From Business Week http://www.businessweek.com/print/magazine/content/08_24/b4088048125608.htm One Laptop Meets Big Business The big idea of giving PCs to poor children has been challenged by educators and business. Here, follow the misadventures of One Laptop per Child by Steve Hamm and Geri Smith
"[The] Unified Union of Education Workers of Peru, representing some 320,000 public school teachers, is skeptical. "These laptops aren't part of a comprehensive educational, pedagogical project, and their usefulness is debatable," says Luís Muñoz Alvarado, the union's general secretary. Muñoz never had a chance to explore the laptops, though. In what seems an easily avoidable blunder, the Education Ministry has not explained the program to the union. Who is responsible for this? It is inexcusable. And don't tell me it was the Peruvian government. We can't go into countries without a plan for preventing such stupid things. Well, let's see. Nicholas had no plan for deployment in Perú and Uruguay, so Ivan Krstić got handed the job with no experience. Before that Nicholas dealt with the Constructionist leaders of the Peruvian Ministry of Education, who arranged for some kind of teacher training (no details available to the public, apparently) but no liaison with the Union. To me, that means that this is 100% Nicholas's fault. Do we have to create a shadow management team to do the things that Nicholas and the paid managers have no clue about? I'm willing to help form one. Also, management claims that it is seeking partners to deal with in-country issues of deployment, teacher training, electricity, Internet connections, and so on, but I see no sign of it happening. Does anybody else? I have resources that I can bring to bear, but nobody to make the offers to. -- Edward Cherlin End Poverty at a Profit by teaching children business http://www.EarthTreasury.org/ "The best way to predict the future is to invent it."--Alan Kay _______________________________________________ Grassroots mailing list [email protected] http://lists.laptop.org/listinfo/grassroots
