TEESSIDE University is to help teachers develop the next generation of computer scientists thanks to a grant from Google.

The University has been awarded $7,000 (about 4,500) to host an event to help secondary school teachers deliver vital computing skills to their pupils.

The award was given as part of Google's Computer Science for High School (CS4HS) initiative which aims to promote computer science and computational thinking in the school curriculum.

Computer science is becoming an increasingly important part of the school curriculum providing both a supplement and an alternative to the existing ICT subject.

The Government recently raised concerns about a lack of computer science in schools and many teachers are now retraining in order to offer both ICT and computer science, including computer programming, in their classes.

Dr Michael Ryding, the School of Computing's Head of Digital Enterprise, said: "There's plenty of evidence that there's a significant shortage of computer programmers not only in the North-East but across the country and as a School of Computing we want to do what we can to ensure that the next generation of computer scientists are equipped with the necessary skills."

The two-day event is planned to be delivered by staff from Teesside University's School of Computing at its Middlesbrough campus for up to 120 secondary teachers from local schools.

It will deliver bite-size learning of many key computer science topics including the internal components of a computer, logic, binary, hexadecimal and computer networks.

The course will probably run before the summer break. Details will be announced in due course.