CodePath will expand its technology education programming for students at three Miami-Dade County colleges after receiving a $2.25 million investment from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.
The Miami nonprofit provides free software engineering courses and career services to help college students land jobs in the tech sector after graduation. CodePath has served about 10,000 people in the four years since its launch, 70% of whom come from Black, Hispanic or low-income backgrounds.
"Through our Knight partnership, we will serve and attract college students to join our tech movement and create a larger, more diverse talent pipeline for employers," said co-founder and CEO Michael Ellison.
With its new funding, CodePath will double down on its programming at Florida International University, Miami Dade College and Florida Memorial University, a private historically Black university. The nonprofit builds on students' existing computer science curricula to prepare them for competitive internships, train them for in-demand roles in fields like cybersecurity and web and mobile development, and place them in software engineering roles at prominent technology companies after graduation.
Despite its demographic makeup, South Florida is not among the the country's most diverse tech labor markets, ranking below metros like Pittsburgh; Nashville, Tennessee; and Charlotte, North Carolina. The region does, however, lead the nation for diverse technology graduates, according to CBRE, which reports 68% of South Florida's tech graduates in 2020 were either Black, Hispanic or from another minority background.
But most of those graduates were men. Only 20% South Florida's 2020 tech degree graduates were women, making it the fourth-least diverse market in the U.S. when analyzed by gender.
The CodePath investment is the Knight Foundation's latest effort to connect locals with jobs in Miami's booming technology ecosystem. Earlier this year the foundation gifted $510,000 to four local organizations – including The Shrimp Society and Haitians in Tech – committed to empowering local tech talent.
“Miamians are talented, full of grit and determination. Increasingly, they seek to bring those attributes to careers in tech,” said Raul Moas, the Knight’s Miami program director. “By investing in CodePath, we are investing in the aspirations of Miamians and key educational institutions which enable our community to succeed."
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