Canada’s most populous city, Toronto, is undergoing a boom of coding schools. Workers disgruntled with high job churn are seeking to improve their prospects by learning to code. It seems to be working for them: one coding school states that 95% of its graduates are employed within 90 days. Boot camp coding and web development schools require no previous experience or background in computer science. The courses are brief when compared to university coding courses – a few weeks rather than a year or three – and are suitable for a quick career turnaround.

Drones come in different types and sizes. Anyone can buy a small one and fly it around their garden for fun. But to fly a commercial drone – bigger versions that fly faster, higher and longer and carry high-resolution video cameras – you’ll need a licence. They are, after all, small aircraft and can cause damage or injure people and animals when they crash, not to mention the dangers of invading the flight paths of passenger jets at take-off and landing. You need to know where and when you are allowed to fly a commercial drone to avoid trouble with the law.

80 students from all around the globe are displayed on a curved screen measuring 45 square metres. The lecturer is a hologram moved around the lecture hall by a robot. The students collaborate on documents and take part in simulations in real time. The professor uses artificial intelligence and big data to run simulations that test the students’ abilities. He or she has a rolling live feed of data on students’ participation, including their emotional engagement. There is no back row of seats where students can hide. Everybody sits front and centre on the giant screen.

Bletchley Park, a suburb of Milton Keynes in England, was central to World War Two intelligence efforts. Scientists including Alan Turing designed the first ever electric programmable computer there (Colossus) and used it to crack the Nazi’s Enigma Code. Bletchley Park is synonymous with British codebreaking and also now houses the National Museum of Computing.

There are hotels in Europe without any staff. You drive up and check in via a machine that issues your room key, the door unlocks and you go up to your room. Then you eat from vending machines, stay the night and check out, all without any human contact.

This concept has now been brought to classroom education. There’s a coding school – started in Europe, just like the hotels – that offers programming courses without any teachers, and does not issue any diploma or degree qualifications. It’s open 24/7, and it’s very popular.

We are all happy to consume innovative technology – but how many of us are interested in doing all the hard thinking and sums required to create it?