Laptops for Developing Countries

This blog is one of the 10 required as "reflective or informative entries regarding technology and/or teaching."

Because I'm a nerd and because I love Africa, I pay attention to BBC News. (It covers issues related to Africa and the rest of the eastern world much moreso than do U.S. news channels.) That said, I recently read an article titled "Politics 'stifling $100 laptop.'" Here is the link: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7094695.stm. The main issue in this article is the difficulties which have arisen in the political arena regarding distribution of laptops to students of developing countries.

However, the main issue which caught my attention is the fact that many developing countries have the same goal as discussed in Prensky's "Adapt or Adopt" article about which I previously blogged. As I stated in that blog, one of the goals in the U.S. is one-to-one computer interaction, meaning that each student would have his own laptop. Also, I stated, "This article said that, by the end of the year, a basic laptop might cost as little as $100." Surprisingly, at least to me, the BBC article said nearly the exact same thing: "It aims to put thousands of low-cost laptops, known as the XO, in the hands of children around the world. The machines are planned to cost $100." (The "it" at the beginning of that sentence refers to the organization heading this endeavor, known as One Laptop per Child (OLPC); the name suggests the intent.)

Similar challenges are being faced by these developing countries as are being faced in the U.S. The cost, the issue of distribution, and the schools' lagging behind are all issues for both. The situation in developing countries is perhaps more extreme. One quote from the BBC article said, "What is the sense of introducing One Laptop per Child when they don't have seats to sit down and learn; when they don't have uniforms to go to school in, where they don't have facilities?" It's interesting to me that the U.S., with all of its resources, is at the same point as other countries which have little or no public education funding and which are still developing or "third-world."