A paradise for hackers

The name 1337 centre comes from a system of modified spellings used by hackers and gamers to show their "elite" status

Khouribga: With its rows of sleek computers and ultra-modern study methods, Morocco’s 1337 campus is a dream come true for budding geeks, in a country where IT skills are in high demand.

Conceived as a paradise for coders, the centre offers project-based training on programming, innovation and building IT systems.Tuition is free and students largely create their own curricula. It all happens on a 24-hour campus reminiscent of Silicon Valley, complete with a canteen, graffiti art on the walls and games rooms offering swings and table football.

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“Everything here is incredible, starting with the teaching,” said Ismail El Mheki, who initially struggled to drag himself away from his screen to answer questions.On discovering the institute, which ran its first courses in 2018, he thought it was a trick — so his reaction was to hack the system.

After two years in Norway working for a cybersecurity firm, he took the entry test for 1337 and passed with flying colours.Before he had even finished his course, he was offered a job as part of the school’s IT security team.

“He’s very strong, much stronger than an old man like me,” said Youssef Dahbi, the school’s technical chief — who is in his 30s. The name of the centre comes from a system of modified spellings known as Leet Speak or “1337 5P34K”, used by hackers and gamers to show their “elite” status in online communities.

The institute works closely with 42, a French programming school created in 2013 by telecoms billionaire Xavier Niel and highly regarded in the tech world.

Fatima Zahra Karouach, one of the women who make up just 10 percent of the students, said the school was like “a big family”. “We have the same state of mind, the same lifestyle,” she said.

“No office hours, no constraints, no judgement,” she said. “In the city, everyone knows that 1337 people are different.”