Tonga.Online Stakeholders Update March 2010

Details
Created: Sunday, 02 May 2010 16:27

1.Introduction

In spite of the general funding challenges facing the project, successes are being scored as detailed below.

2.Maintenance Training Workshop at Tinde

Maintenance was carried out at Tinde High School.

Before Maintenance / After Maintenance
Total Number of PCs 10 / 10
Number of Working PCs 6 / 10
Number of Non working PCs 4 / 0

Observations
Tinde secondary school has a problem with power adapters that are broken and are no longer safe for the computer room environment. The ITC still has a problem of insects that build their combs on computer components inside the PC.

During this maintenance exercise Four Teachers (x3 Males and x1 Female) gained some basic maintenance skills.

3.Servicing Workshop at Pashu

Pashu Secondary School invited Tonga Online to assist with the servicing of their computers as they had noticed that the computers had stayed for long without being serviced. Pashu Secondary school also has a new Teacher so the administration wanted very much that TO assist by inducting the new teacher into TO training programs.

Number of PCs / Number Working / Number Serviced: 10 / 10 / 10


Tonga Online held a discussion with the new teacher and form six pupils. This group discussed issues to do with the ITC in general and attended to general questions and answers from pupils. The group noticed the following amongst many:

1.The Pashu ITC could do with an improvement in general cleanliness
2.The ITC needed a timetable to ensure equitable access by boys and girls
3.The staff room needed to be removed from inside the ITC, since Teachers use the ITC as their staffroom.

TO demonstrated to the teacher how some installed packages could be used in assisting school children in their various subjects that they study at the school.

4.Setting up the Siabuwa ITC

The Siabuwa community through the assistance of the Campfire project procured a generator for the Siabuwa ITC. This led to the setting up of the Siabuwa ITC.

10 Computers were connected and all were found to be working
All computers were setup to run Windows XP and Open Office
HIV/AIDS, Community Development & Food and Nutrition Libraries were installed
eBook resources were demonstrated and left at the school

5.Music Editing

The editing of music recorded by a group from Kariangwe “Lusumpuko Muli Leza” was completed. The group has since collected two compact disc copies of their music and are exploring ways in which to duplicate it for distribution.
Editing is almost complete for the group “Milumbe Voices”.

6.Journalism Clubs

A working manual for the establishment of Journalism clubs in Schools has been completed. Some progress has been made at Binga High School where consultations have been made and a meeting held with 17 students who are members of the club and 1 teacher who is a patron of the club on the 30th of March. The club at Binga High School is a combo club which caters for Debate, Public Speaking as well as what they call a press club.
The meeting was used to highlight part of Tonga.Onlines drive, which is to improve education as well as to facilitate in developing skills and capacity for local content development. Some general principles of journalism were discussed and the members of the club were given a holiday assignment to write a short article. These articles will be collected and used as the basis for further capacity building of the club members.

7.Mucheni Young Buntibe Group

After the failure of the HIFA participation attempt, the focus changed to the Schools Cultural Festival which will be held in May at the Victoria Falls. The young group is very eager for the exposure, but the transfer of the groups trainer (The Headmaster) to Siabuwa Primary is a threat to the continued existence of the group.

8.Marimba

An assessment of the state of the marimba at Binga High was done and a report compiled. The report also provides a list of things that will be needed for the repair of one set of Marimba. The Marimba will be used for the schools Silver Jubilee celebrations in October 2010.

9.Arts development

Work with the Theatre Group, Kukondwa Performing Arts has been ongoing with the studio. The group took part in the drama competitions hosted by Ntengwe and come second overall. The group walked away with a cash prize of seventy five dollars ($75)

10.Challenges Faced

Sianzyundu Secondary School Broken Asbestos
The roof of the Sianzyundu ITC is broken, a series of discussions have been held with the head to encourage the school to repair the roof as it poses a great danger to the computers in the room.
The school always says they do not have money. They actually say, they will remove the computers from that room until they get money to repair the roof.