MacKenzie Scott’s $2.5M donation to Philly’s Resilient Coders funds AI, business programs 

Donors of all sizes often show interest in coding bootcamp Resilient Coders, according to executive director Ayanna Lott-Pollard. 

So when an anonymous organization reached out earlier this year asking them to go through the months-long vetting process, Lott-Pollard thought it was routine. But when she found out it was philanthropist MacKenzie Scott’s fund Yield Giving and just how much money the org would get, she was overwhelmed with emotion. 

“I started laughing and I subsequently started crying,” Lott-Pollard said on Technical.ly Speaking, a monthly segment on WURD Radio’s “Reality Check,” hosted by Tonya Pendleton.

“It came at a very pivotal time for the organization … we’d just gone through our strategic planning process so there were a bunch of dreams on the board.” 

The $2.5 million grant is the largest donation ever received at Resilient Coders, which provides free upskilling for people of color who aspire to be software engineers. The windfall will help the nonprofit put its plans in motion, Lott-Pollard said. 

When Scott and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos divorced in 2019, Scott received 19.7 million Amazon shares. Since then, she’s donated billions of dollars to numerous charities and organizations, including through her fund Yield Giving.

Resilient Coders shared part of its strategic plan with the fund during the vetting process, but the org doesn’t have to submit a report to prove the impact of how the funding is used, Lott-Pollard said. 

The money supported hiring new staff members and expanded programming, including adding AI skills and entrepreneurial training programs to help students. The reserve of money will also help keep the nonprofit afloat long term, Lott-Pollard said.

The org supports building a workforce of diverse coders, from Boston to Philly

Resilient Coders started in Boston in 2014, upskilling Black and brown talent to become software engineers. Since then, the nonprofit has trained thousands of young adults to enter the tech industry, Lott-Pollard said. 

The organization expanded to Philadelphia in 2021 and has trained over 100 people and placed them into jobs with companies like Independence Blue Cross and Accenture. 

Students learn to code in languages like JavaScript and HTML, but they’re also taught how to adapt to new tech stacks so they can adjust to whatever job they get placed in. The donation from Yield Giving will help Resilient Coders train more students and place them into tech jobs. 

“We want to see them thrive and have economic mobility in our city,” Lott-Pollard said.

Students don’t have to have any experience coding, but many of them are curious about it or interested in technology, Lott-Pollard said. The program is for young adults between the ages of 18 and 30 from a low-income background. 

Many of the program’s participants have already entered the workforce and have skills from past jobs. Those skills help them be successful at Resilient Coders, Lott-Pollard said. 

There are two cohorts per year, the next one starting at the end of this month. Applications will open in a few months for the February 2025 cohort. 

Listen to the full segment to learn more about Resilient Coders.