[OLPC India] Fwd: OLPC Afghanistan starting!

[Seth Woodworth]

On Mon, Oct 20, 2008 at 1:24 AM, Edward Cherlin <echerlin at gmail.com> wrote:

> I find this idea of putting XOs into computer labs unacceptable. What
> do others think?
>

I'm not overly fond of the idea.


>
>
> On Sun, Oct 19, 2008 at 9:35 PM, Svetlana Senajova
> <svetla at paiwastoon.com.af> wrote:
> > Dear Edward,
> >
> > Thanks for your points. The idea behind this is that more children have
> > access to computer, as the supply is very limited
>
> "The shortage will be divided among the peasants."--Walt Kelly
>
> I am well aware of this argument. It is wrong-headed. The problem is
> that the answers you get depend on whether you are asking the right
> questions. This project does not.
>
> > - don't forget that
> > Afghanistan is one of the poorest countries in the world. Besides that
> the
> > computers will be in the school where all children will have a chance to
> > get to know computer, their parents will have access to it in the
> evenings
> > to get a learning for themselves - e.g. about hygiene, about how to start
> > a business, how to get better crops out of their fields, connecting to
> > buyers and supplies of agricultural products etc. And this shall at the
> > end prove that it can contribute to economic development of the rural and
> > urban areas and that in the future when parents' standard of their living
> > increases they can purchase XO themselves and whole family - both
> children
> > and parents can use it.
>
> What is this about having parents buy XOs? That violates the
> fundamental principle of the OLPC program. I'm copying Nicholas
> Negroponte on this.
>

Woah, Slow down a little bit Ed.  Svetla said that parents would have access
to the machines, which would make sense in a computer lab setting.  The
mention of purchasing XO's sounds to me like a long term indicator of
national growth and development.  In that, one day parents could buy
machines directly like people in the US can.


>
> > It is per wish of Ministry of Education and with support of USAID/ASMED
>
> I need to see the documentation on this project so I can ask my
> Congressman to investigate USAID for this violation of the project's
> fundamental principle. Is there a public URL for any of the
> agreements? I find a press release at
>
> http://www.mcit.gov.af/detail.asp?CatID=1&ContID=179
> Posted on: Sep 18, 2008
> Ministry of Education and Ministry of Communication and IT Launch the
> One Laptop Per Child Project in Partnership with Roshan and ASMED
>
> http://www.moe.gov.af/news/Sanbullah/15September2008.htm
> Ministry of Education and Ministry of Communication Launch the One
> Laptop Per Child Project in Partnership with Roshan and ASMED
> Quotes Bryan Rhodes, Chief of Party for ASMED, USAID's Small and
> Medium Enterprise Development project.
>
> I can't find anything about this program on
> http://afghanistan.usaid.gov/en/
>

Laptop.org is similarlly out of date, if I wouldn't take that as an idicator
of anything.


>
> Well, I will inquire at
>
> Contact Us
> ...
> U.S. Department of State
> Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs
> Afghanistan Desk
>

By all means make contacts and find out more information.  But please don't
do so in a way that would harm what looks like a newly founded partnership
with USAID.


>
> > and hopefully will a new way of how XO can help in developing world.
>
> It is vital that some of the computers, even if only a few hundred, be
> distributed one-to-one, even if most go into computer labs. That way
> the Ministry can have a chance to see its error.
>

Perhaps this will be the case.  This is a very young project.

--Seth
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