The ceremony was an absolute success, at least I believe so. We had a few hundred students attending the ceremony, numerous parents, community members, SGB members, and government officials, including the provincial HoD of Limpopo. While the HoD was very impressed with the project, he did mention that it would be a bit too expensive to scale up. I disagree, but I don't make the decisions...yet. From what I gather, SA spends almost more than any other country in education and gets the least in return, in terms of literacy. In general, the ceremony went fairly well. I, on the other hand, didn't do so well on my speech. Note to self, write your speeches and/or practice. This was the first time in my life I gave a speech where I didn't write it. In my defense, I was misinformed on who would be translating my speech. The translator did it paragraph by paragraph, not sentence by sentence. Live and learn though.
Current Situation...
The group left Tuesday night for the states. It's a little sad to see them all go, particularly because of how close we all became over the past few weeks. On the other hand, I'm eager to get underway with a lot of my personal work. By that I mean my research for my senior thesis and my Congolop work. Needless to say, there's a bit to be done in the next 7 days. I then took Joey to the airport this morning. He's on his way to Hong Kong for the semester. I'm now in Limpopo trying to figure out how I'm going to work out this project now that we're gone. So the following is a list of "To Do Items" and "Goals" for the next 7 days. If you know me, my life is organized by endless "to do" sheets. It's the only way I can keep track of everything. I hope by putting this out in the open I'll be more encouraged to see each one through.
Holiday Break Camp...
Kids in these areas have little to do on school holidays. The school schedule her in SA is set up so that there are 2 week long breaks every so often. For those reasons, we'd like to put together a mini XO camp, if you want to call it that, so that those students who have excelled here in Limpopo can take advantage of the more "experienced" users in Kliptown. I'm hoping that any skills acquired in such an environment should then be diffused to the 3 schools we're working in. That's the idea anyway. Now we just need to arrange time, coordinate transportation, and find out who can go.
Petrol...
I just received an email from Sipho who received a call from Limpopo saying that they've already run out of petrol. While I haven't checked the situation yet (I haven't even made it to Thusanang yet), I'm hoping it's Mmaweshi since Driehoek doesn't even have their chargers to be using the XOs. In any case, this petrol issue is going to be a hassle. We're hoping that the HoD's presence at our ceremony will expedite power into these communities. Yes, I'm optimistic but I do know it's doubtful. Just have to keep at it.
Internet at Mmaweshi...
I believe we found our solution to the internet crisis at Mmaweshi. I believe we're going with a Linksys 3G Router. It's not up and running but I should be able to purchase it today or tomorrow after I figure out some last minute details. All smiles here! If we're lucky I'll have John communicating with me via email before I leave. That would expedite this follow up process immensely if I don't have to communicate through 3rd parties.
Attendance...
Just thought I should add that we had 100% participation at Katane during the entire time we were working on the project. I can't speak on behalf of Mmaweshi and Driehoek but I can probably assume that they were similar. Look what happens when you make school a little more exciting, kids actually enjoy learning. Ha, what a concept (note the sarcasm)
Evaluation and Monitoring...
Thank god for Pam who generously donated 2k to Thusanang Trust to help sustain the project. Pam, without your contribution I would be struggling right now. Thank you. With that money we'll be able to employ Shelly from Thusanang on a weekly basis to monitor and evaluate the project. Unfortunately, the long term aspect of this deployment isn't emphasized enough. As the leader, I take full blame. I should have been a little more conscious on what we would be doing after the group left, not just while the group was implementing the project. We have, however, put together a fairly extensive evaluation program, or so I hope. This should give us an indication back in the states to what extent this is actually making an impact. Are the kids really improving academically? Does the attendance remain high? Are the students the only ones progressing or have the teachers actually taken on the idea? Are the teachers really integrating the XOs into the curriculum or does the after school program work? These questions go on and on. However painful it is, it's without a doubt the most important in sustaining this project and allowing us to repeat the project. Provided this all works out, we're hoping to do this again and again. By December we'll be able to provide donors with a clear and definitive answer, 'yes, this program is working because of A, B, C and we can prove this by showing them 1, 2, 3, or we say 'no, this project failed because of A, B, C and this is what we'd like to do about it...' It's a long process.
Security...
Thank you Andrew for helping us with our security issues. From what I've heard via voicemail, we now have a fairly secure lock and chain in place at Driehoek. That should prevent someone from taking our generator. We should have a cage built at Mmaweshi sometime in the next week. Only if these schools had electricity, my god this project would run much smoother. I strongly recommend to anyone considering implementing a similar project to decide on electricity 1st. Find some alternatives and have them implemented beforehand.
OLPC ZA School...
Just received a proposal from the Kliptown Youth Program detailing a possible return trip, i.e. what that would look like, costs, goals, etc. KYP, with the help of Larry Weber, is trying to organize a OLPC School, if you will. Neo, Thulani, Sipho, and the remaining KYP members are trying to be "on the groun experts" in a way. Basically, they'll serve donors and groups in the states, such as our Indiana University One Here...One There team, in doing whatever is needed. For instance, none of us spoke Sepedi. They allowed this project to overcome that insurmountable barrier which allowed for communication (without a doubt the most important aspect in doing such a project). They also have the technical expertise in implementing such a deployment. Their next project will be in Durban or Kwazu Natal, don't quote me on that though. In our situation, they should be able to provide some long term support. The downside, of course, is money. All of this takes financial commitment. Fortunately, KYP is without a doubt the most inspiring organization I've ever come across. All participating IU OHOT members are committing a portion of the Busar Bill to KYP's programmes.
1 week left...
My time here is almost over. Unfortunately, I haven't had too much time to reflect on the good, the bad, the pros and cons, etc, etc. This small opportunity to blog has been my only real reflection time. And the only reason I'm doing this is because it has the potential to help our cause in the long run. Now that the group has left, maybe I'll get a chance to reflect. Knowing me though I'll manage to overbook what little time I have left. I've already managed to skip the 1st week of class and with the jet lag who knows what time schedule I'll be on the 2nd week. It's a challenge though. One of the few things that keeps me going. If it were up to me, I'd only be in class for midterms and finals. There's always that 1 professor that requires attendance though. How unfortunate. It's too bad we don't emphasize more practical, hands on experience in school. Joe Peoni and I talked a bit about how much we've learned managing this project. Safely said, we both learned more developing this project than we have in any lecture or class.
Fall OHOT Schedule...
So I return in a week to IU ready to take on this semester's projects. For the first time in my OHOT career, I'm confident in our IU OHOT team to execute some of our goals. Here's just a brief idea of what we've got going:
- Kaitlin Riley is back from Washington D.C. leading the African Education and Development Relief Fund, a spin-off of One Here...One There which includes some of the other African-based organizations on campus. We'll be collecting 10,000 signatures to attach a supplemental donation option to the bursar bill. With that addition, we'll be able to supply a steady stream of funding to both KYP and our current OLPC project in Limpopo. Hopefully we'll have that knocked out by the end of September so we'll earn some money by January. Now that I think about it, today is our kickoff. So it begins...again. I failed the first time so we'll get up and do it all over until we're heard.
- Joe Delehanty will begin organizing our annual Art Benefit scheduled for February. We should be able to pencil in another Indiana Memorial Union African Art month to advertise African issues.
- Joe will start the arduous process of making this SA trip an actual IU course. We didn't get too much support last go around so maybe now that we've proved ourselves they'll take us seriously. God I love beauracracies and red tape!
- We'll also be organizing another student summit in Tampa, Florida.
- I'll be applying for a few more grants to make next go around a bit easier on our donors pocket book (I love you, mom).
- Finally, I need to find someone to run this little organization after I graduate, that is if I can stay focused to keeping my GPA high enough for graduate school.
- There's a few more things on our to do list, too.
Enough writing...time for working...
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