You have to give Google some credit: There is no idea from its competitors that is too good to steal. And so it is now with the search giant’s latest educational push, which mimics Microsoft’s creators strategy and language.

“We need to cultivate a new generation of problem-solvers, storytellers, and creative minds to tackle our next problems at scale,” Google VP of Engineering for Kids and Families Pavni Diwanji explains. “It’s not just about coding and programming computers, it’s about helping students learn skills they’ll need to approach problems in a fundamentally different way across every discipline from business to engineering to the arts.”

Yes. Google has a VP of Engineering for Kids and Families. Let that one sink in for a few moments.

The Google post linked above is tied to Google I/O Youth, part of “a longstanding effort” to get ’em while they’re young. Or, as Google describes it, “to get more students excited about where technology can take them.” Almost 150 5th-7th graders from schools in the Bay Area are joining Google to sign their souls away. Sorry, “to explore activities focused on digital storytelling, inventing, science, and coding.”

Granted, there are only so many ways to describe an audience, and while I sort of cringe at the term “creators,” for whatever reason, it’s broadly descriptive and does neatly encapsulate the remaining strengths of the PC. Which is, of course, why Google is going for this particular jugular.

So, read the Google post, see what they’re doing, and think about how this compares to Microsoft’s recent push for both EDU and, at Build, developers. This is very much about Google trying to take down Microsoft.

Tagged with Google