Newsletter Issue

Springtime Renewal

by Timothy Falconer

Things have been relatively slow at Waveplace since our awards extravaganza last October. This is due partly to the economic downturn, and partly because I've been busy starting a new organization with a similar mission as Waveplace. Squeakland Foundation is devoted to Etoys use worldwide, not just the Caribbean. It's a spin-off organization from Viewpoints Research Institute, the creators of Etoys. We've been busy improving the Etoys software and creating new courseware, along with planning two Etoys conferences this summer, one in Brasil and one in Los Angeles. Waveplace will be presenting at both conferences.

Interest in Waveplace remains high. In the last few months, we've received a whopping thirty XOs from private individuals in the US and Canada. Yesterday, we sent 24 of them down to a new pilot in Haiti, which will start in June. We're partnering with the American Haitian Foundation and the Complexe Educatif St. Antoine school in Petite Riviere de Nippes. Watch our blog to read field reports from this pilot, which starts June 17th.

We've also started our first non-XO pilot, using Eee PCs at the Antilles School on St Thomas, US Virgin Islands. Our efforts in Nicaragua continue, where our partner Campo Alegria is training new Nicaraguan mentors to conduct XO and Etoys training for as many as 400 Nicaraguan teachers. Lastly, we're in the planning stages with another summer pilot in Immokalee, Florida. One of our Immokalee mentors continues to use Etoys with her students to great success.

Things are shaping up for an exciting summer. We'd particularly love staring a pilot in a new area in the Caribbean, though we'll need a strong partner and funding before we can even begin. Stay tuned, and keep those XOs coming!

Four Pilots

by William Stelzer

One thing one learns very quickly in Haiti, is not to take anything for granted. And to treasure every success, no matter how simple. So as we stood by for the first Annual Waveplace Awards webcast, at the Visa Lodge hotel in Port au Prince, there was something wonderful about watching the kids just enjoy free time their laptops. Some took pictures of each other, while others created music. A few kids were even off and running with eToys. Nobody seemed to mind the delay from the technical problems of connecting four countries simultaneously.

In its own small way, the past year has been epic journey. As amazing a machine the OLPC XO is, getting the maximum educational value out was in many ways an unknown. Although it would have been easy enough to teach children how to type, take pictures, and look up information online, Waveplace had in mind a much more difficult and transformative goal.

The kids at Guy Benjamin School, in St. John, U.S. Virgin Islands became the first to take on the challenge. It was pretty much a roller coaster ride. Almost everything was new and untested, and the pilot quickly became an adventure in problem solving. But for the kids determined to plow through, the results were groundbreaking, and they became among the very first computer programmers and digital storytellers at the elementary school level in Caribbean. Even more importantly, the lessons learned there would greatly improve the pilots to come.

Working in Haiti was like living in novel. Filled with larger than life characters and obstacles that seemed at times impossible. Food riots, hurricanes, floods and the ever present danger of a corrupt and devolving country. The one thing that was beyond question though, was the desire and determination of the kids. For most it was the first time they had ever even touched a computer. It was amazing and humbling to see them searching the keyboards for the letters that made up their names. And then to watch them, only a short while later, create digital artwork as if they'd been doing it all their lives.

Immokalee, Florida was where it finally all came together, and everything just worked. The kids were great and we were lucky to have highly educated and dedicated teachers to spark within the kids the almost contradictory conditions to make this strange beast called constructionist learning come to life. Then as a bonus, we even had a chance for it to be documented and broadcast by National Public Radio.

The best word to describe Nicaragua is simply magic. We were back in a difficult and rugged environment, but also a beautiful one. It was here that the true transformative potential of the XO and Etoys most dramatically revealed itself. And not just for the kids, but for the teachers also. As I watched the kids, who almost had to be torn away from working with their laptops, I felt as if I was watching history in the making, and that dreams of the visionaries who began this project were finally coming to life before my eyes.

In the end the Haiti kids weren't able to show their stories for the Award Show. We were running late, it was getting dark, and I was worried about either the teachers or the kids getting kidnapped on their way home. They did get to sing their song though, a haunting and touching message about how children were a symbol for peace in the world, and how they carried our hopes for the future. As they did, I thought how this last year has been like a pebble thrown in a lake, but with waves that might perhaps echo out far further and far longer than one would dare dream.