Pytch @ Trinity’s START Festival for European Research Night

Last Friday, September 26th, Pytch was proud to be part of an inspiring event at Trinity College Dublin’s START Festival, marking the 20th annual European Researchers’ Night, a Europe-wide initiative designed to bring research directly to the public.

Across Trinity’s Front Square, the “Research Village” was filled with stands and hands-on experiments on topics ranging from DNA extraction and drug solubility to cancer research and computer science education.

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As part of the day’s activities, Pytch was invited to showcase how learning programming can be fun, interactive, and engaging. We displayed classic games built entirely in Pytch in an arcade-style setup, connected to Raspberry Pis with joysticks and buttons, allowing visitors to play the games directly and experience coding in action.

This setup gave visitors a sense of how Pytch combines learning Python programming with playful, interactive games by turning abstract coding concepts into something you can see, touch, and enjoy.

Research for Everyone and What We Do

According to Trinity News, Trinity’s Dean of Research, Professor Sinéad Ryan, described the festival as “a unique opportunity for our researchers to engage directly with people about what they do – and why they do it.”

At START Festival, we were excited to highlight the importance of Pytch as a free, web-based platform designed to make programming more accessible by bridging the gap between Scratch and Python. By combining familiar visual elements with real Python code, Pytch makes the transition to text-based programming smoother and less intimidating, supporting young learners as they begin their coding journey.

Thanks to Research Ireland, Pytch remains completely free, with no paywalls. Learners can open a browser, start coding immediately, and save projects locally or to Google Drive. The platform also offers structured lesson plans, workshop resources, and ongoing collaborations with educators, ensuring that it continues to evolve to meet classroom and student needs.

We believe that programming should be for everyone. Our mission is to lower barriers to learning code, spark creativity, and build confidence, helping students turn curiosity into knowledge and ideas into projects.

Thank You!

A big thank you to Trinity, RCSI, and all the organizers of START Festival for allowing us to share Pytch with students, teachers, and curious visitors.