3rd place in the Business Ideas category

CodingPlatform
Andre Mühlenbrock

Programming skills are increasingly in demand in business and are therefore also an important part of education. However, the common approach of “bring your own device”, i.e. having students work on programming tasks on their own tablet or smartphone, often leads to problems. Due to the large number of different devices and operating systems, compatibility problems can quickly arise. The CodingPlatform developed by Andre Mühlenbrock from the University of Bremen is an educational programming platform for programming languages such as Java, C++ and Python that is aimed specifically at schools, vocational training colleges and universities. Companies that require programming skills as part of the application process can also benefit from it. This is because the CodingPlatform completely relocates programming to the web and only requires an up-to-date web browser and an internet connection. Thanks to the simple structure, students and pupils can fully concentrate on learning the concepts of different programming languages and do not fall victim to technical and hardware-specific problems.

Andre Mühlenbrock came up with the idea while working as a computer science tutor at the University of Bremen. He too sets his students programming tasks. “This is nothing unusual in computer science education” says the computer scientist with a smile. “That is why I was all the more surprised by the current market situation. There is surprisingly little on offer, and when there is, it’s usually just tasks involving games for recruiting in companies. A learning tool has been missing up to now.” This gave him the idea of developing a piece of software himself and marketing it. And the interest in his idea has proven him right. The coding platform will initially be used in university teaching, and Andre Mühlenbrock is already in contact with the Bremen State Institute for Schools (LIS).