating.
Bringing it back to The App School, maybe the only way schemes like this could become sustainable would be for them to be built into the school curriculum. But let's leave this discussion for another day this in itself could be an debate in its own right! Let us know what you think on twitter with the hashtag #appsineducation.
