The Code to Inspire school in Herat, Afghanistan.
The Code to Inspire school in Herat, Afghanistan.
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Code to Inspire trains girls to code and make games in Afghanistan

  • Posted byby Dean Takahashi
  • Updated
  • 12 min

Fereshteh Forough grew up as a refugee, but she learned to become a computer programmer. And she wants to give other Afghan girls that opportunity. So she founded Code to Inspire, a nonprofit that operates a school for female students to learn how to code at a school in Herat, Afghanistan.

The school opened in 2015, and it has taught more than 150 female students how to code. They find programming work in areas like web development, game development, mobile app development, and graphic design. So far, 25 girls have graduated from the program. The goal is to empower a new generation of female tech leaders who can contribute to a foundation for peace in the war-torn country.

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Written by

Dean Takahashi

Dean Takahashi is editorial director for GamesBeat. He has been a tech journalist since 1988, and he has covered games as a beat since 1996. He was lead writer for GamesBeat at VentureBeat from 2008 to April 2025. Prior to that, he wrote for the San Jose Mercury News, the Red Herring, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, and the Dallas Times-Herald. He is the author of two books, "Opening the Xbox" and "The Xbox 360 Uncloaked." He organizes the annual GamesBeat Next, GamesBeat Summit and GamesBeat Insider Series: Hollywood and Games conferences and is a frequent speaker at gaming and tech events. He lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.