Coded by Kids is throwing a benefit next week to celebrate its 5th birthday

Coded by Kids, the nonprofit, project-based youth program that teaches software programming, is celebrating its fifth year of helping young people prepare for careers in tech late this month with an awards ceremony.

In the five years since Coded by Kids’ launch, it’s focused on bringing tech skills to underrepresented young people ages 8 to 18 through workshops and classes, as well as hosted coding competitions for high schoolers and launched a student-run digital design and web development agency called Draft Studios. The organization will celebrate the milestone at a benefit Oct. 29 at the Cambridge Innovation Center.

“Starting with just one teacher, with one student, in one rec center, five years later we have reached 750+ students through 1000+ classes,” founder Sylvester Mobley said of the organization’s growth in an email.

The event will also be giving awards to folks in the community who have supported the organization throughout its run. City Councilman At-Large Allan Domb, technologist Mjumbe Poe and the School District of Philadelphia will be honored.

Tickets for the event are available here, and start at $40.

Earlier this year, the founder (and 2018 Philadelphia Award winner) said that Coded by Kids was undergoing a restructuring of how it carries out its coding education programs — and how they’re funded.

Traditionally, Mobley’s nonprofit worked with sponsors to pick a school or location to launch new programs. Instead, the plan moving forward was that the org would pick partners and locations based only on “what makes a good partner and what doesn’t,” he said.