Tag Archives: OLPC

Visualizing universal connectivity in Argentina

Posted on by
Reply

Argentina’s Conectar Igualdad program, which will provide 3M laptops to secondary students across the country by the end of next year, has devoted much time to their web presence.  (The secondary students receive Classmates; 60K primary students in the north have also recieved XOs.) The national education ministry has a history of excellent web sites, including educ.ar, which has gathered learning materials and information for teachers for years.

Conectar Igualdad has, among other things, a lovely real-time summary of the program’s progress, noting the current targets or the deployment and how it has progressed during the current phase in each district.

They are also open about the experimental nature of their work.  They have asked students and communities to come up with great ideas and local initiatives using the laptops and other information technology, running a variety of contests to select the best of them.  The aim of these contests is to highlight the dynamic of “one laptop per child” and universal connectivity, connect with web 2.0 services, and to collaborate with others in a creative way.

Continue reading →

OLPC retrospective in the latest Linux Journal

Posted on by
Reply

SFSU professor and OLPC-SF organizer Sameer Verma wrote a nice project summary in the latest Linux Journal titled OLPC: Are We There Yet?  In it he discusses the state of the project, and what remains to be done before every child has access to tools for their own education.

Sameer writes from the perspective of his own efforts to promote olpc around the world, and that of the Bay-area education hackers who help with everything from testing hardware, Sugar, and peripherals (leggo my WeDo!) to supporting schools in other countries.  It’s a well laid-out piece, with pointers to how local groups can make a difference.

 

 

St. Kitts enters 2nd phase of laptop program

Posted on by
Reply

St. Kitts is expanding its (lowercase) olpc program for high school students. The program, sponsored by their diplomatic ally Taiwan, began with 1200 students in April. This month they are adding 2400 more students.  Ambassador Tsao, the Taiwanese ambassador to St. Kitts, said on Monday that children having their own laptops was “tantamount to hav[ing] keys to their bright future”.

Tamil Nadu seeks 6.8M laptops for older students

Posted on by
1

On June 4, the Electronics Corporation of the state of Tamil Nadu [ELCOT] floated an international tender for sourcing 912,000 laptops.Requirements include a 2.1GHz clock, 320G hard drive, 2G of RAM, 3 hour battery life, and an Intel chipset. Also required: Lin/Win dual-boot, a 36-month warranty, and managing regional repair centers across the country for 3+ years.

ELCOT tender

ELCOT tender  elc58921

The Times of India reports that this is part of a long-term program to provide free laptops to 6.8M pre-college students across the state, and they are hoping for bids under $300 a unit. Unlike previous pronouncements about laptops for children, which were received much media attention with little result, this tender received comparatively little fanfare, and was focused on logistics. The tender closes in early July, and delivery is to start on September 1 of this year.

This free laptop program is a political promise made by the AIADMK party, which is currently in power. They worked through ALCOT to carry out a similar program in 2006, the Free Color Television Scheme,  which provided color televisions to every family without one (4 million in all). In response to complaints that many of these televisions turned up on a grey market, they are mandating hardware and software marking of the machines to note they are from Tamil Nadu.

The AIADMK haven’t budgeted for the program yet, however: this week their Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa petitioned the central government in New Delhi for funds to support it.

OLPC Will Remain a Non-Profit

Posted on by
Reply

A letter to the editor from Rodrigo Arboleda, Chairman of the OLPC Association:

The story in today’s Boston Business Journal about One Laptop per Child requires certain clarification:

1.     OLPC will continue as a non-profit organization in order to carry out its traditional role advocating for 1:1 computing in developing countries as a means to provide a modern education to children.

2.     OLPC will continue as a non-profit organization in its activities to arrange and manage laptop deployments around the world.

3.     OLPC continues to believe that non-profit status enables it to more effectively communicate on the issues of children and education without the possible taint of commercial self-interest.

OLPC is exploring many avenues for the further development of its educational software on new operating systems and computing platforms.  If such activities are pursued, it may require capital from traditional capital markets such as venture capitalists.  These funding sources may prefer to invest in a new type of vehicle labeled “Profitable Social Enterprises”, which would be a subsidiary of OLPC, but would have no effect on the traditional mission, methods or objectives of OLPC. This new subsidiary may develop its products for the U.S. market for a fee, but it is expected that the software would be made available in the developing world for free. This is all part of a new breed of philanthropy being developed that does not contradict the OLPC spirit or mission.

Rodrigo Arboleda

Chairman and CEO

One Laptop per Child Association