At Barcelona Activa's Technology Park, in Nou Barris, the first programming course to be taught at the new 42 Barcelona campus has begun. In a space of 1,622 square meters and with a capacity for 800 students, who will have 200 computers available, this initiative by Fundación Telefónica has been launched, with 3,000 registration applications.
The 42 Barcelona campus is an experience that responds to a disruptive training formula in programming technologies, because the studies offered are free and in-person, and the facilities are open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and students can attend for an average duration of three years. The course offers opportunities for students who are not required to have previous technical knowledge or any type of degree and aims to respond to the demand for new technological job profiles, such as cybersecurity, big data, artificial intelligence, blockchain, or the Internet of Things (IoT), among others.
For the project's promoters, the initiative is born with the intention of expanding the current offer, which is why in the next four years it will receive an injection of 10 million euros, which will be invested 50% by Fundación Telefónica, on the one hand, and the remaining 50% by the Generalitat and the Barcelona City Council, as explained by Luis Miguel Olivas, director of Employability and Educational Innovation at Fundación Telefónica.
The philosophy of the French school 42, without teachers or books, nor degrees, with a pioneering methodology based on gamification and learning, "is a new way of educating," explained José María Álvarez-Pallete, president of Telefónica, during the inauguration ceremony of the course. Álvarez-Pallete defended that students are also prepared in transversal skills and competencies such as effort, tolerance to frustration, and capacity for self-improvement.
For her part, Sophie Viger, executive director of school 42, stated that they share with Barcelona "the spirit open to innovation, creation, and equal opportunities in digitalization". Viger added that they want to contribute to "training the best technological professionals and also helping Catalan companies and startups to advance in this exciting path that lies ahead."
School 42 was founded in 2013 in Paris, when the IT industry was affected by a great shortage of programmers. Now it is located in countries such as Belgium, Morocco, Finland, Russia, Brazil or Japan, totaling 22 states. In Spain, Fundación Telefónica has established it in Barcelona, after starting its courses in Madrid in September 2019 and a few months ago in the Basque Country and, soon, it will be in Malaga and Alicante. In fact, Barcelona is the 28th city in the world to have a space for a 42 campus.
The French school 42 shares with Barcelona "the spirit open to innovation, creation and equal opportunities in digitalization""Technology advances so fast that everything becomes obsolete in more regulated studies," explained one of the new students of Campus 42 Barcelona, Tristán, a university student who has chosen 42 Barcelona to complete his training, during the inauguration of the course. The event was attended by Carmen Morenés, general director of Fundación Telefónica; the first deputy mayor of Economy, Work, Competitiveness and Finance of the Barcelona City Council, Jaume Collboni; the president of Telefónica, José María Álvarez-Pallete; and the general director of Territorial and Social Impact of Knowledge of the Department of Research and Universities of the Generalitat de Catalunya, Xavier Quinquillà.
As a new student, Tristán added that the replacement of teachers by a method of self-assessment and cross-assessment among the students themselves "is very enriching", and expressed his satisfaction with a learning that follows an innovative project-based methodology, which uses gamification and peer learning, in which students learn at their own pace from each other.
Mònica, an architecture graduate who wanted to change her professional career, is also one of the 140 aspiring candidates selected from all applications, who are doing the first piscina, the final test for definitive access to the campus. For her, as she specified, the free nature of the course and an offer in new technologies that responds to her priorities has been essential.
The 42 Barcelona campus is also an opportunity for David, a 42-year-old TMB worker interested in computer science and a student of a higher degree in web application who wants to immerse himself in programming.
Of the first batch of 140 applicants for a place, 20% are women; 55% are from Catalonia, most from Barcelona and its surroundings, and the average age is 32 years.