What ICT projects are there out there in TWB-land?

So, I thought this might be better as a discussion thread rather than a comment on the group wall:

I work with international educators doing teacher training in rural Sudan. One of the schools we work with - the sole high school in a region serving about 10,000 students K-graduation - has a small computer lab but only two of the teachers in the school and region know how to use it. We have been doing training with the teachers of the region to enable them to use this resource to improve their insructional practice and to introduce them to and provide them with e-resources to support this. Before we began this program, all but a couple of the computers had been sitting in boxes, unused for more than a year.

I think this is a pretty common scenario and we are happy to be helping Sudanese educators work toward a fruitful implementation of a a previously irrelevant (and expensive) resource. Anyone out there with similar stories, suggestions for extending our work, or insights?

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Khanyiso on January 26, 2009 at 8:13

With great respect we are also servicing a large community of underdeveloped schools with difficulties as well as joyfull moments.
if you wish we could share ways of doing things and provide solid outcomes for these schools.

Permalink Reply by Noble Kelly on January 26, 2009 at 9:54

Hi Brad, yes you are right. You described an all too familiar scenario. Please check our discussion in the South Africa Project group and here are the resources we used for our ICT training and integration workshops: TWB ICT Wiki

I also have a set of lessons on how to teach computer topics without any computers. If interested, drop me an email and I will send them to you.

Permalink Reply by Sharon Peters on February 1, 2009 at 15:00

Brad, have you heard of the eGranary - http://www.widernet.org/digitallibrary/? Check it out - it may be something you want to explore and bring to Sudan as a bridge for the educators and learners who cannot yet get onto the Internet. We are going to try to explore ways of bringing this on our next visit to South Africa and Kenya.
By the way, would you have any photos or video of your work? My students are currently creating a documentary about Darfur and Sudanese refugee camps in Chad through a National Geographic photojournalist, and we would be very interested in hearing more about your work!

Permalink Reply by Brad Waugh on February 1, 2009 at 16:41

Sharon,

Thanks for the link. I do have a folder of pictures that I have shrunk to a reasonable size (28 photos taking up about 3.5 MB in total) so that they can be e-mailed out. Contact me at bwaugh@krtams.org and I will send them to you. Our project is not in Darfur in the west, but rather in the Merowe region north of Khartoum where the Merowe Dam is being built. There are similar concerns and pressures in the region because the drought (and dam project) are causing social pressures on the people living up there. The education project we are involved in is linked to a larger project trying to address these pressures and hoping to avoid a "new Darfur." I will upload a sampling of photos here. E-mail me if you want the rest.

Brad

Brad

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Permalink Reply by Sharon Peters on February 1, 2009 at 17:26

Awesome pics! thanks for sharing.... will pass on to my students. I envy you the work that you are doing. Would love to hear more, more, more!

Sharon

Permalink Reply by Dan Andrew Otedo on August 12, 2009 at 19:23

Hey Brad,
these pictures present a big contrast.The out door class looks like it has bullet marks on the wall. Cant believe that computer lab is somewhere in the compound.looks life the fellow who got it there is smart and really what he was doing! We have sometimes recieved refurbished computers that break down very often at the Suba Youth Resource Centre.This is a big lesson!

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