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Bootstrapping Cambodia 75

Posted by michael from the basic-input/output-system dept.
Brian Stretch writes "This article in MIT Technology Review left me in awe. "...remote village schools, jacked into the world's online knowledge... Who can help these schools bootstrap, and bring them up to speed with computer skills? The amazing answer turns out to be--orphans.""
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Bootstrapping Cambodia More

Bootstrapping Cambodia

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  • food or boxen? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    These people don't need computers, they need food and access to clean water. Nobody NEEDS computers, and emphasizing silicon over basic human needs is a sure way to create a new class of slaves. What would happen if every citizen on the planet lived like Americans do? One American sucks down the same natural resources a year as what, dozens of Chinese.

    Let's work on the important stuff first.

    as long, of course, as it doesn't mean me giving up what I've got. ;)

    And what's with all the anti-semites today? Hey, I don't go out of my way to associate with them, but keep it to yourself, alright? I know, IHBT...

  • Re:We need less jews (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    More Jews = Worse country .

    Less Jews = Better country .


    Quite right. Need any help packing before you move to Iraq? A ride to the airport?


    I hear you can make wine from their blood

    At least it's kosher.

    More racist assholes = worse country
    Less racist assholes = better country


    Do your duty as a good American and kill yourself, you racist asshole.

  • I'm constantly amazed by .... (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I'm constantly amazed by how people think a computer and a T1 connection is the key to solving all the worlds problems.
  • I have to take jabs at reporters based on their afterwords, but:

    Michael Hawley's column, Things That Matter, will look at how imbedded intelligence and networked computers will actually make a difference in daily life, following the collapse of the Internet hysteria.

    This is a very, very subjective statement. Things that matter, that make a difference in daily life, can't be quantified by any reporter or any other single person claiming to
    To many of the visitors to Slashdot, the existence of computer themselves provide a sort of meaning and pursuit. Who is to say that they are less important than schoolchilden in Cambodia?

  • Cambodians might prefer to learn in their own cultural environment, not be taught safely and remotely from Amerika?


    That is actually what I was thinking would more likely happen. However, I was responding to a post where rebelcool stated "we should instead ship them PEOPLE". I was just pointing out to him that if there were people in the US he wanted to do teaching, they could reach more by using technology. For teachers, the cost would be much higher to send them over and support them than with enabling those same teachers to remotely advise local Cambodians to actually perform the work.


  • These people don't need computers, they need food and access to clean water. Nobody NEEDS computers, and emphasizing silicon over basic human needs is a sure way to create a new class of slaves.


    No, they don't need computers, but what they really need is information. Information and education traditionally lead to an improvement of living conditions. And wired computers gives them the freedom to access a lot of that needed information.

    It has been said "Give a man a fish, he eats for a day. Teach a man to fish, and he eats for a lifetime". That is the point here. Not to give chunks of sillicon, but to give information and learning.

  • I love the people that criticise this type of thing. The idea is "why give them computers and schools when they need medicine and food?" My first question to them is "how much food have you given the starving Cambodians?"<BR><BR>
    I see the necessity of this type of thing. Education and technology are needed to break the cycle of poverty that keeps third world nations locked in their positions. There are other, quite good, organizations that deal with medical aid and hunger relief.<BR><BR><BR>
    My other question is, how does this story have anything to do with Judeism, the Aids virus, or the Holocaust? Several ACs are spouting blatant anti-semitic slurrs, for which there is no excuse. Slurrs don't accomplish anything other than lowering the level of intellectual discourse. then Mr. sales_worldwide is posting random links to www.ihr.org and www.rethinkingaids.com, organizations i find questionable, but they certainly have their right to express their views. BUT, these have nothing to do with the article, which, if anyone remembers, is about a program in cambodia to build schools and train orphaned children to use computer technology!!! I've seen some bad posts on Slashdot, but most of this crop really takes the cake.<BR><BR>
    /end irritated rant.<BR><BR>
  • There's an great writeup [kuro5hin.org] by eries [mailto] at kuro5hin [kuro5hin.org] about this issue. It also has a very interesting poll accompanying the article on how many k5ers would be willing to donate to the cause.

  • "One American sucks down the same natural resources a year as what, dozens of Chinese."

    Yes, and that same American is probably 30 times more productive at only 12 times the cost. Overall, a win for the Americans. Per pound of production, Americans produce less waste, etc.

    The world's environment would be far better off if the American Farmer fed the entire world instead of letting the third worlders rape the environment using substandard techniques, equipment, and theory.
  • Next year, 13 year old Bgot Thai says, "Last year my belly was swollen with hunger, but we ordered genetically engineered seeds from some place in America over the internet, and now my people and I are fat from our largest harvest ever. After the village elders read some public health sites on the Internet to learn about marlaria, they drained the swamp next door and no one gets marlaria anymore. Why, we even found a site on the internet explaining that we get cholera because we traditionally poured out shit in the same river we drank out of, so we don't do that any more and now we're healthy. Knowledge is power. Thank you, america"
  • um, the Normans were Vikings, not French.
  • Lets help them out then, start a slashdot fund for building a school. We donate our money for things like legal defense and advocacy, why not help kids learn.
    Get involved
  • >Education and technology are needed to break
    >the cycle of poverty that keeps third world >nations locked in their positions

    Exactly!

    Having lived and taught programming (+ English) in Myanmar a neighbor of Cambodia's, I can tell you that there are some very important things that computers are necessary for even in the poorest of countries...

    1. Designing buildings and other structures (CAD).
    2. Printing books (Desktop Publishing).
    3. Getting access to medical information.
    4. Unquantifiable category: (Access to the whole gamut of mind opening information that is in western countries but not in poor developing countries.)
    5. Advertising export products and tourism (foreign $'s = capital to develop)
    6. Teaching problem solving skills
    (Abelson and Sussman's "Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs")

    The number of books that is being published in western countries each year may be increasing at an exponential rate, but few of them make their way to poorer developing countries.

    Some of the most influential people in the future development of Cambodia will be the Cambodians who go to foreign countries, study there, get an advanced degree, and then teach generations of young Cambodians.(Pol Pot was a school teacher educated in France).

    Internet access will allow future generations to be aware of the opportunities available and avoid recruiters who often prey on people who lack information.(This also goes for people who migrate to other people to work, e.g. Phiilipines to Saudi Arabia) Since academics usually put a lot of papers on line, they can also familiarize themselves with research.

    What the article doesn't say is what kind of computer system he will end up using the skills he's acquired on: most likely Microsoft Windows
    with some pirated application software like Autocad.

    IMHO there's a great opportunity for members of the open source revolution to go over to these countries and show people how to
    add value with Linux...rather than slowly become dependent on Microsoft.

  • > But the big problem today is that you need more than just a piece of chalk, a
    > Blackboard and a teacher for a good education,
    > you need to have computers and all sorts of High Tech devices

    what else than a good teacher and maybe a few books does it take to provide good education? It never hurts to have a computer for a little bit of programming lessons, but by far the most important things we learn in school is writing, reading, and math. without these you can't even start to learn something new (apart from self-thaught geniuses).
  • > The same people who spawned the Canadians! (along with the dirty French)

    Uh, you've got it backwards. The French spawned the British via the Normans invading/ruling over the Saxons.
  • The students-teaching-students technique works here too. My sister teaches at an alternative public elementary school in Santa Monica that requires kids in the older grades to spend an hour a week teaching the younger kids. A sixth grader will read for an hour to some first graders.

    As anyone who's been a teacher or TA knows, you learn far more from teaching than being a student.
    Scott Ferguson

  • From the article:

    What might happen when commonplace objects, like shoes or underwear or furniture or toys, begin to contain more sensory and computer power than we can currently predict, and when innate, wireless nets fluidly link them to the rest of the planet's infinitely scaling information systems?

    I think if our underwear contains sensory power which links it with planetary information systems, the USENET will simply die out, since dick-sizing will lose its touch.

  • I don't care whether or not a fellow is Jewish. I just don't like a big nose, as it signifies dishonesty [8m.com].


    Tetris on drugs, NES music, and GNOME vs. KDE Bingo [pineight.com].
  • But the big problem today is that you need more than just a piece of chalk, a Blackboard and a teacher for a good education, you need to have computers and all sorts of High Tech devices.

    Bullshit -- you realize you are saying that there were no well-educated human beings before the advent of computers?
  • Teach a man to artificially raise the price of fish and he'll eat lobster.

    Anyway the point is correct - free access to information leads to improved living standards - and computers and the net do have a use besides porn and spam.

  • This 'Camobodian model' for getting school funding to rural third world communities is really excellent. I spent last summer teaching in a rural Nepalese village which faced similar obstacles in supporting education, and I wonder if a similar program couldn't be implemented there. Anyway, I'm going to plug my village: visit here to learn more about the school I worked at, the projects going on there in Nepal and how you can help. [unk.edu]
  • The slashdot community is fairly politically active (or at least it seems to be in writing). Maybe it would make sense for CmdrTaco et al to set up some sort of official charitable slashdot fund which we can contribute to and whose benefactors we can vote on as a community somehow. It probably be hard or impossible to impliment, but I wanted to express the desire for such a thing. There are tens of thousands of us slashdotters, and at a buck or two each it'd be really, really easy for us to throw up a Cambodian school if only we could organize funding as effectively as we organize an online community.
  • Unfortunately, these Cambodian projects could never succeed without the thousands of dollars they get from contributors, money which consitutes a tremendous budget as far as a 3rd world nation like Cambodia is concerned. Obviously I concur that these stories do represent triumphs for villagers and NGO organizers--but it's naive to suggest that money isn't vitally important--absolutely essential-- to their projects, and doesn't play a key role in actually solving important problems. It always plays an essential role.
  • since the donations mentioned in the article also mention the world bank, try searching through www.worldbank.org and see if you can find a donation program that appeals to you. www.worldbank.org/wbi showcases some of the learning programs they've initiated. there's also gdnet.org, a side project of the world bank...
  • depends on what you term high tech...i'm sure you'll agree that some people regard printing presses as high tech, strictly due to the relative state of technology in their country.

    however, i couldn't agree more that water supply, sanitary conditions, and transportation are at the forefront of the concerns addressed by governments of those countries, and are normally the first funded by outside sources. however, the most interesting part of this article for me was the mention of selling local products on a global market level, and i feel that aspect will be the true success of this project - enabling people to earn the money to bring in the infrastructure, piece by piece.

    it's an illustration of the classic adage - the difference between giving a man a meal and teaching him to fish.

  • i agree with you for most of your post (especially since the world bank has strict rules about child labor, and wouldn't fund a school that subsisted on child labor), except for this quote:

    Cambodia is a nation that has had its culture and economy devistated by years of Communist misrule

    you can't leave out the hundred years of colonialism and the bombing initiated by good old Henry Kissinger...that's just as bad if not worse, because the devastation cause by those two paved the way for the khmer rouge to gain the foothold that they did.

  • you raise a lot of good points, but you're forgetting some points addressed in the article itself, such as:

    And $2,000 of it is kept for teachers' salaries (in order to import a new breed of teachers)

    take a read of this opening speech [camnet.com.kh] and you'll know why the people in the country think this is a good idea - and their opinion is the only one that really counts. better jobs mean better money for them, and it means a more educated group of people will be making better demands on their government.

  • This article raises an interesting issue: where is everything going? It seems that venture capitalists will take any opportunity and accept it. They rarely profit, yet are constantly considered the future. It is time that some people should step back and look at the state of computing.

  • 30 times more productive at producing what?

    This is a common economic fallacy: taking production of goods as a measure of value, without differentiation between categories of goods. To say that luxury goods == basic necessities is stretching things a bit.

    I suggest you read 'The Affluent Society' by J.K. Galbraith for a real economists point of view on this.


    Mart

  • There exists in all areas of any country people who can be helped to learn. As important as it is to recognize the work that is being done by others to help in remote areas of the world, it is equally important to recognize that money easily donated is not the real answer. It is extremely easy to donate $25.00 and then go on with your life. An even greater impact could be made by taking a look around your neighborhood. Is their a community program which could benifit by recieving the greatest gift, one of involvement from people with knowledge and the time to share. If there is consider giving the time. If there isn't one allready then start one.
  • This is of course assuming that the village elders can read english. Most cannot read, fewer read english. And have the money to order genetically engineered seeds.

    Since they have none of this, it does them absolutely NO GOOD to have a computer and an internet connection. Instead of shipping these people computers, we should instead ship them PEOPLE to teach and heal them. I agree, building schools is good. But sending computers is stupid. Bill Gates (yes yes, i know everyone here hates him..get over it) said it best. "When a mother brings her sick child in and sees the computer, she will ask, can this save my son?" No, no it cannot. Vaccinations and doctors can save her son. Clean water and fresh food can help. People who speak these people's languages can help. But the computer is a long way from becoming what these people truly need.

    2/3rds of the world get by just fine without a telephone. What in the world do they need a computer for?

  • that donates computer equipment to impoverished villages, that the CEOs should be made to do some work for the Peace Corps first...THEN decide if a computer is what most of the world really needs.
  • I just had to say that, seeing your email address
  • This is truly a crazy, mixed up world. Trolling with hate is pretty damn low, and it isn't very funny. Are you Vlad [slashdot.org] or Archie [slashdot.org]? Want to know something else that is crazy? I'm going to link to Jack Chick [chick.com], and this time it's not for laughs:
    http://www.chick.com/reading/tracts/1000/1000_01.a sp [chick.com]
  • Considering every other solution has *failed*, it's time to give this a try, and in countries like India, it's allowing them to create an industry that parts bloated, lazy Western economies of their money and gives it to a country to do with as it wishes. Giving away food has not made hunger go away. Giving money away has not made hunger go away. Giving medicine away has not made the world healthier (contrary to popular belief). A winner of a Nobel Prize for Economics a few years ago proposed the idea that most of the problems "Third World" populations face are caused by their own local government rather than the lack of donations from richer nations. Example: Ethiopia. I think most people still believe that a drought caused the famine in Ethiopia. The real reason was a bellicose Marxist government fighting rebels in their northern territories (Ethiopia's sea access). When the Soviets and Americans stopped paying for weapons, the Ethiopian government came around and confiscated everyone's food to sell to the Soviets for more guns and weapons (including cluster bombs). Ethiopians are pretty effective farmers and always had reserve supplies of grain for the cyclical droughts, but that grain was taken away by the gov't. The fighting and drafting of the young men of the population then further disrupted farming. The planned for drought hit and boom -- famine. What made it even worse was all that money the West raised ("We are the world!") went only to the Regan administration approved government of Ethiopia (they were still Marxist, but aligned to America at the time. The rebels were aligned with Cuba. Nuff said?). So the southern regions got fed, but the northern regions were completely cut off from aid. Only the Scandanavians bothered to send any food there, and the Canadian government finally sent food there after they got shamed into doing it. There's nothing wrong with the Third World that can't be cured by a removal of corrupt governments more interested in making megacorps happy. Back to the T1: the ability of the population to organize through a T1 connection will probably be the most effective means of curing their ills.
  • Check these people out as one example: http://www.wirelessisland.net
  • No, I'm not saying that at all, silly. ;)

    I'm saying that to produce people who are educated with relevance to the needs of industry today, you need computers (or at least, they are very helpful). Sure Plato was a clever guy, but could he get a good job these days with his qualifications? I would hazard that he couldn't. To produce the sort of people who will bring along the countries economy, you need computers and so on. At least, thats what I think.

  • Yes, it is certainly true that you don't need high tech to teach. I'm just saying that you need high tech teaching methods to teach people to be good at high tech things, and to help spawn a high tech industry.
  • Hello. What you say is very true. If you have to teach a subject, you have to know it inside out, so that you can answer questions from you students. I have done it myself a few times, but only unofficially. If they are doing similar in Cambodia, I should think it will be very successful, and also cheap. Third World children are usually a lot more willing to learn and enthusiastic about education than their pampered first world equivalents, because they *know* it is the only way they are going to get anywhere. If only our children had a similar attitude!
  • How's a pound-me-in-the-ass prison different from serving on a submarine?
  • You don't happen to work in accounting, do you?
  • Say, is there an accounting department at prison?
  • Remember to walk in the light.
  • I plead not guilty to seven counts of murder.
  • Edgewater Technology is everywhere.
  • Is there anyone hiding in the accounting office?
  • "He was a very nice guy. Everybody liked him," said high school classmate Kurt Schulter. "He was always in a good mood. This is completely shocking to me."
  • The victims were identified as: Jennifer Bragg-Capobianco, 29, who worked in marketing; Janice Hagerty, 46, a receptionist; Louis Javelle, 58, director of consulting in the company's Manchester, N.H., office; Rose Manfredy, who worked in payroll and would have turned 49 on Wednesday; Paul Marceau, 36, a development technician; Cheryl Troy, 50, human resources director; and 29-year-old Craig Wood, who worked in human resources.
  • You're with the angels now. May they love and protect you ever after. My thoughts and prayers are with you and your families during this time of loss.
  • Don't you think those accounting people deserved it?
  • yes, the emphasis is placed on computers because the west sells them but meanwhile the simple things to make children's lives better are not done, because people don't want to. Same here in Thailand. Most all the kids are doing chat at the cafe's but haven't a clue on how to use the internet to make their lives better, or if it even can.
  • It would be a definite act of Tzadaka. If each of us here on /. gave $25 we could do miracles.


    The cure of the ills of Democracy is more Democracy.

  • Actualy I think they were bad *BECAUSE* they were Communists. Karl Marx specficly said that Marxism rejects all morality except that as it relates to the class. IE if you are doing what you are doing for the "Working Class" it is OK. I would assert you can draw a direct line from that statement and others by Lenin to the horrors of the Gulag and Mauist China and the Khmer Rouge.

    After all when the powers can be can define morality as they will there is very little reason not to kill people en mass.

    The cure of the ills of Democracy is more Democracy.

  • Community Aid Abroad [caa.org.au] (the Australia aid organisation I do volunteer work for) has some info about Cambodia [caa.org.au], including a brief piece on building schools [caa.org.au].

    Danny.


  • Since they have none of this, it does them absolutely NO GOOD to have a computer and an internet connection. Instead of shipping these people computers, we should instead ship them PEOPLE to teach and heal them.


    Actually, it might do them quite a lot of good. They are getting local people who understand computers (among them the orphans mentioned in the article) to get them setup. Then once you have them wired, in theory one person sitting in the US could teach to several schools at once. And newsgroup access in their local language (even if local servers) could greatly facilitate their learning and exchange of knowledge. Instead of having the expense of flying in individuals to each and every school, you now have the expense of wiring each school.

    Basically, as far as the educating part goes, this helps to move the solution from a many-to-many problem over to being a one-to-many problem. It can help in this way by also allowing a teacher of a given subject who is just an expert in one field to 'teach' at all of those schools at once. Much easier than trying to round up a sufficient number of experts for each individual school.

    Oh, and as far as needing to learn English to be able to benefit from the Internet (which I would question)... you'd be suprised how quickly those outside of the US can actually learn a new language when sufficient benefit is to be gained. Again, if you pay attention to the article you'd note that "They seemed to be able to chatter in most of the tourist languages...". All it would take is one local student at each school to learn English and that entire school could then access the "English Internet".


  • Actually, what I'd like to see is a /. charity of the month. Collecting the money and then squabbling over where it goes is a good way to piss people off. Much better is trying to raise funds for a cause CmdrTaco et al picks and states up front. Anyone who doesn't like a cause can then just wait for the next month's cause to roll around, nobody feels swindled.

    The particular goods I see arising from a /. charity effort are:

    1. Yes, we could all just try to go donate to the causes which please us, but it would be cool for /. to get the credit as the entity which got us to cough up.
    2. Human nature is such that people who can only donate small amounts (such as students) often don't bother unless they see that it's part of a much larger effort. A sense of the collective might of /. itself might motivate more people to give even if only a little.
    3. One big stumbling block to getting people to donate is the amount of trouble it is to do so. I know I am about 10^6x less likely to do anything which requires finding an envelop and a stamp. If there were a simple link to click on to do a pay-pal payment or some such, the odds of my participating go way up.
    I would really like to see the amassed hordes of /. do something with real effect (positive). I just want to see us throw our weight around. ;) ("Must use.... powers... only... for... good".) Too much talk, not enough action. Real action might be too much to ask of mouse potatos, but donating cash might just be low-effort enough.
  • If each of us gave *dollars* it could do miracles. And those of us lucky enough to live in well-off countries (*cough* US *cough*), instead of throwing our drops in the bucket and feeling good about it, what about actually doing something significant like *relieving foreign debt* that keeps poor countries in the vicious borrow-pay-principal-plus-interest-borrow-again cycle? It all leads back to that ugly thing that we all think we are completely above and detached from - politics.
  • Very true. Just about every nation in the region had real damage done to it by imperialism. There would not have been a Khmer Rouge, or a Pol Pot, without the efforts of imperialists and the fallout from the Vietnam War. But Cambodia faired in many ways worse than most. Vietnam had as many or more problems with foreign entanglements, but now has an economy and social order that is much better recovered. Pol Pot systematically murdered an entire generation of the educated and intelligent people of Cambodia. The actions of the West certainly left the nation ripe for his plunder, but I doubt anyone could have imagined the level of carnage that took place under the Khmer Rouge. The Communists literally emptied the cities of Campbodia, and systematically killed almost every member of the educated classes, from college professors and business people to Buddhist monks and nuns. It's one reason why educational programs like this are so important in Cambodia; these people are effectively missing an entire generation of educated leaders, not to mention that areas of the country have been out of contact with the rest of the world up until the past 5-10 years. The monk Mahagoshananda began leading peace marches in Vietnam in the past years, and in many case his procession of monks and peace advocates were the first contact that some villages had had with the rest of the country since the start of the reign of the Khmer Rouge. New species of large mammels (some the size of cattle) have gone undiscovered in Cambodia up until the past 3 years because parts of the country were effectively cordoned off by left over Khmer fighters, land mines, and destroyed infrastructure. So while imperialist interferance has played a big role in bringing Cambodia to its present state, I would still say that the bulk of the blame for Cambodia's rough economic and educational fortunes lies squarely with the Communist government of the Khmer Rouge.

    "Sweet creeping zombie Jesus!"
  • I was using the term Communist descriptively and not perjoratively, in my own mind, at least. I don't think that the KR were bad because they were Communist. They were bad, and they were communist. I was sticking Communist in there because I didn't want to type Khmer Rouge that many times. I don't think that I ever imply that the most important thing about the Khmer Rouge was that they were communist; the post mentions Communism only twice, I think, once in place of "Khmer Rouge", and once as an adjective. I'm not sure how you are reading a focus on Communism into what I wrote. What to you seems to say that I think the most important attritute of the Khmer Rouge was that they were communist?

    "Sweet creeping zombie Jesus!"
  • What I meant was that the Khmer Rouge were not bad because they were Communist, they were bad because they killed many people and destroyed the country. If they were Communist and peaceable, I would have no problem with them. The writer of the earlier post seemed to imply that my problem with the Khmer Rouge was that they were Communist. But to me it is the action that is objectionable, and not the philosophy used to justify it. I do think that Marxism provided justification for the actions of the Khmer Rouge, but Marxism did not dictate it. So my point is just that even if the Khmer Rouge were motivated by some other ideology, I would find their actions just as objectionable, and place most of the blame with them for Cambodia's current state. Now, of course, the actions are greatly inseperable from their motivations, but that is an argument for a history class somewhere. . .

    "Sweet creeping zombie Jesus!"
  • Boosting self esteem...thats awesome. This is a great example of how other countries can be competitive with america without aggression.

    A competitive system is better for everyone involved and does not subtract american prominence in worldly affairs. We already exist in subclasses and groups of every nationality. Will skills in Cambodia be called for in the states? How will our own commerce support developing nations? Will we invite them here, or work with them from afar? Should we support aggressive developing nations? What if a charity breeds a small fleet of khmer outlook hackers, experts in .vbs?
    I am way too paranoid. Those kids sound cool and ready for input. Long live technology!!!!!!!!
    -Sleen
  • The above might have rated an "Offtopic", but not "Flamebait". I think it should have been "Insightful". There is no reason for the visibility of a post to a particular person to be governed by the judgement of others, aside from the relatively few author-related options set in one's user preferences. There is every reason for a user to set the effective threshold for visibility on an author-by-author basis, both downward and upward.

    (Posted at +2 to make a point.)

    "
    / \ ASCII ribbon against e-mail
    \ / in HTML and M$ proprietary formats.
    X
    / \

  • So, they develop schools to get kids to stop working in sweatshops, and what do they do when they get there? They work for the schools. Not learn AT the schools, but they work FOR the schools.

    I think having an 8 year old typing or otherwise demonstrating knowledge is a LOT better than having them sewing Nike sneakers or digging up DeBeers diamonds, but the distinction between schooling and working is still pretty vague.

  • This is somewhat along the lines of The Hunger Project [thp.org], which is attempting to end hunger by empowering the people in those countries to improve their situation. (btw: when they speak of "investors", they're talking about people investing time and money to create a future of people self-sufficient and empowered -- not investing for a monetary feedback.
    `ø,,ø!

  • ...Like an MIS SWAT team, the kids set up machines, got e-mail working so they could stay in touch with their pals back home, and hacked at ways to transmit Khmer...

    But when these kids can't figure something out, there is a fetus in a tank full of amniotic fluid. He's the real wiz.

  • They work for the schools. Not learn AT the schools, but they work FOR the schools.

    Best way to learn a subject is to teach it. Personally I think they should introduce this system in the US; I've always had fun in those rare opportunities I've had to teach, and I think it would help with the teacher shortage.
    --
  • I'm a big supporter of education. I believe that educating these children will ultimately allow them to improve their situation. They can get better jobs and make enough money to provide for themselves, rather than relying on sporadic handouts of food. Or they can learn the skills to advance their society directly, perhaps more efficient farming techniques or energy science. It's sort of like "teach a man to fish...", updated for a more capitalist worldview.

    But I'm really just basing that on faith. It's a guess. Is all the money, and all the children's time, a good investment? Will it help create a self-sufficient society? Or are the children spending so much time at school that they cannot scrounge enough food to get by, with little long-term benefit?

    It's quite nice to donate money to make ourselves feel better (or so I assume; I'm a cheap bastard), but how do we find out what really works best?


    My mom is not a Karma whore!

  • Out there that allows individuals or organizations to donate technology or books to schools in impovrished nations like cambodia?
  • Who needs food, medicine and clean water when we have computers, the miracle cure for everything!

    12 year old Bgot Thai says "Even though my belly is swollen with hunger and my joints ache from malaria, I can now post on slashdot, until I become too weak to move my crippled fingers to type. Thank you, america"

  • Re:It seems to be working, too. (Score:3)

    by rw2 ( 17419 ) on Saturday December 30, 2000 @12:58PM (#1425778) Homepage
    But the big problem today is that you need more than just a piece of chalk, a Blackboard and a teacher for a good education, you need to have computers and all sorts of High Tech devices.

    I couldn't disagree more. Tens of millions of tech illiterates make an honest living here in the US and we're, arguably, the most technologically advanced nation in the world. Certainly we're in the top few.

    Third world countries need things that tech essentially doesn't matter for. Building roads, planting crops, arresting outlaws (we just posted a story on this on poliglut a few days ago which is why this story caught my eye on /.), digging wells, building sewers. None of these require high tech solutions.

    So while I agree the method of knowledge dispersal makes a lot of sense, I disagree that you need high tech to teach.

    --

  • Re:What's the Child Labor angle on this? (Score:3)

    by Spasemunki ( 63473 ) on Saturday December 30, 2000 @12:28PM (#1425779) Homepage
    So call it a co-op system. The kids are providing a useful service to the schools, and doing something that they seem to enjoy, while helping their community and learning at the same time. I don't really see a "child labor" problem in that. If these kids weren't working in schools and going to schools, they would probably be selling things in the streets, working long hours doing heavy labor on the family farm, or something along those lines. The truth is that projects like this may not be possible without the "labor" of children. If they were not working, they would not be home watching cartoons. Cambodia is a nation that has had its culture and economy devistated by years of Communist misrule. There are not a lot of options for rural children. Better that they work in a school during the day than that they wander into a mine field.

    "Sweet creeping zombie Jesus!"

  • Stories like this showcase the human spirit (Score:3)

    by duffbeer703 ( 177751 ) on Saturday December 30, 2000 @11:14AM (#1425780)
    I am always inspired by the way people in extreme hardship manage to survive and even thrive.

    In the USA, we believe that money can solve any problem, big or small. These kids are accomplishing something really big and learning alot without the big budgets of a suburban US school. My hat goes off to them!

  • It seems to be working, too. (Score:3)

    by Lover's Arrival, The ( 267435 ) on Saturday December 30, 2000 @11:16AM (#1425781) Homepage
    They sre building nearly 50 new schools thanks to this method. It sounds like an extension of the 'monitor' system of education developed in India in the 1820's by Dr Andrew Bell (I know this because he founded my old school in Scotland;). The system is that A teacher educates some children, and then the eldest children, who have learned what the teacher has told them, teach the youger children. It is a very cheap and effective method.

    I wonder if in Third World countries today this method could be used or even extended upon? These events in Cambodia sound like just the ticket, but they have extended it to even building the schools themselves. But the big problem today is that you need more than just a piece of chalk, a Blackboard and a teacher for a good education, you need to have computers and all sorts of High Tech devices. The only problem is that the only nations that have the education to make these things can get the money to do the education in the first place, so it is like a Catch 22 situation :(

    I just don't quite know how third world countries can break into the cycle. See, I am not a global affairs expert!

  • Credit... (Score:4)

    by spellcheckur ( 253528 ) on Saturday December 30, 2000 @11:40AM (#1425782)
    This is a great program. Unfortunately, the article fails to mention Bernie Krisher [time.com], who started the program.
  • Follow the link from the article, it's a pretty amazing concept. US$14K buys you a new high-tech elementary school in Cambodia, with matching funds from the World Bank and donations from various multinationalcorps. Anybody know anything about this project? This is the first I've heard of it, and although having such remote donors leaves open the possibility of fraud, I think it's really exciting.

    Maybe 1000 Team /.ers, instead hitting refresh on the SETI@home stats page all day, could each get together $14 for this. If anybody is interested in helping to organize such an effort, pleaes let me know.

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