[rekode]

First reKode 'Cret!ve Gam!ng / Minecraft' Class in the US was a huge success! What a way to start the weekend :)

[rekode]

Need sleep!

We have been trying to find a balance between work and sleep for our last few days here at Techstars. Spending hours on end at the office gets you tired to a level you didn´t know you had but working at a goal this big makes it all worth it. There is though always someone to remind you how important it is to pack up early now and then and catch up on some sleep, a task that is easier said than done these days. This TED lecture is one of those things, listening to it will at the very least help you fall asleep as there is no better way to let you want to sleep as listening to someone talk about it with a soothing voice.....   ZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzz

[rekode]

5 days and counting!

With only 5 days, 16 hours, 44 minutes and 12 sec (at least when this sentence is written) to go the reKode team is trying to prioritise the work that has to be done. You can feel the tension in the air at the office as everybody are stressfully aware of how near Demo Day is.

Most sit with their faces glued to the computer screens, others are walking the hallways practising their pitch, some have time to chat and laugh at a silly joke or two, a few might be banging their heads against the wall but everybody are trying to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

We were brought breakfast and lunch today, that is always a welcoming treat at the office and not an everyday thing. It´s always good when someone else is taking care of filling your tummy when you don´t have time to do it yourself. 

Peace out people and remember, be kind to one another!

[annasiggan]

[rekode]

This is how our CEO rolls. 

[rekode]

A 13 Year Old’s Mission to Empower Girls in Tech

Olina Helga Sverrisdottir (13) just delivered her first keynote speech on self image and girls in tech at the GeekiWood conference hosted at Florida International University on September 27, 2014. Olina has an interesting background compared to many other 13 year old girls as she has been coding since she was 9 years old. Given Olina's background, she was selected as an ideal fit for this event. Olina was reKode´s first student, a program that uses a unique methodology built on proven studies in Psychology, Education & Technology to teach kids from the age 6-14 how to create, collaborate and code. 

Olina and Annie Hayward

Since Olina started, she began realising how helpful her coding skills could be in her daily life. Since she started coding she has gained more self confidence and Olina has better skills to evaluate information that she comes across on the internet. As we all know kids today are swamped with technology, and the reality is that they are consumers of it rather than creators and that is something Olina wants to change.

FBI Award Winner at 11 Years Old

Using her coding skills, Olina created an explanatory game that explained how important it is to follow certain rules on the internet as in real life. By doing so, at the age of 11 she won a coding competition called Alice Challenge run by the FBI and Carnegie Mellon University. She was also the runner up for the Digital Girl of the Year in Europe last year.

Tech Olina

Olina’s passion is to empower girls to explore the diversity that tech has to offer. She has started her own blog called techolina.com where she shares her experiences  and interviews experts in the tech field such as Megan Smith, CTO of the U.S. and Annie Hayward, Strategic Executive Consultant at SAP. To support her digital endeavours, she also created a Patreon site to raise money for her blog and future adventures. Currently Olina attends Redmond Jr. High School, and will be a fellow peer coach at reKode’s Kode Girls class this November at Lake Washington Institute of Technology in Redmond.

[rekode]

Creat!ve Gam!ng/Minecraft Classes

Check out our Minecraft classes starting this November in Redmond WA. 

Register before the 13th of October and get 15% discount.

At Creat!ve Gam!ng we use the highly popular game, Minecraft, as a tool to enable kids to create and build communities. Through the game we teach them how to setup and manage their own servers as well as how to protect their servers in order to be able to play in a safe environment. They also learn how to add modifications into the game and get a basic introduction to JAVA, which is the programming language that Minecraft is built on. Participants get a unique opportunity to connect with other players offline, while also learning important social and emotional skills through collaboration.

November 8th & 9th   Ages 6 - 10 , 9am to Noon  - Register Now  Ages 10 - 14,  1pm - 4pm  -  Register Now

November 15th & 16th   Ages 6 - 10 , 9am to Noon  Register Now  Ages 10 - 14,  1pm - 4pm   Register Now

December  6th & 7th  Ages 6 - 10 , 9am to Noon  Register Now  Ages 10 - 14,  1pm - 4pm   Register Now 

[rekode]

A visit from the other side of the world!

We were happy to welcome Hulda Bjarnadóttir the Chairman of the Board of the Icelandic Subsidiary Skema at Techstars NY. 

[rekode]

Kode G!rls - A Coding Course for Girls

Finally a code course for girls! We look forward to welcome girls at the age 10-14 to our tech course in Redmond.

15% Discount if you REGISTER NOW

At the course we will go through the fundamentals of coding and combine the knowledge of coding with self-image work. Words = Playfulness, cooperation and strength. This course has been especially designed by team of experts in Psychology, Gender Studies, Technology and Education with the mission to graduate tech-girls with clear and positive self-image.

Self-Esteem and Self-Image brought to a higher level

Experience has showed us that coding education can reinforce self-esteem and that girls who have learned how to code usually use that knowledge different from the boys. Girls at the age 10-13 are really open to work with their self-image and with the right education we can bring their self-image to a higher level. Girl’s self-image can fall rapidly at the teen age period (specially after the age of 13) and therefore it’s important to give them extra boost and strength before that time comes.

< Fellow Coach = Olina Helga Sverrisdottir >

Olina Helga Sverrisdottir is a 13 year old girl from Iceland, whose interests include coding, filming, editing, dancing and children’s psychology. She started to code when she was 9 years old, won a coding competition held by the FBI and Carnegie Mellon University when she was 11 and last year she was the runner up for Digital Girl of the Year in Europe. She has been working as assistant instructor and designer since 2011 at reKode, empowering girls to explore the wonders of technology and coding, and is now starting her own video blog. Now she has started her own blog to empower girls to Tech and is a frequent speaker both in Europe and the US!

One 10 Session Class - REGISTER NOW

Mondays < 4:00pm - 5:30pm > November 3rd, 10th, 17th, 24th / December 1st, 8th

Wednesdays < 4:00pm - 5:30pm > November 5th, 12th, 19th / December 3rd

[rekode]

The Clock is Ticking... 21 days / 23 hours / 54 minutes / 33 sec 

Time is moving fast and the Kaplan Techstars Teams are working their hardest to accelerate their businesses. When we feel like the time is almost running out and we have so much todo before we get on stage on Demo Day, it's so good to get a surprise like this one. Thank you Justin for sharing your relaxing tones with us and for giving us a great start of a day.

Hugs

-R

[rekode]

September is here! This is a big month of travels for us. Seattle, Reykjavik, Fort Lauderdale, back to New York. Team meetings will be held via google hangout and we suspect email traffic within reKode will reach a historical high. 

August was the month of connectivity, data gathering/processing, and big decision making. September will be the month of getting sh*t done. Talking to our customers, building our first center, getting processes in order. Oh, and we'll have big news to share in the days to come, so stay tuned!

[rekode]

It turns out that creativity isn’t some rare gift to be enjoyed by the lucky few—it’s a natural part of human thinking and behavior. In too many of us it gets blocked. But it can be unblocked. And unblocking that creative spark can have far-reaching implications for yourself, your organization, and your community.

Tom Kelley

[porchdog]

Ready? Set? Code....

Alexandra Jordan and Super Fun Kid Time finally got me to put some thoughts down re coding and its impact on youth culture. Who is Alex Jordan? She’s the nine year old fourth grader that dreamed up, designed, and pitched her playdate app at Techcrunch Disrupt the other day. Her (adorable) presentation and an interview are here. According to Techcrunch, she’s learning to code in Ruby and HTML with help from her father and Codecademy.

The bigger takeaway here is, as Mashable put it:

"Coding is 21st century literacy."

And it is permeating youth culture in a profound way. It is mainstream. It is cool. It is hip. And it is a really big deal.

Read More

[rekode]

We are feeling pretty good today. Started this brand new and beautiful week off by relaunching our website. Going back to the basics and then adding info on the Kode Squad and our coding courses in the days to come. Stay tuned!

Wishing you a week full of awesomeness, happiness, and optimism.

-R&T

http://rekode.com/

[rekode]

We now have three weeks of Kaplan Techstars behind us. Feeling overwhelmed at times, but mostly entrepreneurially optimistic. We have ambitions to experience the wonders of New York City, but postponing most of such endeavours as we have greater ambitions to do more faster and build a great company. New York isn't going anywhere. Opportunities, however, will not be available forever.

Cultural differences have become more apparent during our stay on the East Coast. Differences in communication styles, expectations, sense of humour, gender roles. Differences that we did not anticipate and need to adapt to. 

Now to the song of choice. Written by Robert Plant about Iceland (during Zeppelin's tour of Iceland, Bath, and Germany in 1970). "We come from the land of the ice and snow, from the midnight sun where the hot springs flow." Fall is approaching in Iceland with the sun setting at around 9.30pm, as opposed to it not really setting during the months of June and July. This is a nice consolation prize as the winter sun only graces us with its presence for around 4 hours during the darkest months. A very important balance between light and darkness. Part of Iceland's attraction.

With this I bid adieu and wish you a wonderful and sunny Sunday.

T

[rekode]

Big Cities - Small World Since coming to New York we have been reminded more than once of how small the world actually is and that first and second degrees of separation even happen in a city of 12 million people (as opposed to only happening in small countries like Iceland that have 370,000 inhabitants in total (yes, that's the whole country's population)). 

One of these connections happened last October when we attended the Women 2.0 Conference in Las Vegas. During one of the networking sessions we started talking to a team of awesome tech ladies who started a medium called MagikFlix that provides curated and safe video content for kids. After speaking to them for a few minutes we discovered a commonality - both our companies were based in Redmond, WA, a suburban city East of Seattle with a population of 56,000. 

Fast forward to today when Techstars Seattle announced this year's participants. MagikFlix is on the list of teams. So two startups from the very small (but very innovative) community of Redmond got into two different Techstars programs on different sides of the country in the same year. From Las Vegas to Redmond to New York and Seattle.

Serendipity is probably at play here, but I think we should also be looking at the size of the communities within communities - making them less intimidating to approach. Maybe the US isn't that different from Iceland, where everyone knows everyone by first or second degree connection. It's all about choosing a community within a community and seeing where that leads you.

Congratulations to MagikFlix and the nine other teams that will embark on their Techstars journey today. You've got a hell of a ride ahead of you!

T

[rekode]

As I was getting ready to check out of the NY Techstars office on a Saturday night to go to my new "home" away from Home, I remembered and thought of the Manual that has been my guide personally and professionally for many years. It's the "Manual for Climbing Mountains" by Paulo Coelho. 

Respect your body: you can only climb a mountain if you give your body the attention it deserves. You have all the time that life grants you, as long as you walk without demanding what can’t be granted. If you go too fast you will grow tired and give up half way there. If you go too slow, night will fall and you will be lost. Enjoy the scenery, take delight in the cool spring water and the fruit that nature generously offers you, but keep on walking.

Running a Startup is actually really similar to climbing a mountain. You need to respect your body if you are going to succeed. It's tough to do that when you think you need to be working 24/7 to succeed. My kiddos have always been #1, #2 and #3 and I have managed to take time off to nourish that relationship. It's actually because of them that I founded reKode and it's because they are so engaged in the business that I've been able to spend time with them and work at the same time. Now that I'm away from Home, and away from my little ones, I've been looking for ways to be closer to them even though I'm far away, other than Facetime and/or phone calls...

The solution was handed to me through one of the most inspiring, honest and motivational talk last Friday morning. Thank you Brad Feld for sharing. I've now bought a stack of envelopes, postcards and stamps to be ready for the next 73 days (according to the timer on the wall). The first postcards to my kids and my parents have been sent out and one will be sent each and every day until I get back HOME. This is a great way to get closer to your loved ones as well as to cherish the memories.

Photo by Martin Schulz.

Founders... You are in it for the long run so remember to enjoy the journey on your way up!

- R

[rekode]

It takes courage to enjoy it.

Every morning when walking to the office, usually when I reach around 33rd and 7th, I listen to this song. It has become a ritual. It's just so fitting. Björk, standing on a truck, singing her heart out about something important that's about to happen, in New York City, at the start of her journey as an international artist. 

What resonates the most about this song (leaving out the oh so catchy melody) is her singing about courage. When explaining her inspiration for the song, Björk said it was about having the courage to enjoy life while living on the edge.

To me, that's about showing up and being seen. Allowing yourself to enjoy different moments of life. Not resisting the feeling of happiness even when facing hardships. Being honest and calling yourself out when you step into the darkness of shame. Going into this journey with an open mind, saying to yourself that that worst that can happen is that you fail. But if you're going to spend 18 hours a day, every day of the week building your company, most of the time not knowing what's going to happen tomorrow, you better enjoy the ride.

"Vulnerability is the birthplace of innovation, creativity, and change." Brené Brown.

T