Perl 6 advocacy in education: first step, local schools

As a member of a local Linux user group (https://nwflug.org) and a
strong supporter of Perl 6, I floated an idea for a new community
project for the NWFLUG on the Perl Mongers list ([email protected]).
Following is the pertinent text of my original e-mail:

<quote>
I'm trying to get a good community project going for my local Linux
user and Perl Monger groups. After two years of trying to give an
award to a student in the local regional science fair, we are going to
try to have an annual coding contest with a twist: it will require
entrants to use Perl 6.
</quote>

I received several replies as shown in the following extracted quotes:

From Tony (<[email protected]>; <http://oc.pm.org/>):

<quote>
Tom, I create a monthly Perl challenge for our group. Perhaps it might
be something of interest.
</quote>

From Philip Hood (<[email protected]>; <http://ny.pm.org/>):

<quote>
jim keenan, from ny pm has started a working group that will meet a
few times up until the summer and teach each other perl 6 ... his
first meeting is later today, saturday, and below is a sample email he
has sent out ...
</quote>

Finally, from Mark Senn (<[email protected]>; <http://purdue.pm.org/>):

<quote>
If I were a K-12 high school student I wouldn't want to enter a
contest where I had to use Perl 6 unless it had a _substantial_ prize.
It might be hard for a kid to rationalize the time it would take to
learn Perl 6.
</quote>

Future plans
=========

Before I expand on my idea for our local area, I need to wave my hands
a bit on what I would like to see come to fruition in the Perl 6
community.  On the Perl 6 users list I mentioned that academia is
where I think the major potential is for Perl 6's immediate future,
specifically to replace Python as the beginning programming language
for CS students.  I believe that our local contest, in whatever form,
could become part of a competition hierarchy similar to the science
fairs in that local winners could compete in state and then national
competitions, with the whole program supported by the Perl Foundation
(PF) and perhaps the ACM (acm.org) and the IEEE (ieee.org).  With the
president wanting to throw megabucks into the schools to teach coding,
such a Perl 6 program would be a natural fit.

Local plans
========

General scheme:

+ obtain local school system support for our project

+ advertise our competition throughout appropriate grades (say, 7-12)

+ interested students must register for the competition by, say, one
month after school start (generally mid- to late-August here)

+ registered students would attend a session of introduction to Perl
6, the Perl 6 ecosystem, and Perl 6 Github resources

+ precise objective would be something like: code a Perl 6 module,
with complete test coverage and submit a pull request for it

+ registrants would be given a hard completion deadline of, say, 15
January of the school year

+ all successful (i.e., working and in proper form) modules would be
considered by local judges (nice to have: votes by Perl 6 devs and
users)

+ all successful students will receive an appropriate certificate of
accomplishment (ideally from the Perl Foundation, and signed by Larry
Wall)

  - winning students would receive a special certificate indicating
the winning positions

  - winning students would receive a cash prize from the local sponsoring groups

  - winning students would receive their awards in a local public
awards ceremony (ideally the same one where local science fair swards
are presented)

Logistics
======

Our local group(s) would raise the necessary money for cash awards.
Ideally, money would be filtered through the Perl Foundation so donors
could get a tax break.

Our local group will design the certificates (unless the PF can provide them).

Our local group is willing to contribute to the Perl Foundation to
support the project if it is interested.

Goals
====

Publicize the benefits of Perl 6 to local students interested in
computer programming or other scientific, engineering, or analysis
profession where competence with a scripting language provides an
extremely useful data handling tool.

Encourage students who may be interested in coding and are not nor
have ever been enrolled in a programming class.

Summary
=======

Some believe no student will participate is such a project because
there is not enough incentive, but I have seen our student population
a bit and know many are self-motivated if they are interested in a
subject.  Whether or not many participate, we are going to try
locally--any higher level interest will be a bonus.

I appreciate any constructive comments.

Best regards,

-Tom

<https://nwflug>
<http://niceville.pm.org>