Mvelo Hive Trust: Building confidence in young coders through Code Club

Mvelo Hive Trust, a global Code Club Partner, is a non-profit organisation whose mission is to enable marginalised groups and communities in Zimbabwe to gain access to education, technology, and skills through activities like Code Club.

Ruhee Shah, Global Partnerships Coordinator at the Raspberry Pi Foundation spoke to Blessed Moyo, Co-founder and CEO of Mvelo Hive Trust about their work and how Code Club inspires confidence in young creators.

From inspiration to a network of Code Clubs

Inspired by Africa Code Week, a digital literacy programme set up in 2015 to empower young people across the continent with essential coding and digital skills, Mvelo Hive Trust wanted to provide regular digital skills training, by offering consistent sessions through a network of Code Clubs. Their experience at Africa Code Week highlighted a significant gap: students in low-income communities lacked consistent, hands-on exposure to programming and collaborative problem-solving. There was no local space for them to regularly explore coding, troubleshoot, and develop projects. They noticed that many young students, despite their enthusiasm for creating games with Scratch, had little access to even basic coding tutorials.

“We wanted to equip learners with resources and digital skills that went beyond just learning how to code using Scratch, we wanted to provide lifelong learning in STEM and inspire the next generation to take up skills in coding.”
– Blessed Moyo, Co-founder and CEO at Mvelo Hive Trust

An insight into Code Club sessions

Since setting up their first Code Club only a year ago, Mvelo Hive Trust now reaches an incredible 350 learners each week in 8 different schools. Each session hosts young people aged 9 to 12 and is usually attended by educators who teach computing and digital learning. Blessed says the atmosphere is always energetic and supportive, as they focus on peer mentoring. They typically draw on resources from the Raspberry Pi Foundation and Code Club projects websites. The projects they use vary, including the introduction to Scratch projects ‘Space talk’ and ‘I made you a book’. Some clubs have begun to use more advanced Scratch projects like ‘Broadcasting spells’ and ‘Don’t fall in’.

Building confidence in young coders

Blessed believes creating a supportive environment helps young creators grow the confidence to continue building and experimenting. In their first session, creators begin with a simple, guided project like ‘Space talk’, which allows them to see their ideas come to life. By dragging their first blocks and creating a basic animation, students gain an immediate sense of accomplishment and self-belief.

“A student, Sthandekile Ncube from Baines Jr Code Club, arrived [to her first code club session] shy and hesitant. By the end of that hour, she’d animated a bouncing ball and helped a classmate debug their code. Weeks later, she volunteered to demonstrate her project to the entire club.”

Regular celebrations are also incredibly important in making sure young coders build their confidence. By giving out monthly certificates to recognise milestones, or ‘high-five’ walls to encourage peer-to-peer praise, the focus shifts from perfection to progress.

“At one celebration, Joelle Steblecki from Moray Code Club, received applause for her problem-solving champion certificate. Her beaming smile was contagious — she told us she finally felt ‘like I belong in tech’.”
– Blessed Moyo, Co-founder and CEO at Mvelo Hive Trust

Beyond Code Club

For the young people leaving Code Clubs, Blessed hopes that they carry with them a curiosity for lifelong learning, a capacity for creative problem-solving, and the confidence to experiment and “fail forward”.
Joelle Steblecki and Elton Muyambo, both from the Moray Code Club in Bulawayo, have already shown this. They represented their school at a tech competition with over 10 primary schools in Bulawayo, where their AI project earned them fourth place. Their success, and that of other young creators, shows that Code Club is a great foundation for future innovators, helping them explore potential careers in STEM.

What’s next for Mvelo Hive Trust?

With support from the city’s Mayor, Mvelo Hive Trust is actively working to expand its reach by establishing Code Clubs in the 29 schools managed by the Bulawayo City Council. They are also approaching local telecommunications companies to secure corporate partnerships and local funding, aiming to implement the Code Club programme across more schools.

Want to run your own Code Club? Find out more on how to get started.