The Apple Foundation Program gives learners an experience of the process and journey of creating an iOS app through learning design, coding, storytelling, and innovative thinking.
In July 2023, we mentored 20 high school young women for three weeks at the Apple Foundation Program (AFP) at UTS. We found out that we were the first AFP in the world to run this innovative Apple-designed program with an all-high school girls cohort.
The AFP worked closely with WiEIT and Apple in 2022 to identify the first school to be involved in the 2023 program. The young women came from East Hills Girls Technology High School, in Panania, NSW, one of WiEIT's partner schools who have participated in our STEM x Impact Outreach Program. A mix of Year 10s and 11s, these learners had minimal exposure to design and coding, but they were very inquisitive, articulate, and tech-savvy. Working in teams, they were first guided through the design phase where each team explored and decided on a ‘big idea’ that they wanted to work on. These young women wanted to grapple with different big ideas that included Self-Care, Innovative Education, Social Awareness, and Identity.
Students interacting in a scrum meeting.
Then, through a series of investigative and exploration activities, each team narrowed their big idea down to a focused problem that they want to tackle through design. After a series of creative and ideation activities, and the design of a series of prototype screens, we introduced them to the fundamentals of Swift, an open-source programming language created by Apple for building iOS apps.
Students with mentor troubleshooting a Swift problem.
Many learners found coding to be “surprisingly enjoyable” and not so overwhelming when we helped them to break the tasks down to smaller bits of coding activities that could lead to quick successes. These early ‘quick wins’ were important as they gave the students a sense of achievement and more importantly, they built confidence.
Students taking a break at Alumni Green.
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By the time the program finished, each team had something they can proudly show and even demo on their iPhones. In our exit survey, all of them said that they have been challenged and 90% of them said that the skills they have learned contribute to their future and future plans.