Serene. Full-of-Life. Promising. Words to describe the community of Lubang, Mindoro. This small, and remote island is home to approximately 28,000 thousand people or Lubanguenos. It is also the birthplace of something special - the first OLPC and eKindling deployment in the Philippines. In partnership with former employees of the National Computer Center, the municipality of Lubang and OLPC Friends, eKindling is working towards bringing the transformative benefits of XO laptops and innovative learning practices to the children of Lubang Integrated School and Maligaya Elementary School.
The answer is YES! Ask Harv Viray, a faculty member of the University of the Philippines Diliman. His home in Pasig was flooded as Typhoon Ondoy battered Luzon. Although he made an attempt to save the XO laptop from the rising, murky waters, he was unsuccessful. A month later, the XO laptop still works - a testament to the ruggedness of the XO laptop.
eKindling was invited to speak about the Sugar Learning Platform, One Laptop per Child project and eKindling at Y4iT 2009. Y4iT is an annual event spearheaded by the UP ITTC ( UP Information Technology Training Center), and is the premiere youth congress in information technology in the Philippines. This year's event had a record breaking 18,000 registrations composed primarily of the youth, as well as education practitioners.
Truth be told, I have an ego the size of Manhattan. Children have a way of giving you a reality check and make you realize that you don’t know jack. I found this out when I had my girls. They don’t even have to do anything but be themselves and ask the questions an adult would be afraid to voice out.
This entry is long overdue. The delay is due in part to a week long vacation that I took. Another reason it took me this long to write this is because it was too hard to summarize the experience with just one blog entry, nor would it give justice to the people who had put time in making the event a success. Like Tim Falconer’s post, I would just have to direct you first to the videos and I’ll try to convey the lessons that I learned personally from that experience.
I must admit that before coming to this event I was both filled with excitement and trepidation.
