One learning child. One connected child. One laptop at a time.
The mission of One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) is to empower the children of developing countries to learn by providing one connected laptop to every school-age child. In order to accomplish our goal, we need people who believe in what we’re doing and want to help make education for the world’s children a priority, not a privilege. Between November 12 and November 26, OLPC is offering a Give One Get One program in the United States and Canada. During this time, you can donate the revolutionary XO laptop to a child in a developing nation, and also receive one for the child in your life in recognition of your contribution.
I tend to be a bit hesitant of a lot of the “western” aid given to developing countries. But this just seems really awesome. It’s not a handout, it’s an educational tool.
I played with kids at one of the schools in Dete, in rural Zimbabwe… and y’know, these are some smart kids. By 8 or 9, they’re functionally bilingual — far more than your average Vancouver kid taking french classes. (French immersion aside — ask me in a few years how bilingual Carol Ann is, I’m not sure how well that works yet.) They can read, write, do math, have good geography skills, and so on and so forth. They’re not uneducated by any stretch.
What they are is poor. They lack resources. The books in the school are ragged and out of date. Their uniforms are old and falling apart, and many of them don’t have shoes. A lot of the kids are orphans. But they still go to school every day, eager to learn. They’re not lacking the drive… they’re lacking the tools.
Give a man a fish, feed him for a day. Give a kid a laptop… and who knows?
I love this project.
We’re thinking of doing the give one/get one as our Christmas present. Jeremy is really into the program and also really wants to check out the technology himself. We need to ask if we can send ours back to them once we’ve goofed around with it a bit, I don’t think it would be particularly useful for us here.
I’m seriously considering getting one for my sister. :) Her birthday is two weeks before Christmas… seems like a reasonable gift. :)
Check out the wiki, too. You can download the software they’re using and emulate it locally, even if you can’t play with the hardware yourself.
Hi Donna,
Thanks for your post about the new XO laptop from the OLPC campaign. We at Razoo really support this kind of creative solution, so much so that we’re including it in our “Good Travels” contest.
The “Good Travels” contest encourages travelers to do good while one the road. As part of the contest, five 2nd prize winners will receive the new XO laptop (and 5 laptops will be donated to children in developing nations).
(By the way, the grand prize of the contest is a trip for two anywhere in the world to put good into action, via ResponsibleTravel.com.)
You can learn more about it and enter here: http://beta.razoo.com/good_travels
Cheers,
rebecca
Razoo. Come Together, Change Your World.
http://blog.razoo.com
hmm… and what happens when the laptop needs to be fixed?
i mean, my mom in Saskatchewan doesn’t even have access to decent tech support. and i’ve seen microscopes in medical clinics in Zambia worth several zillions of dollars (and a big “DONATED BY THE US GOVERNMENT” sticker slapped on the side) that sit unused because some thinga-ma-jigger broke and no one fixed it.
just a dash of pessimism. sorry. ; ))
It’ll happen. But they’re designed to start from to be as rugged as possible, to minimize that as much as possible.
Besides, they don’t run Windows, so that should cut down on the tech support tenfold… ;)
I think they’re pretty spiff. I just hope they can get out to everyone. I’ve heard that charity groups are strangely resistant to the idea.
As for the repair issue, if there are enough of these laptops near the one that’s broken, then the users could at least get to documentation on how to fix things.