I saw it on
the East African news headlines about the initiative One Child Per Laptop plan ready
working in Rwanda, oh not again I meant One
Laptop Per Child,
actually the first slogan is what the critic sees about the program they say is
just “getting laptops to the poor kids” . The project is aiming at educating
the young generation aged between (6-12) years old through computer believing that,
the teaching would become more efficiency, speed their mind and the way they
reason and prepare them for the fast growing tech world. The harsh reality
is that most of the kids are using for playing more than the targeted goal
which was for them to learn through the computers.
Fact, “More than 2.5 million laptops have been distributed in 46
countries since 2007 under the innovative initiative”. The effort is just great, but the
issue is that are the people to whom the digital devices “the laptops” provided to them prepared for the big changes? On the study made on Peru alone, Peru distributed
more than 800,000 low cost computers to the children across the country, is
among the most committed country to the cause. On the study done there on 319
schools in a small rural communities which were supplied the laptops the proof of their success is very low. The
critics believed that the government was not yet prepared when they dwell into
the program.
“In essence what we did was deliver the computers without prepare the
teachers,” said
Sandro Marcone, the Peruvian educational officer who now runs the program. The
study has found that no increase in math or language skills, no improve in
classroom instruction quality, no boost on time spent on homework, no
improvement on reading habit.
In Africa the
Rwanda, Ethiopia, Ghana and Sierra
Leone are the countries which are involved in the program. The
program seems to be promising in Ethiopia the reports said. Dutch researchers
from the University of Groningen, published last year in the journal computer
and education that the OLPC laptops have improved abstract learning. Ethiopia
received 5000 laptops from G1G1 program, Ghana ordered 10,000 laptops, Rwanda
received 20,000 laptops from G1G1 program while Sierra Leone ordered 5,000
laptops. Some industry stakeholders have been given they are thought about the program some
are suggesting the program would at least be more efficient in a country like
Rwanda whereby the population is small and recent they have been working
intensively to combat corruption. But the
questions that remain is, would the laptops survive the bureaucracy and hard Africa corrupted systems?
Practically
for some African countries, where the teachers are on strike day in day out due to the harsh working conditions, low salary and no bonuses, it is very
difficult for this kind of project to see through it purposes.
Hint,
One laptop per child (OLPC) is the project by the Miami based One Laptop Per
Child Association (OLPCA) and the Cambridge based (OLPC) foundation (OLPCF).
Two US nonprofit organizations set up to oversee the creation of affordable
educational devices for use in the developing world. The project was originally
funded by member organizations such as AMD, Chi Mei, eBay, Google, Marvell,
News Corporation, Nortel, Red Hat and Quanta.
The project
is just great on my perception with one condition only if “the
community stakeholders the teachers and the student are
prepared to receive the changes”
There is no
need of investing millions of money for something which is not going to work or
result seems to be far from expected one. Peru’s government spent $200 million
on this project and yet after five years there are serious doubts about wether
the largest single deployment of OLPC initiative really worth it.
On the
positive side of the program, the program has proven itself to be useful, there
is dramatic increase in computer access, abstract reasoning, verbal fluency and
student’s speed in processing information have been said to be high. On my
opinion the project should focus more first in making sure the stake holders a
prepared before starting to distribute the laptops directly. It is better to
cut down the buying cost and use a little to prepare them for the program
through seminars and events.
GreenTech360
@GTech360
Jumanne Mtambalike (gTech360) is a Software Engineer,IT consultant and Web designer based in Africa, currently living in Dar es Salaam Tanzania