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Equator’s Paciencia Canda named ‘Scotland’s Coolest Techie’ in competition looking to dispel nerdy IT stereotypes

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By John McCarthy, Opinion Editor

March 25, 2015 | 2 min read

Paciencia Canda, an interface designer at Equator, has been crowned ‘Scotland’s Coolest Techie’ in a competition which will pit IT 11 gurus from across the UK against each other in April for the title 'UK’s Coolest Techie'.

The competition was organised by Daisy Group and UK charity Computer Aid International with the intention of challenging ‘computer nerd’ stereotypes and encouraging young people to take an interest in IT.

Canda’s role at Equator sees him work on tools to help with the creation of webpage animations. His interests in basketball and guitar also helped the 24-year-old take the topspot.

Canda said: “I think it’s a great opportunity to show what developers do and how interesting it is. You use a real range of skills, not just maths, and you have to be really creative. I think there’s probably a lot of young people who could have a brilliant career in IT but don’t pursue it because they’re worried about looking geeky, and that’s a real shame.

“Being in IT does not mean ‘eating and breathing’ code. We have time to do other exciting things, such as sports and travel. What we do in our spare time often helps us to do our job better because they too inspire us to develop fun and more engaging applications that people will want to use.”

Kids between eight and 15 years old will sit upon the judging panel with Bryan Glick, the editor of Computer Weekly, to pick a winner from the 11 finalists.

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