The One Laptop Per Child program

[Androsphinx]

In centuries to come, archeologists will view this entire programme in the same way we regard Swift's "A Modest Proposal" - a satirical attack on contemporary mores and practices through the advocation of an utterly inappropriate, ineffectual and counter-productive strategy, which even an idiot could see was fatally flawed. I still can't believe that this is actually going to happen.

[Sarevok]

I have to agree with the Duchess. From my personal experience a lot of people have computers in Bangladesh, granted I live in an urban area and that is to be expected. But even in rural villages with no electrical power there are internet and WiFi enabled Smartphones to be found which are hand held computers capable of doing anything a PC from 10 years ago can do. And what exactly are these expensive devices used for ? Surfing the internet for porn, social networking sites, emails and IMing mainly. Even the basic task of using the internet to read a newspaper escapes most people. It is not until I entered university that I started to see students using computers for educational purposes. The $ 100 laptop program is under great deal of debate here today and I hope the money is spent in better ways.

The USA became the world's superpower because it built Canals in the 1830s, railroads in the mid to late 19th century, and dams in the 1930s through 1950s. This was done with the quality of the education system and its exposure to the average population changing very little until after WW2 and the GI bill, at which point a fully developed national infrastructure was already complete. Without a national infrastructure, an educated population is simply worthless.

Quoted for truth. You can already see this in the oversaturated IT sector in south asia. There is far too many unemployed IT people who are helpless and not contributing much to the economy.

[Jadeite]

How is this being funded? Private donations or government contributions? If its the former, why should we bitch about how they spend their money? The worst that can happen is they get confiscated by corrupt governments or sold for money or food (in which case they've still helped out the recipients).

If its funded by government contributions, well, there's still far worse things that money has been wasted on, and this is at least worth a shot.

[Zixinus]

Are you seriously racist enough to think that EVERYONE in the third world is an uneducated illiterate?

Did I say it was? I didn't. I've met someone from the "third world" and he was quite educated. He worked in a language school as an English teacher. His intelligence was shown by the fact that he didn't reside in his own country.

Have you ever heard of Patrice Lumumba University in Moscow?

Yes, I have. I had a teacher that studied there.

And Moscow is in Russia. And since when is Russia a "third world" country?

Yes, I can imagine that there are academies in such poor countries. Reserved for the elite and rich, are rarely for the common people.

A lack of educational opportunities for their current level of social sophistication is NOT their problem.

Yeah, the fact that the children use chalk tablets (like those before WW2 in rural areas) and the teaching rooms don't have desks and chairs to sit on, and the teachers have an education level for what he couldn't get a job at McDoland's in the West, shows it very well.

If you mean that the lack of education for such countries isn't their MAIN problem, well yeah, that I can agree with. However, trying to solve only one problem at a time, while ignoring the rest, isn't that helpful either.

That's the idea behind "children are the most precious resource of country".

Even if this programme worked, all it would do is create people who have a knowledge base which they CANNOT UTILIZE BECAUSE THERE IS NO INFRASTRUCTURE FOR THE INDUSTRIES WHICH REQUIRE A KNOWLEDGE BASE IN THE FIRST PLACE.

A task dependent on their government, furthermore you also think that they are only giving these laptops to dirt poor countries.
Are you reading the parts of the posts that you can oject to? That is, nitpicking?

They are giving this shit to DEVELOPING countries, where the infrastructure is BEING BUILT as I write this.
And again, these laptops are purchased and distributed with the close help of the GOVERNMENTS those countries have! Or did you think that deluded white men smuggle these things into the children's house at night?

How hard it is, seriously, to process that?

I processed the first fucking time you said it you moron. Of course you don't process what I said at all. Your just nitpicking while ignoring my own reasoning.

Furthermore, a lack of education doesn't even hamper their economic opportunities, as in an undeveloped society like those in Africa, being a guy who pours concrete into a dam actually gives you the economic prospects for a highly successful lifelong career which allows you to ably provide for your family.

Does education in the Western world also always produce people with doctrines of some kind? Of course not. The goal isn't to give everyone that, hell that would actually be a stupid idea. The goal is for them to DESIRE to have such facilities, and for them to know more about the world in general. Also, these laptops are given to children as tools for education, so when they grow up, they can make a living in a more informed fashion.

Furthermore, do you think that these countries wil stay like that FOREVER?

How is this being funded? Private donations or government contributions?

Mostly governments that think its worth a shot, but private donations can also come into play trough the "get one, give one" program. You pay 300$ and get a laptop, while another goes to the poorer countries.

[brianeyci]

Quoted for truth. You can already see this in the oversaturated IT sector in south asia. There is far too many unemployed IT people who are helpless and not contributing much to the economy.

Do you have any figures for numbers of unemployed IT people I can stuff down people's throats?

I've always suspected ever since I was a kid that computers and Internet were a needless distraction. Since then it's always been a guilty pleasure, and I finally gave it up in college to become a computer programmer under the assumption that the market was saturated. To me it seemed obvious: Windows and computers don't make civilization, and coding is so easily outsourced that if you want to be a computer guy you're either stuck being nothing more than wrench monkey putting parts together or you have to be the best of the best and work for Google or IBM etc.

But I have no figures to back that up, and really only ancedotal evidence and even more ancedotal evidence from friends who say it's easy to find an IT job. I have heard just as many people say that computer science degree = instant job and if you don't get one you suck, but that's all ancedotal too and I'd love to see some numbers.

I suspect the problem is basic: too many people. Every dickbrain and their cousin wants to get into IT. The .com bust was not so long ago. IT people like to whine how corporations are not offering them enough money so they don't take the job (40k+ with benefits or nothing RAR!) but I just want to see numbers of unemployed IT people. Especially university educated IT people. Or better yet, number of IT graduates actually employed in their field since there's really no point studying computer science for four years and then working for McDonalds.

[brianeyci]

Nevermind my google-fu found in a few seconds...

So despite the alleged skills shortage in IT, a computer science degree isn't looking like a meal ticket: less than two-thirds of new graduates were in full-time work at the time of the survey, and their salaries are only just above the average for all graduates. Add the fact that only just over half of computer science graduates were working as computer professionals, and the outlook seems even less rosy.

So it looks like shit. No duh, sitting in front of a computer is not the way to build civilization, which is unfortunate. Giving these kids computers could get them growing up as computer junkies with IM-speak and computer game addiction, instead of intended affect of Einsteins.

Does anybody know anyone who became a literate intellectual through computer use? As in growing up with ebooks? I know they haven't been around a long time, but experimenting on a child's upbringing in a starving destitute country is doubly disgusting with ebooks if it's never been done before in well off countries. I know personally as a kid if I had a choice to read or fire up video games I would've picked the latter most of the time. With a desktop icon for a game or browser right beside ebook icon...

[Surlethe]

A lack of educational opportunities for their current level of social sophistication is NOT their problem.

Yeah, the fact that the children use chalk tablets (like those before WW2 in rural areas) and the teaching rooms don't have desks and chairs to sit on, and the teachers have an education level for what he couldn't get a job at McDoland's in the West, shows it very well.

If you mean that the lack of education for such countries isn't their MAIN problem, well yeah, that I can agree with. However, trying to solve only one problem at a time, while ignoring the rest, isn't that helpful either.

That's the idea behind "children are the most precious resource of country".

You shoot your own argument in the foot. A needless luxury like a laptop computer in every child's lap will not fix the basic lacks of third-world educational systems. The money would be better spent on things like desks, chairs, pens, paper, textbooks, and educations for the teachers.

Pray tell, how is a laptop in the lap of every single child in some shithole's education system more essential than these basic goods (not to mention, the infrastructure needs of their societies)?

[[R_H]]

^ Exactly. (Surlethe)

I like that number that they spout in the mission statement

Given the resources that developing countries can reasonably allocate to education—sometimes less than $20 per year per pupil, compared to the approximately $7500 per pupil spent annually in the U.S.—even a doubled or redoubled national commitment to traditional education, augmented by external and private funding, would not get the job done.

I'd like to see how they came up with that number, and what information they used (or manipulated) to do so. Is it (average operating budget)/(number of students), or just (number of hours of instruction)*(average hourly salary for teachers)? For a low income developing country, relatively little of your operating budget is going to be spent on things (maintenance, utilities, adminstration in every school, janitorial staff etc) other than paying the teacher, building the school house, and buying textbooks (which don't have to be replaced all that often, less often than computers) and consumables like pencils and paper.
The constructionist learning theory strikes me as a truck-load of steaming bullshit, learning by inquiry only goes so far. You'd still have a curriculm (should anyways) and you can only go so far in science and mathematics by yourself, at one point another someone needs to teach it to you so that you A) understand it and B) can apply it. Universal Gravitation is a good example. Only a tiny percentage of students in junior high and highschool (14-18) could derive UG from results obtained by inquiry. The others would have to be taught this (that evil top down method) in order to (most importantly) understand the concept and then apply it. There are limits to what people can learn on their own, especially if there's no easy way for their questions to be answered. Sure, they could theoretical use the Internet to do that, but they've got the almighty mesh network but no cheap Internet access.

[K. A. Pital]

The idea that improving the education of people in the third world is going to help them is simply wrong at this point, because these people could and should be getting richer by doing manual labour building dams, irrigation canals, and railroads, and stringing power line, which does not require you to have a computer to learn how to do. It's their children or grandchildren, once those projects are done, who will need computers and college educations.

Quoted, since correct. The Third World requires massive industrialization to at least achieve Second World level. Else, they will fail no matter how many "laptops" per child you give to them, since their countries lack industrial infrastructure beyond what's needed for rich resource extraction, end of story.

[phongn]

I've always suspected ever since I was a kid that computers and Internet were a needless distraction. Since then it's always been a guilty pleasure, and I finally gave it up in college to become a computer programmer under the assumption that the market was saturated. To me it seemed obvious: Windows and computers don't make civilization, and coding is so easily outsourced that if you want to be a computer guy you're either stuck being nothing more than wrench monkey putting parts together or you have to be the best of the best and work for Google or IBM etc.

Er, the market still faces extremely strong demand for competent software engineers. There just aren't enough to go around. As far as computers and the Internet being needless distractions? Certainly not. Real productivity gains have been made, businesses developed with strong business cases (not just the nonsense dot-com corporations) and whatnot. No, computers do not make civilization but they are absolutely essential to our modern economy.

As for outsourcing, they've been whining about that for years. You can't outsource everything and your silly black/white fallacy is absurd on the face of it. Even accepting that argument (crap outsource-vulnerable jobs vs. high-end design/architecting positions), that applies to much of the engineering field as a whole, anyways! Of course people want the very best for their firms, not legions of average engineers.

But I have no figures to back that up, and really only ancedotal evidence and even more ancedotal evidence from friends who say it's easy to find an IT job. I have heard just as many people say that computer science degree = instant job and if you don't get one you suck, but that's all ancedotal too and I'd love to see some numbers.

If you want to play the anecdote war, it's not hard to get a software engineering job. IT is not so easy these days - much work has been gone to outsourcing basic, low-tier helpdesk jobs and centralizing management of large networks (so you don't have to send someone out to resolve a software issue).

I suspect the problem is basic: too many people. Every dickbrain and their cousin wants to get into IT. The .com bust was not so long ago. IT people like to whine how corporations are not offering them enough money so they don't take the job (40k+ with benefits or nothing RAR!) but I just want to see numbers of unemployed IT people. Especially university educated IT people. Or better yet, number of IT graduates actually employed in their field since there's really no point studying computer science for four years and then working for McDonalds.

There's an common misconception that IT and CS/software engineering are the same. They aren't. IT almost always refers to management of large systems or organizations. As far as numbers go, 2006 showed unemployment rates of 2.2% in the IT field.

[[R_H]]

What I find hilarious is that they assume that by giving every child a laptop, this will eventually transform the economy (or lack there of ) into and "information" economy. Conveniently ignoring the fact that many low income developing countries haven't even undergone mechanisation of agriculture (requiring less people in agriculture and less subsistence agriculture) let alone industrialisation.

[brianeyci]

Er, the market still faces extremely strong demand for competent software engineers.

That's the question isn't it. Every time I mention this, software engineers rebuttal and say that quality software engineers have no problem finding work. But what is quality? I did dig up figures from that magazine survey (if you got better I will look at it.) So what is a competent software engineer?

When I think of a good software engineer... I think of people like... you. People who run message boards and have been around computers their entire lives. Probably wrote some international programming contests in high school. Keep up with the latest trends in computing, and genuinely enjoy working with computers. Prepared for continual, long-term education and reeducation and adaptive.

But I'm sure you've met the kind: they go to university or college thinking that software engineering or computer science (not all of which are software engineers by the way, at my university software engineering is an "elite" discipline of computer science) not really liking computers and having no real idea how a computer works at all. They think that doing all the ivory tower work will get them a job for life with IBM or Google, when in reality very few get to work for those companies. They don't read the trade journals, couldn't build a computer for the life of them, and chug along thinking just having their diploma is enough. They're good at math so it gets them through but they absolutely suck with computers.

It is better than a say... English degree. But at least English majors got to party. CS majors had to work their ass off, and if they're not going to graduate school... just a very quick search on google with my google-fu gave another source with CS/IT having the highest unemployment in the UK for recent graduates.

If you want to play the anecdote war, it's not hard to get a software engineering job. IT is not so easy these days - much work has been gone to outsourcing basic, low-tier helpdesk jobs and centralizing management of large networks (so you don't have to send someone out to resolve a software issue).

Software engineering isn't the only computer science. And... are these good jobs? I'm not talking about pay, but are these the kind of jobs where you're leashed to a desk coding 24/7? Is it fun? Do the people get job satisfaction from it?

There's an common misconception that IT and CS/software engineering are the same. They aren't. IT almost always refers to management of large systems or organizations. As far as numbers go, 2006 showed unemployment rates of 2.2% in the IT field.

2.2% is great but the most important is:

1. Jobs for recent graduates. It's not much help if the jobs popping up are managers as your link says, which require experience. Is the field actually growing, or simply maturing?

2. Whether they actually work in the IT field. This is important to me, because the amount of work a CS or SE major has to put in compared to a English or Humanities or even Physical Sciences major is a fucking living hell. Stravo mentioned guys who don't have computer science degrees who just know how to use legal software packages and they can get jobs in legal with computers. Nursing is probably the same, with nurses with little computer experience.

As for the difference between IT and CS and SE, yeah it will take different training and different skill sets. But I was under the assumption that for medium and small businesses, it is all lumped together and there's absolutely no difference. An engineer should be intelligent enough to do anything and everything a business requires of him. I'm sure an engineer is smart enough to self-study and learn enough about computer programming on his own. It's not as good as a dedicated software engineer, but there's enough non-formally trained people in the field that I think it's safe to say software engineering can be picked up by any person with formal mathematical training in a degree over the course of a year, especially since they took many of the same courses going up.

As for engineering, mineral engineering has I think a 0% unemployment rate. Chemical will have less too. Computer engineering has the most IIRC. So it honestly seems like a losing proposition to go into computers, IT, CS, SE.

[phongn]

It is better than a say... English degree. But at least English majors got to party. CS majors had to work their ass off, and if they're not going to graduate school... just a very quick search on google with my google-fu gave another source with CS/IT having the highest unemployment in the UK for recent graduates.

Yeah, I saw, same for Australia. I'm looking for North America numbers, though, since IT spending seems to be pretty good here and there's growth - especially since so many of the big software and IT firms are located here. Same goes for all the big software firms.

Software engineering isn't the only computer science. And... are these good jobs? I'm not talking about pay, but are these the kind of jobs where you're leashed to a desk coding 24/7? Is it fun? Do the people get job satisfaction from it?

Yes, there are good jobs - but most good software engineers, in fact, spend the least amount of time coding and much more doing planning, design and testing. The real joy in programming is solving a problem - the code is just an ends to a mean. During my internship, I certainly wasn't chained to my desk with my eyes bleeding from staring at code - we had design meetings, reviews, communications with the customer.

1. Jobs for recent graduates. It's not much help if the jobs popping up are managers as your link says, which require experience. Is the field actually growing, or simply maturing?

Both, as I mentioned. Pure IT is rapidly maturing to centrally-managed systems. Growth there tends to require a very strong skill set and there just isn't the demand for low-level 'paper MCSE' employees anymore. Software engineering is almost always in demand somewhere. And it appears in a lot more places than you might expect - large growth is taking place in interdisciplinary fields combining CS with some physical science or medicine.

As for the difference between IT and CS and SE, yeah it will take different training and different skill sets. But I was under the assumption that for medium and small businesses, it is all lumped together and there's absolutely no difference. An engineer should be intelligent enough to do anything and everything a business requires of him.

The fields are more specialized than you think. In a very small business, yeah, your software guy might also be able to manage the network but once you get larger one generally needs to segregate the fields. Writing or designing software and managing networks and systems are just too different.

I'm sure an engineer is smart enough to self-study and learn enough about computer programming on his own. It's not as good as a dedicated software engineer, but there's enough non-formally trained people in the field that I think it's safe to say software engineering can be picked up by any person with formal mathematical training in a degree over the course of a year, especially since they took many of the same courses going up.

Programming, maybe, can be picked up half-competently in a year. Good software engineering? I don't think so. There's a lot more to it than just churning out code in front of a computer.

As for engineering, mineral engineering has I think a 0% unemployment rate. Chemical will have less too. Computer engineering has the most IIRC. So it honestly seems like a losing proposition to go into computers, IT, CS, SE.

Maybe for Australia and the UK, but North America still seems different. I'm looking for numbers.

[brianeyci]

During my internship, I certainly wasn't chained to my desk with my eyes bleeding from staring at code - we had design meetings, reviews, communications with the customer.

That's true, one advantage that software engineers have over others: the co-op program is usually very good.

Problem is not all software engineers get into co-op and it is usually an elite program.

Good software engineering? I don't think so. There's a lot more to it than just churning out code in front of a computer.

This is the big question. Software engineers go through so much shit in their diploma, so much math and physics and on top of that computer courses, and they don't even get certified as a P.Eng.! No insult to software "engineers" but a Mineral, Industrial, Chemical, could probably do what they do with some spare courses and spare time. The exception is computer engineers who follow a traditional engineering program, but that's not really software engineering or IT.

The prestige and rigor of the degree is definitely not as great as a real engineering degree, and the work is almost as much. Seems to me better to go all the way and go computer engineering or even go for mech and do computers on your spare time. There's enough of those ads for private computer schools and professional certification: are they all shit? What stops an engineer from getting a chem and say, doing computer stuff in private schools like people get their MBA's on their spare time?

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Did I say it was? I didn't. I've met someone from the "third world" and he was quite educated. He worked in a language school as an English teacher. His intelligence was shown by the fact that he didn't reside in his own country.

Plenty of them do, however.

Yes, I have. I had a teacher that studied there.

And Moscow is in Russia. And since when is Russia a "third world" country?

Strawman. The whole university existed simply to educate people from the Third World, retard, at considerably depressed rates. So third-world people have access to educational opportunities, obviously, in sufficient quantities for national needs.

Yes, I can imagine that there are academies in such poor countries. Reserved for the elite and rich, are rarely for the common people.

So? The common people don't need an education to have highly successful lives in undeveloped societies. That is a fact.

Yeah, the fact that the children use chalk tablets (like those before WW2 in rural areas) and the teaching rooms don't have desks and chairs to sit on, and the teachers have an education level for what he couldn't get a job at McDoland's in the West, shows it very well.

And computers are going to fix this how? Better to focus on training the teachers to a better level, so that they can impart useful job skills to the kids, like pouring concrete and stringing electrical wire and other things which actually need to be done in places like Kenya and Cambodia.

If you mean that the lack of education for such countries isn't their MAIN problem, well yeah, that I can agree with. However, trying to solve only one problem at a time, while ignoring the rest, isn't that helpful either.

That's the idea behind "children are the most precious resource of country".

Except that they're being over-educated for the work that they must do under this ludicrous scheme. What part of that can't you process? The problem of a lack of educational resources for lower-class people can only be solved when they have a functional infrastructure which lets them get decent jobs and have regular access to food in the first place!

A task dependent on their government, furthermore you also think that they are only giving these laptops to dirt poor countries.
Are you reading the parts of the posts that you can oject to? That is, nitpicking?

They are giving this shit to DEVELOPING countries, where the infrastructure is BEING BUILT as I write this.
And again, these laptops are purchased and distributed with the close help of the GOVERNMENTS those countries have! Or did you think that deluded white men smuggle these things into the children's house at night?

It's still a luxury, and these "developing" countries frequently still have serious infrastructure problems. Cambodia, with the pilot project, for example, has a ridiculously small railroad net, and the Mekong river is not heavily dammed yet, nor its tributaries. All of this would result in major economic development, and would be a better use of the money. Remember, I did in fact read about the project, and it's the governments which are paying for these laptops--and therefore it is the governments which are wasting the money that could be better spent on a dam. We don't need another useless project to encourage third world leaders to spend more money on.

I processed the first fucking time you said it you moron. Of course you don't process what I said at all. Your just nitpicking while ignoring my own reasoning.

Your own "reasoning" is nothing of the sort, rather you have an addiction to Utopianist buzzwords about creating "free access to knowledge" and expecting it will magically bring prosperity. Well, here's a hint for you, I didn't have access to the fucking internet as a six year old, and I'm a successful and technologically adept individual in a first-world country today. I didn't need the Magic Laptop of Knowledge to get there, either. Spend the money on a library.

Does education in the Western world also always produce people with doctrines of some kind? Of course not. The goal isn't to give everyone that, hell that would actually be a stupid idea. The goal is for them to DESIRE to have such facilities, and for them to know more about the world in general. Also, these laptops are given to children as tools for education, so when they grow up, they can make a living in a more informed fashion.

And that can be inoculated by a proper normal education system. And why do they need this to live in an informed fashion, precisely? 19th century broadsheets led to informed and involved societies then, so why is the internet needed here? Give the village a fucking printing press, and another teacher to teach people how to read. Much cheaper than a hundred and fourty dollar laptops for every single kid.

Furthermore, do you think that these countries wil stay like that FOREVER?

For at least the next hundred years, yes. At minimum.

[[R_H]]

Regarding a printing press and "free" knowledge. What about a printing press in a village/region that prints textbooks (information in them donated by publishing companies like McGraw-Hill etc) for the students. It would certainly reduce the distance that the textbooks have to be shipped and would be fairly sustainable if ink, paper and spare parts can be procurred within the region. The government would be buying the textbooks from a domestic supplier, which of course is a plus for their economy.

[General Zod]

Regarding a printing press and "free" knowledge. What about a printing press in a village/region that prints textbooks (information in them donated by publishing companies like McGraw-Hill etc) for the students. It would certainly reduce the distance that the textbooks have to be shipped and would be fairly sustainable if ink, paper and spare parts can be procurred within the region. The government would be buying the textbooks from a domestic supplier, which of course is a plus for their economy.

Where are they going to get the raw materials to build and maintain the printing press, let alone the funding if it's all local?

[Boyish-Tigerlilly]

^ Exactly.
The constructionist learning theory strikes me as a truck-load of steaming bullshit, learning by inquiry only goes so far. You'd still have a curriculm (should anyways) and you can only go so far in science and mathematics by yourself, at one point another someone needs to teach it to you so that you A) understand it and B) can apply it. Universal Gravitation is a good example. Only a tiny percentage of students in junior high and highschool (14-18) could derive UG from results obtained by inquiry. The others would have to be taught this (that evil top down method) in order to (most importantly) understand the concept and then apply it. There are limits to what people can learn on their own, especially if there's no easy way for their questions to be answered. Sure, they could theoretical use the Internet to do that, but they've got the almighty mesh network but no cheap Internet access.

It's not bullshit; the problem is that people try to take an either/or approach to pedagogy, and it's inappropriate. You want to use both direct instruction and Behaviourism as well as Constructivist approaches to augment each other. You don't do a class that's all Constructivist or All behaviourist. It's hardly bullshit.

Learning by individual inquiry is only one part of Constructivism in education, and it's usually advocated in elementary school grades. Constructivism focuses on student learning styles and advocates a VAKT approach: (visual, audio, kinesthetic, and tactile) when you make up lesson plans. But this isn't appropriate for all subjects at all times.

Additionally, it advocates explaining a rationale for what students learn and showing them practical applications, letting students use that information for authentic projects, purposes instead of simply memorization and regurgitation with fill-in bubble tests. You need to tell students why something is important, what it means, and how it is derived. It helps them learn. In traditional classes, you got a formula, memorized it, and that was that: turn to page 40 and do 100 problems, find the answers in the back of the book. We had no explanations of anything in the math and science classes, no interaction with the material. It was just memorization of random factoids.

Constructivism also advocates that, in addition to lecture, teachers should use leading questions and get the student to understand by scaffolding and interaction with the instructor and peer groups (aka, reciprocal teaching, socratic seminars, etc). This doe work, but only a fool thinks this is the only technique to employ.

It's only part of the lesson. You wouldn't teach science entirely like this. In fact, the pedagogical basis for part of lab practicals, projects are Constuctivist. They're useful tools, but they have a place and time.

[Resinence]

There's enough of those ads for private computer schools and professional certification: are they all shit? What stops an engineer from getting a chem and say, doing computer stuff in private schools like people get their MBA's on their spare time?

Hilariously, I'm just the guy your talking about and to be honest, the talk about "well why can't just some random guy do it" is insulting to the amount of work in proper IT courses. Those "we get you a job in 4 months or your money back" things are shit. And not worth the paper they are written on. From what I've seen, at least 80% of the courses are packed with the morons you just described, who don't know shit and just follow the guides. And still don't know shit afterwards. Some random guy picking up coding is not going to even come close to a good software engineer, infact, neither do the hordes (yes, hordes) of idiots with stacks of degrees. Do they know the difference between a ring-0 and ring-3 debugger? Read assembly? Code it? Know more than just a scripting language (lol javascript )? Moreover, some random computer savvy employee doing your network stuff is asking for a disaster. In a large company your servers will be attacked, there is always some stupid scriptkiddie. And thats when the difference comes up, the good manager has had backups running every night and taken offsite and kept up to date on security exploits from the sites the kiddies use, and the random eployee is completely fucked and now has a trashed internet server.

[phongn]

Problem is not all software engineers get into co-op and it is usually an elite program.

Well, I was an intern - not at a co-op, and certainly not at an elite institution. Really, though, in Tampa Bay, those opportunities are there for the taking.

The prestige and rigor of the degree is definitely not as great as a real engineering degree, and the work is almost as much. Seems to me better to go all the way and go computer engineering or even go for mech and do computers on your spare time. There's enough of those ads for private computer schools and professional certification: are they all shit? What stops an engineer from getting a chem and say, doing computer stuff in private schools like people get their MBA's on their spare time?

Sure, they can program with some extra courses. That's not in contention. But if they want to do software engineering, they're going to be at a competitive disadvantage in the marketplace - they have a few courses + their engineering degree, versus someone with a full undergraduate degree and implied training.

[TrailerParkJawa]

I agree with Phongn's sentiment that a good software engineer has a lot of possibilities. This is true in Silicon Valley even after the boom. Things are rolling pretty well.

The other parts of IT (I'm using a large umbrella here) like Desktop Support, Help Desk, Application Support those jobs are grinding, boring, and most of have left the Bay Area for cheaper states or overseas. Most companies leave 1 or 2 guys local for things that need to be done physically and thats it.

As for the laptop problem I think its a waste of resources. It smacks to me of an idealistic notion that laptops for poverty stricken 3rd worlders are going to be of much help. How much help is a free laptop to a someone living in poverty in the USA? Not as much as you'd expect.

I rather think problems like the one were they give "micro-loans" to people in the 3rd world do much more help.

[phongn]

As for the laptop problem I think its a waste of resources. It smacks to me of an idealistic notion that laptops for poverty stricken 3rd worlders are going to be of much help. How much help is a free laptop to a someone living in poverty in the USA? Not as much as you'd expect.

There have been numerous programs to get laptops into the hands of poorer students in the US, or to invest huge sums of money into computers in the public schools. I don't think I've seen anything indicating that such programs have been successful. Solid education is going to require a much more concerted effort.

Now, as Brian and other notes - hardened systems per village to let people get information (possibly tying into a cell-network for low-speed access - GSM is freaking everywhere) is a good idea. OLPC is not.

[[R_H]]

Where are they going to get the raw materials to build and maintain the printing press, let alone the funding if it's all local?

I don't know, it was just something I threw into the open. Maintaining it shouldn't be too difficult for some parts of Africa, seeing as they can keep decades old Soviet military equipment running. It would just have to be very simple (like said old Soviet mil. equipment). Perhaps a lease or a loan on the printing press if it's too expensive to be purchaseed out-right.

It's not bullshit; the problem is that people try to take an either/or approach to pedagogy, and it's inappropriate. You want to use both direct instruction and Behaviourism as well as Constructivist approaches to augment each other. You don't do a class that's all Constructivist or All behaviourist. It's hardly bullshit.

Learning by individual inquiry is only one part of Constructivism in education, and it's usually advocated in elementary school grades. Constructivism focuses on student learning styles and advocates a VAKT approach: (visual, audio, kinesthetic, and tactile) when you make up lesson plans. But this isn't appropriate for all subjects at all times.

Additionally, it advocates explaining a rationale for what students learn and showing them practical applications, letting students use that information for authentic projects, purposes instead of simply memorization and regurgitation with fill-in bubble tests. You need to tell students why something is important, what it means, and how it is derived. It helps them learn. In traditional classes, you got a formula, memorized it, and that was that: turn to page 40 and do 100 problems, find the answers in the back of the book. We had no explanations of anything in the math and science classes, no interaction with the material. It was just memorization of random factoids.

Constructivism also advocates that, in addition to lecture, teachers should use leading questions and get the student to understand by scaffolding and interaction with the instructor and peer groups (aka, reciprocal teaching, socratic seminars, etc). This doe work, but only a fool thinks this is the only technique to employ.

It's only part of the lesson. You wouldn't teach science entirely like this. In fact, the pedagogical basis for part of lab practicals, projects are Constuctivist. They're useful tools, but they have a place and time.

Thanks for clearing that up. Are they (OLPC) going for a solely Constructionist pedagogy than a combination of it, direct instruction and behaviourism?

[General Zod]

I don't know, it was just something I threw into the open. Maintaining it shouldn't be too difficult for some parts of Africa, seeing as they can keep decades old Soviet military equipment running. It would just have to be very simple (like said old Soviet mil. equipment). Perhaps a lease or a loan on the printing press if it's too expensive to be purchaseed out-right.

Until they have the demand and infrastructure for the books, it would be more economical to import them. Especially when literacy in these nations is appallingly low.

[J]

A few years ago I worked in Nepal, where a large part of my job involved studying the impacts of aid & infrastructure projects on the local population. The Duchess is 100% right, a 3rd world society does not and will not bootstrap itself up to 2nd or 1st world status simply by giving them laptops or other high tech toys. We are looking at subsidence farmers & villagers without running water nor electricity and a beaten dirt path for a road, where water has to be carried in by hand from the river or local wells.

These people don't need a computer to tell them that they need clean running water and decent roads which don't become impassable with every rainfall if they ever hope to raise their standard of living. They know already, but they can't do a damn thing since their resources are too limited to do much beyond keeping themselves alive, and a computer isn't going to change that.

What they need is basic infrastructure, an irrigation canal for the farm so villagers won't have to carry water for the crops every day, running water for proper sanitation, transportation routes to nearby villages & cities to enable trade, all that is needed to get people off the farms and doing work which will lead to the advancement of their society.