I thought this was pretty cool. Homeless man offered choice of $100 or coding classes.

Borla · Aug 24, 2013

NYC Engineer Wants to Help Homeless Man With Software Coding Classes - Yahoo!

Patrick McConlogue is a lot like the many others working in the New York tech scene. Every morning, he walks to work, passing a few homeless people on the streets, and then spends the rest of his day at a computer, writing software code for a 35-person startup.
But the 23-year-old engineer didn't think those two parts of his day had to stay separate. Earlier this week, he made an offer to one of those homeless men.
"I walk by a homeless guy every day on the way to work and I get this feeling every day that he is a smart guy -- he has books and he writes," McConlogue told ABC News. "I was trying to think of a way to engage him and help him."
McConlogue approached Leo, a 36-year man who lives on the streets of lower Manhattan, on Thursday and gave him two options.

The first was $100 in cash.

"I figured that was enough for a ticket some place or a few meals, if that's what he wanted," McConlogue said.

The second option on the table was a laptop, three JavaScript books and two months of coding instruction from McConlogue.

After hearing the offer, Leo, who McConlogue described as very articulate and gifted, especially in on the topic of environmental issues, decided to take the coding option.
"I want to spread knowledge and information about climate change and global warming," Leo told ABC News in a phone interview facilitated by McConlogue.
Soon, McConlogue will deliver him a Samsung Chromebook with 3G connectivity, three JavaScript books, a solar charger for the laptop and something to conceal the laptop in. He will spend an hour before work every morning teaching him the basics of software coding.
McConlogue began documenting his plans to help Leo on the blogging platform Medium earlier this week and has seen a mix of reactions.
The technology community, in particular, was critical of his first post, which was titled, "Finding the unjustly homeless, and teaching them to code." Many commenters criticized McConlogue for using the word "unjust," which he admitted was a poor word choice.
Still, some writers heavily criticized McConlogue's effort beyond that.
Techcrunch editor-in-chief Alexia Tsotsis said McConlogue was "tone-deaf" and that his plan demonstrated "a profound cluelessness about poverty and the disenfranchised."
Slate's Matthew Yglesias argued that housing, not coding, is the first step in fixing homelessness.
Then, Slate's Will Oremus called him a "naive techie."

But along with the critics, there were those who supported his effort. More than 1,200 people have liked the "Journeyman" Facebook page McConlogue has set up about the project and he said he has even heard from some previously homeless individuals who see the effort as useful.
Leo himself, who is aware of the online chatter, said that he is understanding of the criticism. "It's America, people have the right to have their opinions," he said. "It's the Internet, people have the right to post what they want. I agree to disagree." When asked about housing Leo said that he thought "housing was great for people who want to be put in housing, for people who want and need it."
Ultimately, McConlogue says he is offering what he can right now to help.
"Being able to code will help him do some of the things he wants to do," McConlogue said. "The negative feedback is that you should give him housing and food. My thought is that technology will do a better job connecting him, in the long term, to what he wants."
McConlogue plans to keep blogging about the experience on Medium and Leo himself will write the next post. He said he doesn't have plans to do anything with the larger homeless community at this point, however.
"I've tried to build products for the many before, but I wonder if this new generation is building projects for the power of one," he said. "I am going to do a really good job with this guy. I will learn from him, maybe even more than he learns from me."
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I think that was a creative and generous offer on McConlogue's part. He obviously was correct in sensing that Leo had some potential and I think he did a pretty cool thing in offering to help him learn to code, let alone giving him the Chromebook and supplies. And he's giving something that is most valuable, his time.

I was a little surprised that people are criticizing him for this, saying he should give housing to homeless before something like this. Hopefully what Leo learns (and let's be real, from the attention this story may garner) will benefit him enough so that he can land a job and be better equipped to take care of himself. I understand that providing housing for the homeless is a more basic need. But most people in McConlogue's shoes do nothing, or maybe drop some change in a cup on rare occasion to appease themselves. I think it's awesome what he's doing, and I hope it works out for them both.

Fremen · Aug 24, 2013

After hearing the offer, Leo, who McConlogue described as very articulate and gifted, especially in on the topic of environmental issues, decided to take the coding option.
"I want to spread knowledge and information about climate change and global warming," Leo told ABC News in a phone interview facilitated by McConlogue.
Click to expand...

What I first thought of when reading that^.

I think the idea is sound. It's like the "teaching a guy to fish" saying.
Like in the article, I'm not sure if getting the guy a home first is the best step. With a way to pay his own way, he'll hopefully handle his future better.
Hope everything turns out well for these two.

ASU2003 · Aug 24, 2013

I would choose to be homeless over coding for someone else again...

Bodkin van Horn · Aug 24, 2013

I think it's admirable in the individual case here. But I think criticisms are warranted with respect to attempts to extrapolate this story of individuals into a narrative about homelessness in general. This story feeds into the notion that homeless people should just get off their asses and learn new skills, which ignores the reality of how people become homeless, what services are available to homeless people and whether employers are willing to employ homeless people.

Plus, there's totally this facile notion amongst the techonorati that technology can solve all problems. Like if we could somehow build an app for homelessness, then it would go away.

snowy · Aug 24, 2013

Bodkin van Horn said: ↑

I think it's admirable in the individual case here. But I think criticisms is warranted with respect to attempts to extrapolate this story of individuals into a narrative about homelessness in general. This story feeds into the notion that homeless people should just get off their asses and learn new skills, which ignores the reality of how people become homeless, what services are available to homeless people and whether employers are willing to employ homeless people.

Plus, there's totally this facile notion amongst the techonorati that technology can solve all problems. Like if we could somehow build an app for homelessness, then it would go away.
Click to expand...

Yeah, this is what I was going to say. It completely ignores structural poverty. We can teach people to fish all we want, but if there are no fish, then what do they eat? Their coding skills? Additionally, there are no SNAP benefits for people without addresses.

Borla · Aug 24, 2013

While I agree that it would be better if we could permanently end homelessness, I think it's admirable that a 23yr old guy is willing to give an hour of training every single working day for two months, and $300-500 worth of goodies to a homeless stranger. It is far more than almost anyone else in society is willing to do. Not a lot of people will give 20-30 hours/month of their time in volunteering.

Borla · Oct 2, 2013

I stumbled across an update to this story today. The classes have went well. Leo is about to publish his first app, which focuses on global warming and the author thinks is a viable app. The day after the interview he was set to have a meeting at Google. He and Patrick have become buddies. I hope he has great success with it.

Video: Leo, the homeless coder, speaks.

When I first read Patrick McConlogue's post on Medium about a month ago—titled "Finding The Unjustly Homeless and Teaching Them to Code"—I'll admit I was skeptical. McConlogue wrote about the homeless man he sees on his way to work each day. He has drive, McConlogue assures the reader. So the 23-year-old Manhattan-based programmer comes up with this:

The idea is simple. Without disrespecting him, I will offer two options:
1. I will come back tomorrow and give you $100 in cash.
2. I will come back tomorrow and give you three JavaScript books, (beginner-advanced-expert) and a super cheap basic laptop. I will then come an hour early from work each day—when he feels prepared—and teach him to code.
Who is this guy? I thought to myself, scanning the rest of the article. It would make more sense to give them food, or housing options, right? Than code? Sure enough, I wasn't the only person who felt that way. The masses were quick to scoff at McConlogue's idea. "Homelessness Solved" was Valleywag's headline.

I called McConlogue on the phone. "Do you know everyone is snarking on this?" I asked him. He did. "I regret the words I used in the title," he confessed. It's an old adage: Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime. McConlogue told me he wanted to test the theory, not for his own personal gain or notoriety, but because he, for whatever reason, believed this particular homeless man would want to take the challenge.

He told me he was going to approach the man the next day, and I told him to keep me posted. "The homeless man (Leo) is going to learn to code," McConlogue announced the next day on Medium. I called him again, and told him to contact me in a few weeks if this was still going on. I wanted to see this experiment in action. Sure enough, with Leo's permission, McConlogue invited me and a film crew to come to a coding class this past Monday, which marked the halfway point of the eight-week period McConlogue allotted himself to teach Leo how to program.

I showed up at a rogue park on the West Side on what NY1 later announced was the coldest September morning since 2000. McConlogue and Leo approached me shortly after and while the video crew prepped for the interview, I sat with Leo for 20 minutes and told him about the kind of questions I'd be asking him. I wanted to know the basics, I explained, but of course, if anything made him uncomfortable, he didn't have to answer.

We shot the breeze for a little while. He told me about losing his job at MetLife back in 2011 and being priced out of his neighborhood when a high-rise full of luxury condominiums was built a few blocks from his apartment. He told me something I already knew: New York City is expensive. Whether his story of homelessness goes beyond that brief explanation he offered or not, it's an indisputable fact.

He told me what it was like when McConlogue approached him with the two options. I asked if he hesitated at all, or if McConlogue pushed him to choose to learn to code to help him prove a point to his critics. "I can go through $100 in a few days. In a week," Leo said. "But he told me I could have a laptop and learn how to do something and I figured it could turn into something more." He gestured to the city surrounding us. "It's not like I don't have the time to learn to do it."

Leo told me how each weekday, McConlogue comes to Leo's regular spot for an hour, usually around 8 a.m., and they dive right in. He started telling me about JavaScript and a site called Nitrous.io and how he can write 50 functions and maybe only two of them could be error-free. Leo spoke so confidently that I kept stopping him to make sure that he had only learned about coding—in any respect—just a mere four weeks earlier. "Yeah! I mean, I thought 'coding' was something that went over like, a dessert," he told me. (He meant "coating.")

In four weeks, the two men had worked together to start building an app; one that is projected to be completed at the end of the eight-week run. Like any good entrepreneur, Leo wouldn't let me talk about the app here, but I assure you, it's a great idea, and focuses on Leo's big interest in global warming and climate change.

When McConlogue leaves to go to work, Leo spends 3-4 hours on his own, practicing writing code and reading one of the three JavaScript books McConlogue gave him alongside a Samsung Chromebook. He charges his laptop at what he told me was a "fancy building where everyone was happy to let him get power" and he also has a WiFi hotspot gifted to him by McConlogue.

As we were shooting the interview, we had to stop a few times. Honking trucks, construction, the sun in our eyes. While we became easily frustrated by the soundtrack of the city, Leo remained unfazed. After all, these conditions are the mainstays of his environment. Imagine learning something new. Now imagine having to learn it in the middle of a construction zone.

Once I learned all about the business side of things, the pair (who, by the way, have inside jokes and act like old friends), told me they were going to Google the next day to do a live Hangout video chat with the tech blog Mashable. "What's the Google office like?" Leo asked me earnestly. I told him I had never been there and he was shocked. The idea that he was deemed important and interesting enough to be invited to Google's offices—and it wasn't something that everyone does on the regular—was unfathomable to him.

But really, I needed to know how Leo really felt about all of this. Did he feel like a pawn in someone's game? Did he feel like he was being treated like a stepping stone for McConlogue to get his 15 minutes in the spotlight? Did he even like coding? Did he know what Mashable was? Leo just laughed. "I don't really care about all that, what do I care? I'm learning something, right? I know I'm learning something and that's what I care about. Patrick's my man," he told me.

Most importantly, Leo wanted me to know that he wasn't miserable before McConlogue came along. Patrick, to him, was not a knight in shining armor, but rather a person who looked beyond the stereotype of homelessness and offered him a chance. He had never thought about coding, he admitted; he didn't even know what it was until a month ago, but "it's really hard to convince people that you are not a bad person, or a drug addict or a crazy. How are you gonna do that when you are homeless, and that's how the homeless are depicted? It's not always a negative thing but people don't know that."

"My life had good moments before this whole thing," Leo told me. "And all I think is now maybe learning how to do something new will give me more opportunities to have more good moments."
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Borla · Dec 10, 2013

The app hit today.

Leo the Homeless Coder Finished His App, and You Can Download It Right Now - Yahoo Finance

I'm guessing my use of it will be "rare to never", but I'm going to buy it just because.

snowy · Dec 10, 2013

Borla said: ↑

The app hit today.

Leo the Homeless Coder Finished His App, and You Can Download It Right Now - Yahoo Finance

I'm guessing my use of it will be "rare to never", but I'm going to buy it just because.
Click to expand...

It's a dollar. I think it's worth it.

rogue49 · Dec 10, 2013

Awesome.
You code, you can get paid.
You design, you can really get paid.

At a buck a pop...and the news noting it nationally, he'll make some.
Only question is he can handle it after the fact.

I think the key is...that he took the help...and then he followed up with it.
I can tell you quite a few get offered a gift...then don't do anything with it.

I wish him the best of continuing returns.
Keep rockin'

Herculite · Dec 10, 2013

Spiritsoar · Dec 10, 2013

Is it sad that the first thing that came into my mind as I saw this guy's success is that I know it will cause the commentary "See? This is how the 'insert thing here (church, organization, country) should be helping people, not with all those obama welfare benefits"? It is, it's sad, because I know it's true without even looking.

Herculite · Dec 11, 2013

The problem with most approaches dealing with the homeless is they seem to assume that the homeless aspect is due to some external factor and not the fault of the person who is in fact homeless, or as we used to call them "bums".

Even with mental illness out of the equation, many just make very poor life choices. Learning a skill is great, but I'd guess that most would still continue to make poor life choices.

Charlatan · Dec 11, 2013

Arguably there are many people who are not homeless who also make bad life choices. Some just have a bigger safety net than others.

Herculite · Dec 12, 2013

Charlatan said: ↑

Arguably there are many people who are not homeless who also make bad life choices. Some just have a bigger safety net than others.
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Which is true but what does it matter?

Charlatan · Dec 12, 2013

Herculite said: ↑

Which is true but what does it matter?
Click to expand...

About as much as your comment mattered. Not a bit.

Herculite · Dec 12, 2013

Charlatan said: ↑

About as much as your comment mattered. Not a bit.
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Mine was directly related to the idea of teaching a skill to a homeless person as a way to get them "out of the gutter". A lack of skills is not why they are in the gutter.

Spiritsoar · Dec 12, 2013

Herculite said: ↑

The problem with most approaches dealing with the homeless is they seem to assume that the homeless aspect is due to some external factor and not the fault of the person who is in fact homeless, or as we used to call them "bums".

Even with mental illness out of the equation, many just make very poor life choices. Learning a skill is great, but I'd guess that most would still continue to make poor life choices.
Click to expand...

Estimates are that about 40% of homeless men are veterans. So I guess the poor life choice was to serve their country. I won't argue that some poor life choices probably cause people to fall into homelessness, be we don't as a society make it very easy to climb back out of that hole.

Herculite · Dec 13, 2013

Spiritsoar said: ↑

Estimates are that about 40% of homeless men are veterans. So I guess the poor life choice was to serve their country. I won't argue that some poor life choices probably cause people to fall into homelessness, be we don't as a society make it very easy to climb back out of that hole.
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Joining the military doesn't make one a hero or special, its what you DO in the military that does. I'm not sure where this idea of all military members are "heroes" but it cheapens the meaning of the word. Until the over used "everyone's a hero who serves" meme of the last 10 years, the military was known as a place for lifes losers to go because they wouldn't turn them down and provided all the basics.

If a guy is homeless because he is a combat vet suffering PTSS then by all means they deserve help from all of us. If the guy was a cook at Fort Polk, then yea whatever.

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I thought this was pretty cool. Homeless man offered choice of $100 or coding classes.

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I thought this was pretty cool. Homeless man offered choice of $100 or coding classes.

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Fremen Allright, who stole my mustache?

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