 So as we all know Finland as every other country in the world needs more coders And I'm sure all of us here at slush Can certainly feel the pain. So I won't spend much time talking about this particular challenge But maybe just to throw one example out there It's been estimated that all of us together here Could hire anywhere between 7000 to 9000 new coders right now and This figure is growing by thousands every single year So it's a big problem But I do not think it's the biggest problem. I Don't think we should only be talking about the quantity of the coders We should have also a discussion about like who is coding for I Think the bigger challenge actually is that we have this very simplistic view About who is coding for? We think that it's for these geeks with math geniuses who are often boys and Unfortunately because of the simplistic view Many many people who would be amazing coders Never even give it a try To illustrate the size of the problem Try to imagine a world Where all the books would be written by males and Not just by males, but a certain type of males. I Mean how many great books would not have ever been written in that type of a world? And that's the world that we're living in if you think about the software industry So if I think about the coders at Supercell I Think about coding very differently For us coding is about creativity, it's about problem-solving It's about teamwork. I mean no one no single individual can bring develop these products anymore It's about working in team What really is makes a great product is a great team So it's pretty clear to me that what we need is that we need more people from all walks of life To get into the coding. There's a massive massive opportunity and potential here and By way if we are able to do that that would also help us solve the numbers challenge So last year I heard about this crazy idea On how to solve a challenge So this photo is is from a school in Paris. It's a coding school. It's called 42 It's been founded by a legendary local entrepreneur and a philanthropist Xavier Neil and What's amazing about this school is that they have no classes They have no books and Most interestingly they do not have any teachers instead People and the students they learn coding by doing these very practical coding assignments together They instead of learning from teachers. They learn from each other Also, what's very cool about this cool is that it's for everybody Anyone can get in you don't need to have a degree What they have is this online test That measures your problem-solving skills your logic skills and your Creativity and if you do well on the online test and anyone is free to try then you get invited to the first phase of the school So this school has been around for a for a few years and the metrics are unbelievable As a starting point half of the people who get in they have no background What so ever in coding they can't code Despite that in a few years 100% of these students get jobs from tech get coding jobs and Probably like what's even more interesting for this audience here at slush is that 30% of these people become entrepreneurs Oftentimes With the people that they met at the school and they work together on these assignments It's really hard to describe the school if you haven't visited it But my is when I walked in my sort of own personal first impression was that I like wow I've never Felt energy and passion like this At least not in a school for sure and it actually Reminded me a lot about Some events that we have here it reminded me of slush It reminded me of junction and maybe assembly that we have here in Helsinki and And certainly didn't feel like a school and my immediate thought back then was that a Man we just have to bring this concept to Helsinki and then I start to talk about a talk to Xavier about this idea and and he was so supportive and And so helpful and he actually like offered all of this all the software or software Assignments the curriculum that's behind the school. He offered all of those for us and actually for free So I'm so excited to announce today that we are bringing this coding school to Helsinki and it will be called hive Helsinki If you love finding patterns If you want to fix what's broken If you're ready to rewrite the world Then let's set you on the right path If you don't know code yet you want a school that's like no other if you want a future-proof career if you can dream it Then you can code it hive Helsinki Thinking right now like why did why on earth did we decide to call it hive? Well to us hive is this place where young people from all walks of life Can get together they have a common goal They were work divorce it and they learn together like they together they form a movement and It's just a bigger thing than just a school. It's a movement. So how are we gonna do this in practice? first of all We will form a foundation a non-profit foundation Supercell will be funding that for at least for the first five years. We've estimated that it's gonna be an Investment of roughly 8 million to 10 million euros for us and then later on we hope that Our companies and also the public sector perhaps after that five years also joins us in funding the school The online test will go live in January next year and then the school will open in August And as a first phase we are gonna take in hundred students and others with the scope the goal is to scale it very further As we go along the one thing that I really want to emphasize here Is that I would hope that people wouldn't see this as a supercell initiative? I mean we did not form this school to be able to hire new game coders for ourselves like For us this is a kind of philanthropic effort And how we would like to see this at this school belongs to everybody it really belongs to the whole community for all of us here and That's why we also wanted to set up the independent foundation and Obviously the foundation has also an independent board and just so happy to introduce you to the board And it's amazing the type of people that they got in Starting from a chair woman Linda Lucas who I don't believe needs any type introduction for this crowd We have Yaku Lehtinen many of you guys would know him from Alta University from MIT from Nvidia We have the Rozilla who's a supercell representative bringing in the industry perspective and especially the creative industry Prospective a long-term gain deal of a veteran who's done an amazing amazing job in leading this initiative at Supercell And then finally we have better a component a serial entrepreneur an investor from lifeline ventures again A very familiar face and name for many of us here as I said the school belongs to all of us and And I'm just so I've been so thankful about the number of people who've been helping us to get the school started And I just to give you an idea here are the companies who've already signed up as Partners and what they will do is that they will offer internships for the students And we've also been very very happy about the support and the cooperation with city of Helsinki And just being just so so humbling to see the kind of amount of support from all around to from all the people We've talked about this initiative And to give you an idea about the people who've been like helping us and and who've been around this Let's look at this quick video There is a high demand for skilled coders and this demand is increasing all the time That's why we must invest in technology and coding education in Finland Well, first of all Hive is a proven concept from Paris and the Silicon Valley and other locations already But why I think it's a particularly good fit for Finland is that we have a Grassroots hacking culture that's old and thriving already Hive is a completely new way of rethinking how education should be done for For the coders for the creatives And I find it really gratifying to see that it's finally landing in Finland We need diversity in coding because coding is a tool to create things and to solve problems And every individual is unique and comes with a unique background So we need more different kinds of people trying to solve different kinds of problems I wish Hive will show how computer science can be a magical way of exploring and understanding the world I think the biggest misconception we have about computer science is that it's about studying the computer Whereas in reality computer science can be used to solve the big problems in the world those of energy or education or nutrition or health Well, there are a lot of things that I expect Hive to bring to Finland but maybe One thing to point out here is that I wanted to rattle the way We traditionally think about teaching and education Hopefully Hive will make people think and figure out new ways of Complementing the old methods So having a background as a hobbyist and self-taught Coder, I think the way Hive operates It really really resonates with me. I've I've had the privilege of working with incredibly driven People with who don't necessarily have the necessary skills from the start But who have the drive and willingness to to do what it takes and work together with others to to make big stuff happen and This is exactly the way Hive operates and it really really It really feels good. I think this is exactly how things should be done So I've said this before but I honestly believe that our community Is the strongest when we can set a common goal and then the all of us work to go towards That common goal and slush for example would be a great example of that So it doesn't belong to any individual person. It doesn't belong to any individual company It belongs to everybody and I really hope that Hive could become like one such thing like that our community Owns and I just wanna like express like huge huge Thank you to all the countless number of people and the companies who have been so helpful in getting this started And I'd like to propose a big round of applause for all of these people So as you know startups are all about people It's all about teams and I actually believe that the same is true about schools And at this point I'd like to invite to the stage to keep people behind the school Linda Lucas the chairwoman and Minna Kiwi helmet was a school director. Let's welcome them on the board So Minna, let's start from you. So you've had this amazing long career in the field of traditional Education and your previous job was running the computer science department in in Haga Helia. So you've been actually teaching coding So I'm curious like what on earth like made you take the leap running a school that has no teachers Aren't you a bit scared? Well, I have had two things in my life a working career that I'm very passionate about and those things are education and coding So when I first heard about this initiative, it was just before summer and I had a chance to go go into that curriculum and All the stuff that there is in the 42 in France and the more I read and the more I read I got more excited about the idea and actually I kind of didn't have any other choice then to take this leap of faith and Joined this great initiative But I seriously mean like the school has no teacher So I need to ask you this like what is it that you do? Well as a school director I think that there is plenty of stuff that I need to do But the most important thing is for me to be able to create an environment for the students To learn from each other to support each other and coach each other It is actually a typical example of a classical peer-to-peer learning concept So Linda as I just said you don't really need an introduction for this crowd But you've known for these books that teach kids Coding and get them to computers and and you've been very vocal and active in getting girls in general to coding So is highway girls school? No, it's it's a school for literally everyone all of the outliers All of the misfits all of the people who don't see themselves as computer scientists And I think the question that kind of got me excited about hi was the idea that what if Meena Kanth was a programmer what if army ratia was a programmer what if Tom of Finland was a programmer So I think hi is all about finding those people who have a curiosity and creativity to change the world with code So what do you think about the fact that? In high people will work on these assignments together. How important is that for you? Well, I think it can't be a very good programmer unless you can work with other people and we have these Misconceptions about computer scientists only working with computers But there is this really famous saying by a researcher called Edgar Dijkstra who says that Computer science has as much to do with computers as astronomy has to do with telescopes And I think that's what we're trying to show with hi that it's about learning to learn and not about learning one specific programming Language but learning like to think yeah, that's a great point if I think about the best game teams that we have at Supercell and they're all filled with like this proactive doers who I mean of course very great coders like many of them are But then also it's about those like team working skills and you know just getting stuff done as a group So I'm curious Linda like you visited the school in Paris What did you think of it? So I walk into the school and I feel it's Hogwarts meets the matrix and it's full of these like brimming excited young people from all walks of life and There's energy everywhere and there's people working together and not alone on their computers But actually in teams and the pedagogy is actually you'll talk more about that, but it's really hardcore computer science It's not about like easy-peasy things So they were really concentrating well and I got a chance to also meet some of the alumni of the school So Paula who was showing me around she was talking about like her peers in the group and how and what kind of things They went ended up doing and as you mentioned there were a lot of entrepreneurs A lot of people who work at big companies and most importantly people who came from all around France from different social economic And social demographic situations. They came from all over Europe also, and that's what we also wish to see in hive So you've also been an active Participant and member of our local sort of tech community and the startup community here How do you see something like hive like feeding into our ecosystem? I think it takes a village to start a school and Finland has as you mentioned being so good at starting these ecosystem projects And and yeah, I think hive will be really beneficial for us to work together But then also the rest of the world is really anxious and curious to hear about the Finnish tech innovations Within the gaming scene, but then also like other things we can offer for instance in the field of security So building the curriculum together What was your reaction when you can so we become a number of companies and name number of people who can want it to like chip in and help Here, I feel like you have a lot of work to do for the next five years at least probably yeah So Mina, let's talk about from practical point of view. So how does one get into the school? Can you talk a bit about the the process? So if you are between 18 to 30 you can apply and first you have to pass our online test Which is not easy. I tried it myself and luckily I caught in But nevertheless, it is not something that you do just like that and after you got This online test passed then we will invite you to the peace in and now I know that you are wondering what does that peace in means Well, it's French and it means swimming pool And the next question probably is for you guys. What does swimming pool had to do with the coding? Well, it is actually an entrance course. It takes four weeks and during that we can see all those students that are Motivated enough capable enough and willing enough to get into the school without no teachers Can you also talk a bit about curriculum? I believe we actually have a photo of it here here So to me I remember like when I first time I saw this this curriculum like it reminds me of an MMO game or RPG game and the game map, but you know, can you talk a bit about this? Yeah, it does look a bit like a board game to me as well And it is actually like that you start from the same position All all the students start from the same spot and then they continue With the same projects at first because those projects are mandatory, but when you go on then those options sort of spread to you and you can choose the ways that you want to do your coding studies and one really cool thing is that the Curriculum we can actually improve it ourselves from Finland the the France They are very excited to get Finland on board because we have so cool companies here like Supercell and we could You know create more projects about the gaming gaming area and we have for example f secure Which is very very known company in the security area and so on Yeah, actually I should add like, you know, there's lots of countries lots of cities like competing to get this cool And one of the reasons why Helsinki got it was it's the strength of the ecosystem So again, it's not about any one company But it's the fact that we have these nvds and fc cures and and other companies here connect who can actually Contribute to that curriculum so meaning that they can create more assignments for the students and that and of course We'll then give all of those assignments for all the other schools around the world as well Which are based on the same concept So it sort of benefits the whole network and I think that was one of the biggest reasons why we They're able to like sort of come jump the queue and and you know get in the pole position here Another example of how important the strong community is Me no one more question to you So the other crazy thing apart the school not having teachers is that you don't also get a degree What are your thoughts on that? Yes, actually the degree isn't the thing that makes you a good coder your knowledge and skill is what it what makes you a good coder But of course we do give you a diploma if you want that and We give you a study transcript of the projects that you have accomplished So in a way it is about the diploma and study transcript with you can prove your Your capabilities and skills to your employer future employer by that and one more thing That is probably out of interest for you guys is that if those students that want to continue to a traditional system later on It is possible that it's possible for them to to sort of a Get those degrees faster it is because of of the System that the traditional Education's have and it's Recognition of pre-learning I know that because of my background in haga helia and haga helia is very good in that That perspective like other other skills as well So it's about showing the skills you have learned and you get credit points out of that if you want to go to a traditional system so Everybody wins, but the one thing we need is trust from the parents I think the young people in the room are really energetic and excited about jumping the chance to apply to the schools But the parents in the rule need to trust that this system works and that your kids whether they want to be Ballerinas or biologists when they grow up they will find these skills useful and Employee be employed easily and so forth and this is a whole new way of teaching these skills So spread the world So unfortunately it looks like we are running out of time So maybe the last question to both of you So like if you would need to sum it up in just one sentence like what does make high so groundbreaking? It answers a question. We've been all asking for years and it do does it in a very pedagogically fun and exciting a new way and For me it is learning how to learn that is the most important thing we can teach to our youth All right, I want to close by asking everyone's help here. So I Said the online test Will go live in January the website is open right now and If you're under 30 you can apply and If you're over 30 The thing that you can do is that you can spread the word. I mean let's work together To solve this problem. Let's get more people into coding. Thank you very much