Microsoft welcomes innovation and coding policy focus

Today, the Federal Opposition Leader, Bill Shorten announced that if Labor was to form Government after the next election, it would establish a $4.5 million grant program to fund initiatives that inspire girls to learn code.
The proposed grant program would support a range of industry-led or grassroots initiatives that have emerged to encourage young people, particularly girls, to explore coding.

It’s another good idea for stimulating the growth of Australia’s digital skills and innovation ecosystem, amongst a number of other ideas emerging from all sides of politics in recent months.

We need more young women exploring STEM skills, and particularly ICT careers. In Australia, women still make up only 20 percent of the ICT workforce, according to the Australian Workforce and Productivity Agency (AWPA).

To bridge that divide we need to inspire young girls to study computing and discover the rewarding career opportunities that exist in ICT and emerging digital industries.
Microsoft itself has developed a number of initiatives and tools such as the TouchDevelop platform, ITAcademy and #Wespeakcode, aimed at inspiring all young people to gain IT skills and explore digital careers.

Microsoft is thrilled that the policy debate in Australia is suddenly awash with ideas for supporting innovation, STEM skills and addressing the gender imbalance in ICT careers.

The Assistant Minister for Innovation, Wyatt Roy’s Policy Hack was a great initiative to generate ideas for stimulating Australia’s innovation ecosystem.

Our new Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull similarly helped inspire more than 700 school children to learn to code at our #WeSpeakCode event at UTS in May this year.

We look forward to working with all sides of politics on driving Australia’s innovation agenda forward.