In short: Lindiwe Matlali founded Africa Teen Geeks in 2014 to close South Africa’s computer science education gap. The organisation has since grown into the continent’s largest computer science NGO, now having introduced over 800,000 children to coding and robotics, and her story is a working example of what social entrepreneurship looks like in practice.
Why did Lindiwe Matlali start Africa Teen Geeks?
Matlali’s turning point came at a conference in the United States, where she watched an eight-year-old present an app she had built. “Computer codes are the backbone of the modern world,” she has said, and she wondered why nothing similar was happening in South Africa. Research into the state of computer science education gave her the answer: information technology was only taught from grade 10, and largely only in affluent schools. In 2014, she founded Africa Teen Geeks, a non-profit teaching schoolchildren and unemployed youth to code, to close that gap before it widened further.
How big has Africa Teen Geeks become?
What started as a single initiative has grown into the largest computer science NGO on the continent. The organisation has introduced more than 800,000 children to coding and robotics, built a STEM Digital Lockdown School that kept lessons running for children during the COVID-19 school closures, and trained thousands of teachers to deliver the curriculum themselves rather than depend on external volunteers indefinitely. Matlali’s own recognition has grown alongside it: she was named Queen Elizabeth II’s 86th Commonwealth Point of Light for voluntary service, sat as a commissioner on South Africa’s Presidential Commission on the Fourth Industrial Revolution, and won the Schwab Foundation’s Social Entrepreneur award in 2020.
What is the actual gap this organisation is closing?
Matlali’s work draws on Harvard’s “Lost Einsteins” research, which found that children from wealthier families are far more likely to become innovators, largely because they are more likely to meet one. Township children in South Africa are routinely excluded from that exposure entirely. “Ninety percent of the technology jobs we have didn’t exist ten years ago,” she has said, from social media roles to data science, and every profession now needs some level of technology literacy, not just careers explicitly labelled “tech.” Africa Teen Geeks also runs a Girl Geek Programme specifically because only around a fifth of ICT professionals in South Africa are women, and closing that gap starts with exposure at school age, not at the point of hiring.
How does the programme actually reach children?
Africa Teen Geeks runs free Saturday coding classes in partnership with the University of South Africa (UNISA) at campuses across the country, alongside workshops, hackathons and community outreach events aimed at both schoolchildren and unemployed youth. Younger participants start with Scratch and Python; older high school learners work through Harvard’s CS50 introduction to computer science and artificial intelligence. The organisation also partnered with the Department of Basic Education to help develop the coding and robotics curriculum for grades R to 9, training the teachers who deliver it in the classroom.
What does “social entrepreneurship” actually mean in practice?
Gus Silber, co-author of The Disruptors: Social entrepreneurs reinventing business and society, describes social entrepreneurs as people who combine a business mindset with a genuine social mission, refusing to accept that a problem can’t be solved just because no one has solved it yet. Matlali’s own answer is direct: Africa Teen Geeks isn’t her income. She founded and runs Apodytes, a VR studio, as her for-profit business, and treats Africa Teen Geeks as separately funded through sponsorships and corporate consulting, precisely so the classes can stay free. “Apodytes pays my bills and Africa Teen Geeks feeds my soul,” she has said.
What has running it actually taught her?
Matlali, who grew up an orphan raised by her grandfather on his pension, is candid that the road wasn’t smooth: “I got more no’s than yeses. Focusing and staying on course during the many painful disappointments taught me to master my emotions.” One highlight she points to often is partnering with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime to host a global hackathon in Silicon Valley, where her Africa Teen Geeks participants beat teams from the US, Bolivia and Indonesia. Her takeaway from that win: “It demonstrated that the difference between children from Diepsloot and Sandton is access to opportunity. We have no talent deficit in this country.”
Frequently asked questions
Is Africa Teen Geeks still active?
Yes. It has grown into the largest computer science NGO in Africa, having introduced more than 800,000 children to coding and robotics.
Are Africa Teen Geeks’ classes free?
Yes. The organisation is funded through sponsorships and corporate consulting specifically so that participants never pay to attend.
Who can join Africa Teen Geeks’ programmes?
Schoolchildren and unemployed youth, particularly from under-resourced and township communities, through Saturday classes at UNISA campuses and other partner venues around the country.
What is the Girl Geek Programme?
A specific track within Africa Teen Geeks aimed at getting more young women into STEM, addressing the fact that only around a fifth of South Africa’s ICT professionals are women.
Does Lindiwe Matlali earn a living from Africa Teen Geeks?
No. She earns her income from Apodytes, a separate for-profit VR studio she founded, and runs Africa Teen Geeks as a non-profit funded by sponsorships.
Originally published in May 2019. Updated September 2026.
