Technophobia

I came across this organisation which provides e-readers to schools in low-income countries.

An organisation with a similar theme is OLPC (One Laptop per Child) who coordinate the provision of low-cost, low-energy using laptops to schoolchildren in low-income countries.

I have some reservations about their programmes. I have never directly worked with them, and so have no way of knowing how they deal with these issues, which are not discussed on their website. I wonder how they deal with the inevitable risk in very disadvantaged regions that the laptops will be stolen and sold, by parents of recipients, or by corrupt education personnel. I have worked in areas where textbooks had to be kept under lock and key because it was understood that once a book left the classroom, it would be taken and sold. I have seen market-places full of items labelled AID- NOT FOR RESALE.  The laptops are intended for the children to take home and learn from on their own initiative, as well as in the classroom.  So, I would like to know how OLPC monitor the laptops, and ensure that the children can continue to use them.

 I spoke with someone who had worked with schools who were recipients of the OLPC laptops, who said that after a very short time, the kids were way ahead of the teacher in their use, limiting their effectiveness as a classroom tool.

I also have reservations about concentrating on laptops in areas where old-fashioned pencil-on-paper (chalk on slate) literacy has still so far to go. I believe that literacy must come first.

This reservation does not apply to the e-reader project, because reading is reading is reading, and an e-reader is just a medium for access to books. But I think the number of suitable books available must be quite limited as yet, and e-readers break down, which books don’t.

My concern about these innovative projects are that they may be driven by those who understand technology, and develop these devices to adapt to the context as they understand it, but are perhaps not aware of all the issues being faced in education in the countries where they are distributed.

Or perhaps I'm just being a technophobe, and overly hesitant in accepting innovation in education?

Au Revoir les Enfants

This week saw the departure of the majority of the Montagnard refgees with whom I have been working in Cambodia. After the government of Cambodia demanded the closure of the site where they were housed, Canada stepped in and offered them asylum. Most of the Montagnards I have worked with derrived their refugee status from a family member already in the United States, and they expect to be settled there eventually.They will be living in Quebec. I am so glad that they are going somewhere where they have the freedom to work and travel; many of them have been in the closed site in Phnom Penh for as long as six years. During that time, food and basic necessities have been provided to them, but they have not been allowed to leave the site except for official purposes and under supervision. This chunk of their lives has been in suspended animation. The education provided to them there has been less than ideal, and my biggest concern is for the young adults among them, who have grown up in this environment. 

I have loved working with them, and I am very sad to say goodbye, but hope that their futures will be bright in Canada.

 

Certainly, Canada in February will be difficult to adjust to for people from the Vietnamese highlands who have living on a closed site in Cambodia. Not just the weather, which may come as a shock, but the unfamiliar amenities and ways of doing things. Even seeing them off at the airport brought it home to me how many things will be new to them. At the airport, the automatic taps, the toilets, the escalators, were new, and sometimes bewildering or terrifying experiences. I put all my faith in the social services in Quebec to support them through this. I trust that they will discover, as I did, what a privilege it is to work with such amazing people.

Fear and Self-loathing in Humanitarian Space

The brilliant Hugo Slim in his essay ' A Call to Alms' says;

A sense of neo-colonial guilt, which can verge on self-hatred, lurks just below the surface of many individual humanitarian vocations and has a pernicious effect on humanitarian purpose and morale.

Slim is the only writer on humanitarian matters whom I have come across who has pinpointed this issue which I have seen so much evidence of among my peers, but rarely heard discussed. The uneasiness we feel about the neo-colonial nuances of what we do, and our frustration with the ineffectiveness of some projects can translate into feelings of negativity that threaten to take over.

Sometimes it's hard to distinguish between a healthy dose of self-satire which helps us laugh about the issues we deal with, and the self-hatred which Slim refers to. We humanitarian workers have to be able to laugh at ourselves, and I think we need to to be able to laugh at situations that really aren't funny. I find this blog; http://stuffexpataidworkerslike.com/ a great instance of aid workers poking fun at themselves, and I find most of the entries hilarious and very recognisable.
I  recently saw a cartoon video posted on Facebook entitled 'Aspiring Aid Worker Interview'.The tagline reads: This is a satirical look at the challenges of professional aid and development work with idealistic activists with good intentions. I haven't reposted it partly because it seems to have been removed for copyright reasons.  A young man with a robotic voice tells an interviewer with a robotic voice that he wants to be an aid worker, and gets put straight about how useless and uninformed and naive his ambition is, and how he doesn't need to go overseas. It was posted by a fellow humanitarian, and several other of my humanitarian friends 'liked' it, and commented on how funny it was. The young man protests 'But I have a Master's degree! I use words like 'empowerment'!' Speaking as one with a Master's degree, who uses words like 'empowerment', I'm not sure that I think this is laughable. If we don't believe in what we do, how do we expect anyone else to?