Blackstone Operations

Tomorrow I find out if I made it to the interview step.  I’m kind of nervous.

All of our applications for funding are now in.  We still have a few interviews to do, but basically it’s just a waiting game at this point.  We are hopeful that we will get the funding to see this operation through.  We are really excited about the experience and can’t wait to make our first post from Cameroon.  That’s right, we will be making regular posts while we are there as part of the requirement for our funding.  So stay tuned and keep us in your thoughts.

We live in one of the most privileged communities in the world — the United States.  Both members of the team attend fine universities that use technology, specifically computers as great tools for learning and business.  Both members of the team also receive scholarships to attend these universities, money that comes from individuals committed to ensuring that we receive the best education possible.  Both schools offer money in the form of fellowships and grants to perform capacity building projects, money that comes from the tuition of the universities’ students.  We felt that it was only right to do as much as we could to obtain and use that money to help underprivileged men and women gain educations as well.  Neither of us would be in the position we are today without computers and could think of no better way to educate and enable communities than reaching out to them directly with computer hardware and training.

The team intends to travel to the Cameroonian city of Buea to assist in the building and supplying of a new computer lab at a school/community center that will be used by many students and adults.  The computers that the team will help provide are Inveneo designed fit-PC2’s.  These computers are unique in that they are specially designed for developing regions that may only be able to power the computers through low power means such as solar technology.  These computers consume less energy and are engineered to withstand the harsh climate and handling conditions in Cameroon.  Despite the low-power benefits the computers provide, they are still capable of handling practical tasks like modern operating systems, office applications, internet browsers, and DVDs/CDs.  In addition to helping build/supply the computer labs, the team will play a large role in providing the training of IT instructors at the lab.  These instructors will be able to manage the lab long after we are gone and will also be responsible for training other teachers, educators, and students to develop computer literacy in surrounding communities.  These local instructors will continually provide a steady stream of computationally educated citizens rather than segmented groups of educated students.

The IT instructors will be trained to use both Linux and Windows (XP or Vista) operating systems.  All instructors will also be trained in: computer basics, Microsoft (MS) Excel, MS Word, MS Powerpoint, MS Access, email, and the internet.  Advanced training in Web Design (HTML and CSS), Networking (A+ Certification), Hardware & Software Maintenance, Desktop Publishing (MS Publisher and QuarkExpress), Photo editing (Adobe Photoshop), and Computerized accounting will also be made available for instructors who readily pass through the basic training and are ready to advance further.  Two non-profit organizations, Help International (HINT)  and Develop Africa, have agreed to partner with the team to assist in the developing and planning of the computer lab.  HINT will also provide substantial assistance in the training/locating of IT Instructors.

After training the IT instructors at the computer labs, the team will then be able to follow the IT instructors’ efforts to observe how they and the community use both the newly trained instructors and the computers to impact the Buea community.  The team will also investigate other Cameroonian cities and analyze how communities are affected by the presence (or lack thereof) of ICT.  We are extremely interested in how new technology is accepted and received in developing communities.  We intend to research the impact of newly added computers on the community and how the technology is also being used to address economic and social problems.  We will pay special attention to the impact on job competitiveness, classroom teaching techniques, and social habits (recreation, idle behavior, etc) as well as how the computers are being used in the community to address a myriad of other problems.

This project is exciting because it will illuminate some of the ways in which modern technology may be integrated into communities.  By focusing on a nation that is technologically struggling despite the relative strength of its economy, this project will hopefully highlight the means by which some of Africa’s more complicated problems may be addressed through human cooperation rather than passively donating goods and resources from a distance.  However, simply analyzing and reporting the Cameroonians’ struggle is both insensitive and irresponsible.  The nature of this problem combined with the skills and resources the team has obtained obligates that we approach this unfortunate crisis not as passive observers but as active components of the solution.  The most effective way to combat this challenge requires  addressing the shortage in ICT availability.  Through this effort the team hopes to come together not as the misfortunate and their chronicler but as two worlds united to overcome a formidable challenge.

Dr.  Abdessadek Lachgar (a chemistry professor from Morroco) identified one of the greatest challenges to students successfully attempting to start new projects in Africa to be the lack of a framework or blueprint from which they may draw experience/guidance.  Though this project will strive to provide that precedent, it will also provide a means by which students may discover other paths that combine scholastic curiosity with an attentiveness to improving the universal condition of man.  We will formally outline our analysis in a paper and will present it at any conference/research symposium where its inclusion is appropriate.

Additionally, the future goals of this project will benefit the Winston-Salem community.  The Forsyth County Computer Training Bridge, a volunteer group of experienced computer users and IT professionals who volunteer to teach computer skills of varying levels to adults at Forsyth County public libraries for free, has agreed to partner with the team to try to connect the citizens of Buea with students/schools/mentors in the Winston-Salem community.  We also hope to maintain an interaction with the students/instructors in Buea long after we have returned to the United States.  We strongly believe that connecting students (and teachers) from different cultures and backgrounds will be an enormous benefit to each community involved and will provide benefits far beyond simple computer literacy.

The team plans to be in Buea for approximately 78 days.  We anticipate that lab space setup and computer installation will be complete within 30 days.  Training of teachers can begin immediately after installation is complete.

We now have a firm location set for Operation Connect – Buea, Cameroon.

Cameroon is an ideal place for Operation Connect.  The economy is strong enough that schools and communities could realistically be expected to support and maintain a computer lab.  However, their ICT progress is so sparse that each region may be significantly impacted and improved through cooperative interventions.

Cameroon is the 10^th largest economy in Africa and has been growing steadily since 1995 with the support of several government reform and IMF (international monetary fund) that are still growing in strength.  Cameroon also enjoys strong levels of stability and has been in a state of peaceful growth for over a decade.  These strengths have been part of the support behind Cameroon becoming one of the top 10 countries in net additions of internet users in Africa between 2000 and 2008.  Despite this, lack of access and training in computer techology have been cited as contributing factors to the underdevelopment of both the Cameroonian ecnonomy and educational sector.  The government is also clearly interested in addressing the technology gap that separates Cameroon from so many valuable opportunities.

In an effort to tap into the benefits higher computer literacy provide, the Cameroonian government, lead by President Paul Biya, has required computer science be taught in secondary schools.  However, on average only 4.1% of households even own a computer (far fewer than even many of the UN’s “Least Developed Countries.”  In Africa, Cameroon is 23^rd in terms of percentage of households with a computer.  Figure 3 (attached at end of document) shows the large disparity in internet use in Cameroon compared not only to the world, but also other developing countries.  Buea, a city totaling about 150,000 people, is the capital of the southwest province of Cameroon and was once the colonial capital of the former German-controlled “Kamerun” from 1901 to 1919.  The city is home to the only Anglophone university within Cameroon (University of Buea) and a significant number of ethnic groups.  However, even here only about 5% of the secondary schools have computers installed in their schools.  It is an ideal community to assist because all progress made here will affect not only the immediate Buea region but many villages that surround this city.  The lack of publicly available computers (only 5% in secondary schools) consequently harms not only this community but multiple others.  The general need and receptiveness on the citizens’ parts to advance forward in the ICT age strengthens not only the likilihood but the necessity for a successful project.

Africa suffers from a shortage in exposure to and experience with computers.  This shortage makes the ability to develop computer literacy exceptionally challenging.  The explosive arrival of ICT (Information and Communication Technology) has made computer literacy (defined here as the ability to use everyday computers to perform common tasks such as searching the internet, writing a document, and understanding how to use a program)  a commonly expected skill and a key component of many jobs today — especially higher level jobs.  As can be seen from Figure 1 above, the percentage of internet user penetration in Africa is lower than any other region (excluding Antarctica).  Though startling, this shortage must be observed in reference to the greater overall picture which shows that this shortage of internet is exacerbated by the lower level of telephone sevice and general electricity service.  In fact, Africa is behind the developing world (using the UN’s 2006 definition of developing countries).  Even more striking is that Africa has lower levels of computer internet usage relative to the number of households that do have electricity and telephone access — pointing to the need for more ICT resources.  The inability of most African communities to acquire computer literacy greatly damages their ability to compete for jobs and improve their economy in an increasingly globalized society.

In most cases, the significant cost of computers makes them unaffordable considering the average income levels in Africa.  This price barrier is the leading inhibitor to the penetration of computer and internet usage in African households and causes a large shortage in the number of computers in Africa.  Many countries also lack the necessary infrastructure to support the bandwith and electrical demands of ICT.  This has led to public internet/computer sources (community access centers, internet cafés, schools) becoming the most prevalent (and usually affordable) method of access to computer technology.  According to a recent household survey conducted by Research ICT Africa, the main location of internet use in many African countries such as Ethiopia, Ghana, and Cameroon is the cyber/internet café.

Though several efforts currently exist that attempt to address the complicated technology gap most African nations face, the effectiveness of these programs are hotly debated.  Because Cameroon’s economy is relatively strong, communities like Buea are frequently ignored by such organizations.  At the forefront of these organizations is One Laptop Per Child, a nonprofit organization that delivers laptops that are custom-designed for children to countries all across Africa.  The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation also funds multiple efforts to provide ICT to low-income African areas.  Much as a fishing pole is of little use to a hungry man without any instruction on how to use it, these and other similar solutions merely provide hardware to communities without any means for understanding how to integrate them into their communities.  Furthermore, after the initial recipients of the computers have grown and advanced, there is no mechanism by which their knowledge may be passed on to further generations.  Several retrospective analyses of the One Laptop Per Child effort have even found that communities are negatively affected by the depositing of computer hardware on uninformed communities.  Several critics, led in large part by Cameroon’s very own Marthe Dansokho, have also faulted the organization for failing to use the computers in ways that address issues important to Africans as well as ignoring countries that do not comprise the most financially devastated.

Computers are communication and learning tools today, but more importantly are the communication and learning tool of the future.  African communities have very little access to computers — even communities that are doing well economically.  The goal of Operation Connect is to provide one of these communities with fully capable computers and the training needed to use them.  The operation will focus on creating and furnishing a computer lab and then training teachers in computer skill education so that the project’s effect will last for the rest of the foreseeable future.  Secondary goals include connection of African and American communities and cultures as well as immersion of team members into Cameroonian culture.

Buea, Cameroon has been chosen for the site of this computer lab due to the location of project supervisor Genesis Tinshu, president of HINT; the economic, academic, and political conditions of Buea and Cameroon; and the major-city-community centrality of Buea.

This is the original concept for Operation Connect.

Download (PDF, 360KB)

The development of technology since the entry of computers into the consumer market has been explosive.  Mail services are struggling to survive as emails have taken precedence over envelopes.  Newspaper companies struggle to justify producing printed medium and the music industry is  being forced to revolutionize its publishing schemes in order to combat widely-available-pirated-online materials.

With a few clicks one can connect to satellites circling the earth and access a picture of some location. Getting there? 3 clicks more. The answer to any question is just one search engine away. Instructions manuals, dictionaries, maps, calculators–all within reach with only a few minutes of time. In nearly every avenue, computers are beginning to make indelible marks on the way the world operates.

Although it would seem reasonable to call this revolution widespread and explosive, an asterisk must always be inserted — Africa is this asterisk.

Though the benefits of computers and the wonders of the internet are widely lauded across the planet, but most of Africa remains untouched by this revolutionary change.  Even though Africa is the 2nd most populous continent in the world, less than three percent of the world’s internet subscribers were located in Africa in 2006. That’s not too surprising considering that there is only one computer per 130 people in Africa. The access to broadband connections is lower than 1%. This can probably be explained by the continental average of around 3 main lines per 100 people. In over 20 countries the national average is fewer than 1 main line.  Of the connections that are available, most are severely overpriced and inconvenient. Many individuals can only afford access at libraries or schools for free.

Operation Connect will address this challenging dilemma in the most effective way we are capable.  Though a few programs are in place to provide computers to developing nations, many fail to adequately help these countries actually become a part of the revolution.  Some programs only offer specialized computers that are not operated like the computers that the working world requires employees to use with competence (i.e., One Laptop One Child).   Furthermore, many of these programs merely drop computers into communities and leave the members flummoxed with how to practically integrate them into their schools and communities.  Despite these companies’ attempt to teach the masses to fish, they have merely handed out second-rate fishing poles.

The goal of Operation Connect is to completely connect selected communities with the outside world.  Blackstone Operations’s approach connects access to free-up-to-date computers with the hands-on power of personal training and integration of computers into every-day life. Blackstone Operations will strive to give underprivileged communities first-rate fishing poles and teach the member of these communities to utilize the full range of opportunities provided by the tools.

Operation Connect is a declaration that everyone can learn given the same tools… that cultures from different hemispheres can connect to and learn from each other without condescension or scorn… that each man and each woman is both deserving and capable of fishing from the same prosperous pool.

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