[ASLO] FW: Note about assembly, and our impending trip's agenda

[Mark Battley]

I will get the UCC Computer Science guys to send their stuff...but in a
couple of weeks...we are heading off to March Break, and I am leaving for
our OLPC site in Kenya in an hour. For whatever it is worth, here is our
agenda. I am going with another teacher (Kevin Olds: Head of Computer
Science) and four students (16-17 yrs old):

I think we now have a terrific focus ­ or foci -for our trip. This still
needs to be approved by Lewa and Ntugi, but it gives us an ambitious plan:

Help Ntugi with better, quicker smarter use of the laptops, Internet and
Google 
We will talk about safe-surfing, sign-out, storage, cleaning, repairing,
Google Custom Search, smart searching for links, within domains, and by
country, verifying websites¹ authority, spam, scams, etc.
Amal leading, all participating


Work with Lewa/Ntugi/Subuiga to cost out, plan, and fundraise for a summer
lab construction and implementation of 50 OLPC 1.5¹s
Jacob will travel from Nairobi to meet with Faith, Phineas, Godfrey and our
team. In turn, we will meet with suppliers (Joel for solar). We will plan,
seek sponsorship, and fundraise for the construction of a computer
lab/outreach centre, solar power on the roof, and 50 new laptops, and
wireless hardware and date time.
Mark and Kevin leading, all participating, Adam, Derek and KG supporting
from Toronto


Field test the $500 ³OLPC Solar Suitcase²
We will see if we can create a fully portable, solar powered internet café
for USD$500 using the following:
* OLPC XO1.5 $229 
* Lightweight, flexible GP 10/14V solar panel $36
* Cradlepoint PHS300 $130
* iGo Controller $60
* Safaricom USB Modem $25
The idea is to explore the viability of a student kit that could also be
used as a micro-business in their local community, and that might also have
applications for rangers as well as aid, health, and environmental
fieldworkers.
Kevin leading, all participating, Adam, Derek and KG supporting from
Toronto.


Set up ³Horizons² Kenya and visit  Subuiga Primary with a Ntugi
implementation team to demo the OPLC¹s
If we have a successful implementation of the 50 new OLPC 1.5¹s in the
summer, Ntugi would like to re-purpose the old 20 laptops to Subuiga
Primary. We taught for a single afternoon at Subuiga last year and it was
remarkably successful. . We will work with Ntugi to train a small group of
senior students who, like our own boys at UCC, will run an outreach/teaching
program at Subuiga. We will explain how our ³Horizons² pay-it-forward and
peer-to-peer program works and encourage them to experiment with this model.
We will also photograph and videotape the results of last years library
construction 
Connor and Amal leading, all participating


Explore collaborative curriculum in Science/Computer Science
Ntugi already has some sense of the overlap between our two curricula. Kevin
will explore this further, and show them the possible application of the
Vernier data sensors.
Kevin leading


Collaborate with Ntugi students in a variety of social workshops
* Juggling (Matt) 
* Sax, Recorders and Singing (Matt)
* Mural Painting (Richard)
* Digital Photography and Video (Amal and Connor)
* Blogging (all) 
* Badminton (Amal) 
The goal here will be to work collaboratively, record those collaborations
in sound, photo and video, and post the results on a collaborative blog. We
will be bringing over two waterproof, dustproof, shockproof Casio Exilim
EX-G1 Digital Cameras in support of that project, and leaving them so that
the school can capture photos and videos for their blog. The best thing
about this camera, other than the fact that you can drop and submerge it, is
that it mounts on the OLPC and you can easily access videos and pics.
All participating


Work with Lewa on Possible Internships and Ongoing Wireless Sponsorship
Cian O¹Neill-Kizoff, a UCC/College Film grad, who is now studying
engineering and solar innovation at Queens University, has expressed
interest in volunteering to work with Lewa and Ntugi to develop their
program, and in helping them connect to other similar implementations in
Kenya and around the world. We have had a number of other offers like this.
Mark will meet with Dr. Jonathan Moss and Faith Riunga, the Lewa Educational
Executive Officer, to discuss whether there is capacity at Lewa to
accommodate this kind of offer. They will also meet to explore ways to meet
the costs ongoing data usage at Ntugi.
Mark leading

Anyway, folks, that¹s the plan. It will, of course, develop and change.  If
you have any concerns, feedback, suggestions, please feel free to add to the
discussion.

M

Mark Battley
Head of Digital Media
Upper Canada College
416-488-1125 #3306 



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