Thursday, September 02, 2008
Rwandan President Paul Kagame is latest to sign his country’s school children on the global project to equalize access to computer education.
Parents are urged to support their wards’ education by buying the $100 computer, irrespective of the hard choice they have to make between computers and access to clean water and sanitation, for instance, which guarantee an extended life expectancy for the children.
However, such concerns may be misplaced as increasingly poor country governments are being supported by donors to make primary and secondary schools free. The Rwandan government has been able to implement a nine-year free education up to secondary schools level.
This means, the One Laptop Per Child shouldn’t be a burden to parents.
The program begun last year with some hundred computers already sold and 5000 more to be sold this year. The project is set to span the next five years. The computers are said to be environmentally friendly and rely on less power.