Bringing every child a free laptop should be considered an essential starting point to reduce social inequality and poverty. Giving the opportunity to the poor child that has born in the countryside to be connected and teach him about technology since is a 5 years old bring an amazing democratizing tool of opportunities to them. And perhaps the only one.
I'm from Uruguay and starting in 2006, this is exactly what the government has been done. This has become a national cause. And as far as I know, this has been the most successful implementation to date of this.
Uruguay is a relatively small country (similar to Greece but with a lot rural areas) and with a modest population of 3M people.
In less than two years (by 2009) the government implemented free wifi connectivity for OLPC kids across the country. The country is very close to 100% wifi connectivity for OLPC kids (run on a separate network) and we're near to 100% 3G costless as-well across the country which works at least at 5Mb / second.
In addition to that, the government declared internet as a right that anyone should get, for free. Any uruguayan can claim at least 256k in their houses for free on any part of the country. There's no barrier anymore to be connected. And truth is, people is getting interested in the opportunities of it. The little kid who goes to school in a horse because is 20km far from his house in rural areas now he's aware of a new previously unseen potential and see the opportunities of becoming a designer or a programmer. And this is really happening.
However, is naive to think computers alone will do the trick. Bringing computers is just the starting point of something bigger which is not only the connectivity, but mostly the educational foundations that should be instrumented afterwards and carefully followed up based on all the feedback. Real iterations based on data and adjusted as the project goes. It may resonate like the same principle of a startup.
I heard the people who contribute to this in UY is now beginning to help the Peruvian and other countries with the experience and all we have learned of this to re-create the same kind of educational environments.
I agree that the OLPC was a good equalizer and brought opportunities to our children, and I support the project.
However, I don't think it has been a good tool in the classroom. I've talked to some teachers, and they feel they weren't prepared to deal with it or to utilize it, it has actually disrupted classes in some cases.
I'm from Uruguay and starting in 2006, this is exactly what the government has been done. This has become a national cause. And as far as I know, this has been the most successful implementation to date of this.
Uruguay is a relatively small country (similar to Greece but with a lot rural areas) and with a modest population of 3M people.
In less than two years (by 2009) the government implemented free wifi connectivity for OLPC kids across the country. The country is very close to 100% wifi connectivity for OLPC kids (run on a separate network) and we're near to 100% 3G costless as-well across the country which works at least at 5Mb / second.
In addition to that, the government declared internet as a right that anyone should get, for free. Any uruguayan can claim at least 256k in their houses for free on any part of the country. There's no barrier anymore to be connected. And truth is, people is getting interested in the opportunities of it. The little kid who goes to school in a horse because is 20km far from his house in rural areas now he's aware of a new previously unseen potential and see the opportunities of becoming a designer or a programmer. And this is really happening.
However, is naive to think computers alone will do the trick. Bringing computers is just the starting point of something bigger which is not only the connectivity, but mostly the educational foundations that should be instrumented afterwards and carefully followed up based on all the feedback. Real iterations based on data and adjusted as the project goes. It may resonate like the same principle of a startup.
Here's a summary I found of a pilot OLPC experience in Uruguay. http://www.divms.uiowa.edu/~hourcade/ceibal-workshop.pdf
I heard the people who contribute to this in UY is now beginning to help the Peruvian and other countries with the experience and all we have learned of this to re-create the same kind of educational environments.