Week+3+Lab

ICT4D olpc - "its not about the laptop, its about education"

1) kids keep laptops 2) focus on early education 3) no one gets left out 4) connection to the internet 5) free to grow and adapt

"One Laptop Per Child is a neo-colonial trojan horse." "Digital Innovation and Cultural Transformation"
 * Do you agree with this statement? Provide reasoning.**

I agree but also disagree. Because the seeds of colonialism were planted long before our generation, and they have been cemented and will always exist in our society, there is a major part of the world that is reaped of its goods and resources. The people that live in these underdeveloped parts of the world were affected and are clearly still affected to this day because of it. Living in a capitalist society and world further affects the gap between the developed and underdeveloped nations (aka the digital divide). As citizens of a country where we have so much knowledge and resources at our fingertips, select individuals and groups have decided that because we have the power to, at the very least, change, grow and help the people that in all cases would not be provided education and knowledge otherwise, it is our __responsibility__ to help them as good and moral human beings, since we are in the position to do so. We are not so much infiltrating their countries with our technologies to harm them or fight with them, but to help them, hopefully in a genuine way.

In the case of OLPC, I do agree with their slogan, because at the end of the day they are providing a piece of technology that can **transform** these child's lives, so yes, by using technology and digital innovation, they are helping a country that is less fortunate than ours and giving one of the most important parts of life, knowledge, to children, who are the most innocent of humans simply less fortunate than we are. Starting education early is the most important because that way they can start to learn and continue to learn throughout the rest of their lives, and those laptops that harbors communication with others, can fuel that interest in learning and growing as a person, which hopefully leads to contributing as a citizen of the world, and ultimately giving back to the people who started this whole thing to begin with.