Learning.com Supports Local Diversity with a Scholarship for an Aspiring Programmer

Learning.com has been committed to diversity, equity and inclusion for many years — well before I joined the company. But over the years our level of involvement in community-based work around diversity initiatives has continued to grow, and I’m proud to say it’s reached an entirely new level during the last year.

In 2016, Learning.com joined TechTown PDX, a collective of Portland-based tech companies committed to cultivate a more diverse workforce across the region. The TechTown community has been a great resource for us in our diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) journey since then. Quarterly sessions that bring together champions of workplace diversity from numerous local companies give us a space for ideation and information sharing while also keeping us accountable to the DEI initiatives in our companies and workspaces.

In 2020, Learning.com stepped up its commitment to workplace diversity by establishing an annual budget to support the DEI committee’s efforts. This budget not only helps to fund internal educational opportunities from book club purchases to bringing in speakers on DEI topics and hosting events, but also helps us to support DEI causes in our community.

When we learned about the Portland OpenPath program through a TechTown monthly session, we knew this was a great opportunity for us to put our dollars to work. Portland OpenPath is a community collective with the goal of bringing diverse voices and talent into the local tech and advertising industries. As part of that effort, they provide scholarships to the local coding school Epicodus, specifically to individuals from often overlooked communities such as Black, Indigenous, Hispanic/Latinx, LGBTQ, nonbinary and gender nonconforming folks, and women. Our DEI committee was able to sponsor one student’s coding course this year. Aligning the goals of bringing underrepresented youth into the tech field while also giving an amazing opportunity to someone in our community feels like a win-win.

We are so excited to be able to make such an important impact for an aspiring programmer and look forward to what is to come in 2022.

Sarah Trice is Learning.com’s HR Manager, and has been with the company since 2013.

Sarah Trice

HR Manager

Sarah is passionate about developing human resources strategies that attract, engage and delight customers. As HR manager for Learning.com, she fosters engaged cultures, supports collaborative teams, ensures policy and standards compliance, and aligns goals to business strategies.