Dr. Richard Rowe, President of Open Learning Exchange (OLE), and Larry Direnger, Executive Director of Educators for Social Responsibility (ESR) National met in ESR’s Cambridge offices on August 14 to sign an important and far-reaching Memorandum of Understanding (MOU). The agreement permits OLE to distribute through the Billion Kids Library all of ESR’s materials on conflict resolution and aggression mediation, which have been used successfully in urban school systems throughout the United States.

Once the materials are in the Library, they will be available for use and adaption by teachers and leaders all around the world.

The agreement also anticipates OLE and ESR working jointly to provide training for OLE centers in Rwanda, Ghana, Haiti, and other locations where conflict and civil turmoil have been a key issue.

Plans are underway to help ESR localize their programs in these international areas through the inclusion of local content and references to local issues. The content of Connected and Respected a nationally respected K-6 curriculum, and ESR’s equally acclaimed Conflict Resolution in the Middle School and Conflict Resolution in the High School will become available to OLE members around the world as a complete K-12 curriculum.

–Joe Rappa

His talk was grouped around celestial bodies and events: the Milky Way, the constellations, the moon, Jupiter, and the current Perseid meteor showers. Mixing humor, academics, and his own personal experiences as an amateur astronomer, Cézanne gave a lively talk and then took participants outside to the library’s deck, where he’d set up his Burgess five-inch refractor telescope on a computerized German equatorial mount, and gave everyone the opportunity to take an exciting up-close-and-personal look at the moon and at Jupiter.

Cézanne can often be seen at the base of MacMillan Pier in Provincetown, Massachusetts, inviting passers-by to “come see the moon!”

Pun said the work was a “crazy project”, since when they started in 2000 the team had no money and knew very little about wireless technology. “You see photographs of our antenna dishes up in the tops of trees,” he said. “We did not put them there so we could invent ‘green wireless’. We did that because we had no money to build towers.”

Under Nepal’s previous government, it was illegal for private citizens to import key pieces of technology needed for the project, so team members and ‘tourists’ endured significant risks by smuggling components in their backpacks. The current government has recognized and licensed the project, and is helping integrate it into a large-scale effort to provide improved Internet access to Nepal’s larger communities. “We have worked very hard and many, many villages now have wireless,” Pun said, “but still most of the country is waiting.”

For Nepali villagers, access to the Internet is often less about checking email and more about providing remote medical care and advice for communities that have no doctors, and helping teachers provide a suitable education for the students in their care. In regard to the latter, Pun spoke extensively about the efforts of OLE Nepal to introduce and support e-learning in Nepali village classrooms. “To put a laptop in a classroom, and have no materials to use on it, is to waste everybody’s time,” he said.

The presentation was one of many Pun has been making during a tour of the United States to raise support for the wireless project. He asks as many people as possible to commit to a dollar a month so that the team can continue to extend and improve their wireless network.

To find out more about supporting the Nepal Wireless Project, visit www.nepalwireless.net.

Tom’s professional success has opened doors to broad opportunities. His interest in human/wildlife interactions led to his doing the field audio and distribution work for an EMMY-nominated documentary focusing on the annual spawning of Atlantic horseshoe crabs on the Delaware Bay, “Dollars on the Beach.” Building on that material, he later helped develop an award-winning, multi-media, multi-disciplinary curriculum, “Green Eggs and Sand.”

Tom’s service on the board of a Chinese nature protection organization led to his developing an “up close and personal” profile of the composer Chien Tai Chen, that aired nation-wide on China’s five major television networks, featuring Chen’s theme song for an emerging grassroots Chinese environmental organization. He also has served on the advisory board of an American Indian educational organization.

Living on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, near Washington, DC, Tom enjoys volunteering in the local community, riding his bicycle and eating roast sweet corn and watermelon when they are in season.

GeSCI provides strategic advice to Ministries of Education in developing countries on the effective use of Information Communication Technologies (ICTs) for education and communities of learning. GeSCI works to improve the quality of teaching and learning through the strategic and effective use of ICTs.

The workshop presented an opportunity for continued collaboration between OLE and GeSCI. Already GeSCI has provided valuable support to both OLE Ghana and OLE Rwanda during the important early stages of their development. Coordination of efforts between OLE and GeSCI is a priority for both organizations.

The GeSCI workshop also presented a welcomed opportunity for networking between OLE Ghana and OLE Rwanda leaders. Topics of discussion were funding, future projects, and partnerships.

OLE Rwanda works in partnership with the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Youth. The mission of OLE Rwanda is integrated in the Rwandan Education Sector Strategic plan 2006 - 2010 (ESSP) for basic Education. This plan also empowers young people to participate actively in the government’s poverty eradication programme (Vision 2020 Umurenge) through human capacity building projects.

OLE Rwanda has an impressive Board of Trustees led by Chairman Bizimana Muhebera. Chairman Muhebera is the Director of Library at the Kigali Institute of Education. Murinda Muzira Jacques is the new Executive Director for OLE Rwanda.

The first areas of concentration for OLE Rwanda will be the creating and describing digital content for the Rwandan education system so that it can be shared quickly and freely by teachers all over the country, and developing and deploying a peace building curriculum for basic education.

John was met on his arrival by a crowd of over five thousand villagers, many of whom had walked for miles to celebrate the opening of their new school. They gave him a huge welcome, applauding him continuously as he greeted each of those in the long reception line and as he sought to accept the literally hundreds of traditional flower garlands that were one by one draped over his shoulders.

This was a moment that will be remembered. The school will transform the lives of thousands of these Himalayan children and their villages where their average family income is $3.50 per week. Even with the donation of this new school building, a year’s tuition for one student is $60, equal to one third of the average family income in those villages. This forces families to chose which one of their children will gain an education. Many are not able to do that. Thus this is just one critical step in ensuring every child a quality basic education.

John worked for years as an accountant and then grew his company into a multi-million dollar financial services firm for large retail chains. Since his retirement a few years ago he has lived a good part of each year in Nepal and Thailand, has built several schools in both countries and has provided full scholarships to many students from that part of the world for study in the United States. He is an inspiration for all who know him about how one person can help so many others improve their lives.

Reflecting on his visit this morning, John simply said, “What a wonderful way this is to spend one’s time and money during retirement.”

The conference takes place annually with the goal of developing eLearning capacities in Africa. It is the largest gathering of eLearning and distance education professionals in Africa. In 2007 the event attracted 1046 participants from 88 countries. eLearning Africa enables participants to develop multinational and cross-industry contacts and partnerships.

Read more about the conference at http://elearning-africa.com/

This project is part of OLE Nepal’s mission to increase the quality of education while reducing the current disparity in access and quality between school types, regions, and population groups by integrating ICT (information and computer technology)-based education in the daily teaching-learning process.

The laptops for the project were donated by the Danish IT Society in Copenhagen. Read more on OLE Nepal’s blog.

On Tuesday, April 8 Director Feliz Peralta met with the Mayor and school Administrators in Lawrence to discuss the development of the OLE Dominican Republic program. The Director of the City Music program at Berklee College of Music also attended and expressed great interest in establishing a City Music program in the Dominican Republic that would be associated with the OLE initiative.

Additional contacts with both the City of Lawrence and the Dominican Republic are scheduled for early in May, leading to a public presentation to the Lawrence School Committee. A memorandum of agreement has already been signed by Superintendent Laboy. As a result of the meeting, Director Feliz Peralta is collecting and forwarding the Dominican Republic’s Educational Standards and Assessments, and discussing the possibility identifying an OLE Board of Directors as well as approaching several notable leaders in Santo Domingo who may serve as the national OLE Executive Director. Due to ongoing activities in the Dominican Republic and the strong support of Ambassador Santana Silvestre, the likelihood of establishing a board and identifying a local director is high.

The Dominican Republic OLE will benefit from work currently being done in OLE Nepal. There is great interest in using laptop computers as a platform for connecting teachers and learners in at least four urban areas around the country: Santo Domingo, Santiago, Puerto Plata, and one other location. Each of these project sites would coordinate through OLE to develop, apply, evaluate and share educational programs, applications, activities and results.

The interest and potential involvement of Berklee College, through its City Music program, is an additional attractive element that could result in a national program akin to the Cultural Digital Hot Spots being developed in Brazil by Minister of Culture Gilberto Gil. This combination of existing elements, people and activities of mutual interest with the support of national and local officials at the highest level gives OLE Dominican Republic the potential to be a highly successful site and a springboard for future OLE activities throughout Central and South America.

Joe Rappa, Consultant and Regional Coordinator, Latin America