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Peru's school children to get laptops for $100

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Peru's Education Minister, Jose Antonio Chang, shows off one of the laptops that will soon be available to Peruvian students.

© Andina

(LIP-jl) -- Peruvian Education Minister Jose Antonio Chang announced that Peru is on the doorsteps of signing an agreement with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to provide Peru's schoolchildren with affordable access to new laptop computers by next year.

'One Laptop per Child' is a non profit organization that works with country education ministries to distribute these low cost machines, much like textbooks, to children in developing nations.

According to Chang, the details over the conditions that are needed to subscribe to MIT's 'One Laptop per Child' program are currently being evaluated by Peruvian officials.

One Laptop per Child has already proven successful in other developing countries around the world and Peru's schoolchildren are sure to enhance their academic experiences when these laptops come to Peru.

"We have incorporated Peru into the program. This will give our children access to technology and improve their learning experience. We hope this will be a massive incorporation for our students," said Chang.

For more information on One Laptop per Child, please visit their official website here (link).

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# Fernando Pareja says :
26 May, 2007 [ 20:09 ]

I like this laptop, I really do. However, when I sat at a lecture by Jim Gettys, OLPC's VP of Software, in Boston last month I kept wondering how this laptop and the whole project are really going to play out in Peru.

By the way, the laptop is called the 100 dollar laptop but it really costs 175 dollars.

I saw some of the Peruvian media coverage and government statements about the OLPC project and the laptop, code-named the XO. How can I say this in a politically correct way? I think the media coverage and government statements have room for improvement.

First of all, the Peruvian Government is not signing an agreement or subscribing to a program with MIT. What it is signing is a purchase order for US$ 43 million dollars to buy 250,000 laptops (assuming Peru buys the minimum purchase quantity).

This is like going to Saga Falabella or Jockey Plaza and buying ONE laptop, but MULTIPLIED 250,000 times. Problem? These US $ 43 million are not in the budget. This is an unfunded mandate.

Second of all, the OLPC has not been used or proved successful ANYWHERE. There have been Beta buildstested in Brazil and Uruguay and even 100 prototypes are being tested in Peru.

Now, I am on my fifth computer of my own (three of them laptops). I bought first one, a laptop, in 1985. Do I think they are incredibly helpful? Yes. Do I carefully evaluate everytime I upgrade my

hardware-knowing exactly what my goals are and what new capabilities I get with the new computer? You betcha.

Should Peru do same: know exactly what goals are for US$43 million dollars worth of laptops and what are the students going to get from that? I submit we should.

Some very articulate, knowledgeable, specific coments and questions have been posted. Some are:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_Laptop_per_Child#Good_use_of_money

Reportaje – La Ventana Indiscreta
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ANXK54zDs4&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fchristianpalacios%2Eblogspot%2Ecom%

2F2007%2F05%2Folpc%2Dun%2Dsalto%2Dal%2Dfracaso%2Ehtml

http://gpicon.blogspot.com/2007/05/olpc-peru-ilusiones-y-demagogia.html

and
 
http://nvalcarcel.aureal.com.pe/?p=121

Mr. Getty's conference is at http://forum.wgbh.org/wgbh/forum.php?search=OLPC
WGBH, the Boston PBS station has been having bandwith problems with its popular server 

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