Daniel Charles
Joined: Jan 7, 2002
Posts: 10 (view all)
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Gender & Age: Male & 35
Country: Canada
Province/State: Manitoba
City: Winnipeg
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Inspiration
March 27, 2002 - 11:48 AM
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There are so many stories of success coming through here. I just want to share this one with you.
Daniel
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"Help Mauritania Bridge the Digital Divide" [GKD]
Children of impoverished countries start their lives with bright-eyes and smiles on their faces. I have seen so many of them, 4 to 6 years old, with their beautiful smiles, facing the world without knowing what the future will be for them. At that age they do know know yet how their lives will be. A contrast with the faces of older children;
sullen, apathetic, resentful.
Will computers change their lives?
It is not computers that will change their lives. Rather the people that uses them to teach better.
A teacher at those rural places is only a little bit more informed than the illiterate parents of the children he is trying to teach. No pencils, no paper, no materials to teach, all they can do is tell the children what? tales of his limited life?
A computer opens the windows of wonderment not just for the children but for that teacher also.
Let me tell you what has been happening at the places that received the 546 computers donated by Quipunet.
Report from Calca. Father Ricardo:
"We are using the computers to teach the people. It is quite heartwarming to see the night-class students, starry eyed using the computers, it makes us forget all the problems we encouter"
Report from Vicabamba, Cusco (The Little farmers)
" We had a contest for the children of the area with a computer as first prize for the winner's school, and rabbits for the next 10 places"
Report from the same school- one month later:
"We would like to use more programs to teach but the computers we have requires some "cards" to be able to run the other programs." They are learning by themselves.
I could go on and on quoting reports. They are just as joyous as the messages above.
What has been accomplished by Quipunet?
1) we have been giving back some self esteem to my rural people who had been stripped of pride for so long,
2) we let our people learn and use their computers to shape their own future.
3) we wait for them to ask for help....and they have been doing that.
4) we have given them the best of gifts...let them know that we care and we are thinking of them.
It takes many people and the tools to wrought a change.
ICT: Information and Communications Technology.
We did not know what they were. But I think we have been using those tools all along.
The first task we had at the beginning: We recieved information about Infodev. Not being qualified as yet, we went ahead and translated the guidelines and one of the nonprofits in Peru was able to present a proposal to Infodev and obtained a grant.
Communication Technology: All of our seminars with volunteers in Japan, Taiwan, Brasil, USA, Peru, Spain, etc, etc, was done with communication technology to plan and execute the jobs assigned to us. The same was used when we received a donation of CPUs in North Carolina. We formed
committees in North Carolina, Seattle, Port Orchard, Lima, Peru, and Chiclato, Peru. The most difficult job, and yet the most rewarding as we saw the completion of this donation arriving to their different destiny at so many rural areas.
Do we see the indigenous people using personal computers?
Perhaps, though this is a dream too distant to reach. But it is certainly helping channel more education, and more hope. And if the children cannot leapfrog across the divide, at least they will know there is something better on the other side. Something they might be able to reach.
Martha Davies
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