Admissions for the second batch of students at Abu Dhabi’s free, no-teacher, no-classroom coding school have opened. After welcomed 225 students to its Mina Zayed location in September, 42 Abu Dhabi is now offering an additional 1,000 places for budding coders. Traditional courses and teachers have been eliminated, and the school, which is open 24 hours a day, instead relies on peer evaluations, coding projects, and internships to keep pupils occupied. A student who completes the curriculum in three to five years is expected to become a programmer. “Coding is no longer in the future; it is now.” “The peer-to-peer gamified methodology used by 42 Abu Dhabi allows students to develop a unique repertoire of soft and hard abilities,” stated Leo Filardi, the company’s CEO.
He claimed the extension of the Abu Dhabi campus, the company’s first in the Middle East, was due to “exceptional demand.” In order to construct a knowledge-based, technology-driven economy, the UAE is focusing on developing and attracting coding expertise. In July, the government announced a partnership with a slew of tech behemoths, including Google and Amazon, to train 100,000 young people in computer programming, as well as the opening of 100,000 Golden visas — which grant recipients long-term residency — to entrepreneurs, business owners, and start-ups focused on coding. 42 launched its first school in Paris in 2013 and has since trained over 12,000 students worldwide in digital and business skills. Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey and Snapchat co-founder Evan Spiegel have both endorsed it.