<< Previous post
Next post >>

One Laptop Per Child

I am reading a book by Dave Evans, Social Media Marketing: An Hour a Day, because I am trying to get up to speed on using Facebook, Twitter and other forms of social media for business purposes.  Wow – what a lot to learn!!  The exercise for Day One involves reviewing blogs and wikis to learn about them.  One of the examples given was the wiki for One Laptop per Child (ONLP).  I had heard of the program before but really did not know much about it.

According to the wiki, the mission of OLPC is “One Laptop per Child creates educational opportunities for the world’s poorest children by providing each child with a rugged, low-cost, low-power, connected laptop with content and software designed for collaborative, joyful, self-empowered learning.”

The website gave the following update: “OLPC launched its second Give One, Get One (”G1G1″) program on November 17, 2008, following last year’s popular program which supported the production of over 150,000 XOs. This year the XO laptops will be shipped to donors through Amazon.com, and the program includes Europe. Visit laptop.org/xo.”

For $199, you can give a child in a developing country a laptop.  The Amazon page says:”Why give a laptop to a child in the emerging world? If you replace the word “laptop” with “education” the answer becomes clear. You don’t wait to educate until all other challenges are resolved. You educate at the same time because it’s such an important part of all the other solutions.  The XO laptop was designed especially for children. So no matter who they are or where they live, this computer has the perfect features and software to get them excited about learning. Just imagine how the world would change if every child had the tools to unleash their full potential.”

What a great project and such a low “ticket price.”  Check it out at www.laptop.org and perhaps your business can join the effort and give the gift of education. 

…And I still don’t really get wikis…

Tags: , ,

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 22nd, 2008 at 8:22 pm and is filed under Take Action!. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

One Response to “One Laptop Per Child”

  1. Dave Evans Says:
    November 24th, 2008 at 9:15 am

    Dear Susan-

    Thank you for your interest in my book: I love the fact that one of the examples (One Laptop per Child) has prompted further action and awareness. Re wikis…simply put, they are the end product of a collective effort: This makes them perfect for evolving projects like One Laptop per Child. By comparison, this blog is also collective, but the end product is a threaded conversation rather than a single document. Both are related: It’s really the difference in the presenting (or even existence of) a “conclusion” that sets them apart.

    I am so happy that people are actually doing the exercises — you are providing an excellent example in this regard and at the same time spreading the word about a great cause. At its core, that is social media in action.

    Wishing you a happy holiday-
    Dave

Leave a Reply