With a tech skills gap remaining prominent globally, causing recruitment difficulties for tech companies, people learning to code are in need of a guide in the right direction regarding the most appropriate resources for their current skill set.
The 2022 Developer Survey from developer troubleshooting site Stack Overflow has found that learning to code online last year increased from 60 per cent to 70 per cent year-on-year, with younger respondents in particular opting for online resources – 84.95 per cent of under 18-year-olds.
However, the research also found the first and often most difficult challenge in a technologist’s learning journey is figuring out where to start.
To help solve this challenge, Stack Overflow, alongside Edtech platforms Udemy and Pluralsight to launch an Online Course Recommendations Module designed to provide personalised recommendations of learning courses.
Stack Overflow’s study found that a large proportion of users have already been turning to Udemy (66.5 per cent — the most popular platform for developers) or Pluralsight (22.4 per cent) to develop their coding skills.
Based on the user’s cookie preferences, courses will either be tailored to content visited on Stack Overflow; resources selected based on the content of pages accessed; or currently trending courses, with course recommendations appearing as an ad module on the right side of the page.
“Our research shows that the first, and often most difficult challenge in a learning journey is figuring out where to start, and then finding appropriate, trusted resources for your needs,” said Teresa Dietrich, chief product & community officer at Stack Overflow.
“We are very excited about our evolution from collective knowledge to collective learning, but it will take time. You’ll see us begin to introduce new capabilities on the platform for you to try, and we’ll update you as we leverage community feedback and user research throughout.”
Seth Hodgson, vice-president of engineering at Udemy, commented: “We share in Stack Overflow’s mission to empower developers and technologists through learning and skill development in the flow of work and look forward to helping the community take the next step in their educational journey.
“The new online course recommendation ad will help Stack Overflow users easily access specialised and relevant courses from our extensive catalog — right when they need them.”
Chris Tonas, CTO of Pluralsight, added: “Learning technical skills and keeping them sharp is critical for developers to build better and faster while also growing their careers.
“We look forward to partnering with Stack Overflow to provide online course recommendations for our developer communities, so they can discover purpose-built and immersive learning experiences to develop the skills they need to thrive.”
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Edtech trends for the near future — In this article, we explore the biggest trends that are set to emerge in the education technology (Edtech) space in the near future.
