Page 129 - Education in a Digital World

116 International Development

twenty years – from providing basic technological access for those without,
to supporting the community generated networks of learning. During the 1990s
and into the 2000s, much of the NGO and charity efforts in the area of ICT4D
attempted to tackle basic inequalities of access to digital technology and, it follows,
to technology-based education. Initiatives of this kind continue to take a variety of
guises – in particular the subsidised provision of access to computers for those
without. For instance, a range of non-profit organisations such as the Belgian ‘Close
the Gap’ and the US ‘World Computer Exchange’ charities, all work to supply
developing countries with refurbished and recycled computers that have been
donated from firms and individuals in developed nations – selling them to groups
and individuals in low-income countries at prices that cover their expenses (see Streicher-
Porte 2009). Many initiatives have also followed what is known as a ‘telecottage’ or
‘telecentre’ model, where community-based rooms and buildings are equipped with
one or more internet-connected computer. Programmes from developed nations
from the 1980s onwards have seen governments and charities sponsoring the public
provision of computer and internet access in community-based sites such as shops,
churches and even solar-powered shipping containers.
The aim of all these public resource initiatives has primarily been to provide
flexible access to new technologies for those without such facilities at home or at
work. While becoming less prevalent with the decline of the fixed ‘desktop’ computer,
these approaches continue to be important components of NGO work in remote
and rural regions (see Zhang 2008). Besides the setting up of community technol-
ogy centres, sustained efforts have been made over the past thirty years by those
working in the NGO sector to support the technical resourcing of educational
institutions. As early as 1983, for example, non-profit programmes such as the
Aga Khan Foundation financed Kenyan ‘Computers in Education Project’ and
have worked to provide computers to schools, universities and other educational
institutions (Wims and Lawler 2007). Thirty years after, much of the digital
technology resourcing of primary and secondary schools remains the ‘gift’ of NGOs
and charities.
While programmes of this type continue throughout developing contexts, one of
the most celebrated technology provision programmes of the past twenty years
has been the less formal and less institutionalised ‘Hole-in-the-wall’ initiative. This
programme originated in the 1990s in a slum area of New Delhi and has since
extended to over 500 sites and over 40,000 young people across India, Cambodia
and Africa. As its name suggests, the premise of the project is simple. The monitor
of an internet-connected computer is sunk into the external wall of a building in a
local community. The monitor has no keyboard but is accompanied by specially
designed joysticks and buttons to act as a mouse. Although a local volunteer is
usually responsible for the maintenance of the computer, there are no teachers or
technical support on hand. Instead, an ethos of ‘minimally invasive education’ is
followed, where children and young people can access the computer at any time,
and teach themselves how to use the computer on an individually paced basis.