OLPCorps Support Committee

OLPCorps Support Committee

The OLPCorps Support Committee is comprised of One Laptop per Child staff, community members, and anyone (including OLPCorps applicants) who wants to get involved. The primary role of the support committee is to design, develop, and support OLPCorps. Key actors hold significant responsibility in the success of OLPCorps.

An OLPCorps Team requires a high-level investment of time, energy, and resources. For that reason, if you would like to support OLPCorps, but to a lesser degree, please indicate so under the relevant team section (write contact info in bottom section). To successfully implement up to 100 small XO deployments, each team must rely on a team of community support members. Your involvement, no matter how small, is needed. Anyone is encouraged to participate.

Director of OLPCorps

Qualifications The Director of OLPCorps should be someone with a passionate commitment to the cause of quality universal primary school education and utilizing laptops to help achieve that goal; a proven track record of managing successful intern programs in either the non-profit or private sectors, with a strong preference given to those who have run African programs; excellent written and oral communications skills; excellent logistical skills and strong attention to detail; experience in working with people from a broad array of countries and cultures; willingness to travel; a strong disdain for mediocrity.

Responsibilities

• Oversee all aspects of the project, including recruitment of individuals, liaising with partner NGOs, government officials and private sector institutions in relevant countries
• Serve as a primary contact point with participating universities worldwide in creating an exceptional experience for students who qualify for the program
• Serve as a primary contact point with participating universities worldwide in creating an exceptional experience for students who qualify for the program
• Create opportunities with various vendors and volunteers to provide pro bono services in the on-going development of OLPCorps: Africa
• Work with OLPC on developing a two-week training session for participating students in Kigali, Rwanda beginning June 8
• Organize and plan a large-scale program presentation event in Cambridge the weekend of October 10
• Document and maintain ongoing awareness of the Program to the various OLPC communities and the press
• Be innovative and creative in all aspects of organizing, communicating and support

Organizational & Management Team

Qualifications The Organizational team's primary role is to assist the OLPCorps Director and ensure the project plan's completion. The organizational team should be able to multi-task alongside all team members; have an understanding of OLPC, its history, inner-workings, and direction; grasp the operational scope of an XO deployment; have the ability to focus on the present tasks at hand while maintaining a clear picture of the long-term direction of OLPCorps; effectively and regularly communicate with staff, OLPCorps Support Committee, and student teams.

Responsibilities

• Oversee OLPCorps implementation and all key actors supporting it
• Work alongside each team to ensure that tasks are being accomplished on time
• Handle related OLPCorps PR
• Coordinate the application process from submission to acceptance
• Liaison with the OLPC legal team to ensure all liability issues are handled correctly
• Ensure all project proposals are being evaluated and critiqued
• Oversee the development of a Deployment Guide specific to 100XOs & OLPCorps
• Oversee the management of financial transactions between OLPC and student teams
• Document OLPCorps processes for future refinement
• Coordinate and ship 1 XO each to accepted team members and remaining XOs to deployment zones in Africa
• Work closely partnering agencies to arrange delivery and pick-up of XOs and bundle.

Tech Team

Qualifications The Technical team should be someone who has an extensive background and skills relating to software, hardware, connectivity, and power; familiarity with XO deployments; the understanding and know-how of establishing internet, server, & related hardware in off-grid environments; can effectively communicate with students who come from diverse cultures and have varying degrees of technical skills.

Responsibilities

• Conduct online training seminars for teams
• Field technically-oriented questions from teams before deployment
• Finalize Change the World Technical Manual--a "how to" for deploying 100 or more XO laptops--with OLPC staff
• Coordinate and implement a comprehensive support network for teams while on the ground
• Design an online forum whereby teams publish their project proposals

Communication Team

Qualifications The Communication team should be someone who feels invested in both sides of OLPCorps: the local, deployment side, as well as the organizational side. He or she should be able to voice concerns by serving as a medium between OLPCorps teams and the committee. This person should feel comfortable communicating with all different types of people, personalities, and backgrounds. This person should consider him /herself very organized to ensure communication between different teams and between the committee and teams is accurate and structured. The Communication team should also know how to edit and create Wiki pages to help with less knowledgeable teams. Finally, this person should understand the goals and inner workings of the OLPCorps program so that he or she will be able to understand concerns that he/she will be communicating.

Responsibilities

• Support correspondence between OLPCorps and applicants. The team is responsible for creating personal relationships with teams.
  • This can either be through the OLPCorps Gmail account or RT.
• Ensure all wiki pages are updated and organized
• Reach out to teams who do not know how to take advantage of wiki or are not doing so
• Responsible for ensuring that each team has an individual wiki page
• Compile a contact list of applicants, accepted teams, OLPCorps Alumni, etc
• Connect university teams regionally (e.g. West African teams, South African teams) and to any existing deployments in-country.
• Coordinate OLPCorps Committee--Student Team conference: a 1-2x online discussion on development of deployment, questions/concerns, needs, expectations of workshop and deployment, etc.
• Compile accepted team information: copies of visas, passports and immunizations; flight details; emergency contact information, etc

Support Team

Qualifications The Support team should be someone who is able to identify strengths and weaknesses within teams and deployments. He or she should also be able to identify individual needs of deployments and communities through communication between the team and community members. This person should be able to match mentors strengths with a deployment's weaknesses through extensive personal communication, meaning that this person should also feel comfortable with acting as a liaison and working with all different types of people.

Responsibilities

• Partner teams with mentors within the community using OLPC's extensive community support base
  • based on a teams area of weakness and the mentors skills
  • Each team may or may not have multiple mentors
  • When possible, teams and mentors should be partnered by proximity
• Organize weekly/biweekly online seminars for teams
• Coordinate support effort during and after deployments

Promotion Team

Qualifications The Promotion team should be someone who considers him/herself well spoken and able to communicate ideas and thoughts easily. This person should understand and feel invested in the goals and principles behind OLPCorps so that he or she may accurately advocate for the program. This person should be able to advance the existing OLPCorps initiative as well as devise new ideas to improve it. The Promotion team should be willing to put in extensive time and effort in the areas of research and development. Organizational skills are key to keeping updates and research accurate and helpful.

Responsibilities

• Research new avenues to promote OLPCorps in underrepresented areas (i.e. Africa)
• Design a promotion strategy for OLPCorps '10
• Work with fundraising lead to cover costs for OLPCorps '10 Promotion expenses
• Compile & continually update an extensive university and student organization contact list
• Liaison with OLPC Europe to promote OLPCorps for European students
• Design a promotion strategy/PR campaign while teams are on the ground.

Fundraising Team

Qualifications The Fundraising team should be someone who has an intimate understanding about all aspects of fundraising. This person should also be considered fiscally responsible and know how to handle money and funds. A knowledge of how and where to find grants, as well as how to write them, is important. This person should feel comfortable giving guidance and advise pertaining to money, fundraising, and money allocation for the XO deployments. This person should be familiar with these kinds of deployments and the costs associated with them. This person should have outside experience and should feel comfortable with asking for money and funding. He or she should also be organized in order to be able to handle the listed requirements.

Responsibilities

• Create a fundraising kit for teams, including logos, fundraising tips, 501c3 status, how-to handle finances, distribution of funds, etc...
• Provide guidance on finding funding (best practices)
• Research grant opportunities via various databases
• Support teams with grant applications (e.g. writing, review, advice, etc)
• Report on what each of the university teams will need for future funding

Pedagogical Team

Qualifications The Pedagogical team should be someone who has a deep understanding of the science of education and learning (specifically Constructionism). He or she should also be able to accurately run the XO laptop and its programs. This person should work well with others (including people from all nationalities, cultures, and backgrounds) because of the need for him or her to work with teams who may know less about the XO. This persons background in education science and their knowledge of the XO workings should allow for him or her to be able to advise teams about project ideas, educational matters, and general concerns pertaining to each deployment. Finally, the Pedagogical team should be able to help in the success of each individual deployment with their support.

Responsibilities

• Responsible for engaging teams in online discussions on related themes (e.g. constructionism, learning environments, etc).
• Produce a detailed project-idea handbook for teams
• Support teams in learning how to operate all programs on the XO (i.e. field questions, outeach, etc) (e.g. Scratch, Pippy, etc)
• Compile a suggested reading list from related academic articles

Media Team

Qualifications The Media team should be someone who has an understanding not only of how to address media concerns, but also know how to distinguish what media will best portray OLPCorps and advance the program. This person will have an understanding of how to determine and identify compositionally sound media while also being able to work with all different types of media. The Media team should be willing and able to work well with all participants of OLPCorps and student teams.

Responsibilities

• Compile all media (pictures, content, footage, etc) from teams before, during, and after the program.
• Produce a ~1min promo clip of OLPCorps
• Work closely with other teams to provide them with media as needed.

Translation Team

Qualifications The Translation Team is someone who has knowledge of languages associated with OLPCorps or who has the network to get translations done. This person will be able to translate various documents in a timely and efficient manner. He or she will work with all other committee leads to diminish the language barriers that will potentially delay this program

Responsibilities

General OLPCorps Support Committee Info

• Each team is responsible for reaching out to the community for support and advice on a regular basis.
• Teams are responsible for continually documenting their role (i.e. what works, what doesn't, why, etc).
• Weekly meetings will be help at a TBD time to discuss developments.

Director of OLPCorps

Contact: TBD

Organizational Team

Paul Commons

• Contact: (commons@laptop.org) 317.523.9822
• Short bio:I was first introduced to OLPC by Nicholas Negroponte while attending an international student conference in Abu Dhabi, UAE, '07. Through email exchanges with Nicholas, I was encouraged to participate in the first G1G1. I purchased 40 XOs--20 went to OLPC & 20 went to Honduras with me. Following the success of that initial project, I wanted to see the program replicated elsewhere. I encouraged several of my peers at Indiana University to participate in the Give Many program. Through our student organization, we purchased 150 XOs (50 to OLPC) and took the remaining to an organization we partner with in South Africa. With technical support provided by Neo Masilo and KYP (the 1st SA deployment), the project turned into an overwhelming success, with 100% attendance at the 3 rural schools, a Saturday school with 100+ students crammed into a classroom, and numerous other incredible learning stories.

Bryan Stuart

• Contact: (bstuart@laptop.org) 317.750.4141
• Short bio:As a member of the IU OLPC chapter, I've had the opportunity to contribute to XO deployments in both Sierra Leone (December 08-January 09) and South Africa (August 08). My roles on these deployments have varied, ranging from developing and customizing the general Deployment Guide to fundraising and grant proposal writing to developing relationships with local government officials and NGOs.

Adetola Adeola

• Contact: (sheriphadeola@gmail.com) +234.803.088.8255
• Short bio:I am a graduate of Systems Engineering, University of Lagos. I have experience in project coordination, networking, Wi-Fi deployment, information systems and business solution development. My work experience spans provision of technical and networking support to clients in the Financial Services and Telecommunications Industry.As a project coordinator, i was involved in the pilot of the OLPC in LEA Primary School, Galadima, Abuja between April and December 2007, where alongside Carla Gomez, an OLPC representative, and the project team, supported the deployment of over 300 XO’s in terms of technical support, training and educational content management. I also installed the solar panel for the Multi-battery gang chargers. I was also actively involved in the training of the kids in repairing the faulty XO’s. Adetola currently works in Abuja Connect limited where he is a project administrator.

Hassan Ogunlowo

• Contact: (hazzino.me@gmail.com) +234.802.370.2567
• Short bio: I am an Electrical Electronics engineer by profession. I have experience in delivering turnkey ICT solutions. My experience spans, networking, operations management, use of Linux OS, telecommunications and business development. I have worked in various capacities as a project coordinator and technical support specialist in multiple ICT projects for a diverse Industry lines.I participated actively in the OLPC pilot which took place in LEA primary school, Galadima, Abuja, Nigeria between April and December 2007, where alongside OLPC representatives, i provided technical support, training, educational content management and project coordination. The project was a huge success, we were able to bring out the constructive potentials of the students and through our technical reports, contribute to the technical improvements of the XO design. Having been a firsthand witness to the remarkable educational improvement in the students of Galadima as a result of the XO’s, we intend to use our wealth of experience and the opportunity presented by the OLPCorps

Tech Team

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Communication Team

Maxine Jean-Louis

• Contact: (Maxine.JeanLouis@gmail.com) 407.982.6162
• Short bio: I am a Boston College senior and an OLPCorps applicant. I have strong communication skills as well as experience organizing large groups of people. Our team has been in contact with other SA teams to develop a support network and we would like to continue these efforts with other teams throughout Africa. I am very well organized and could offer support to OLPC as I am located in Boston. I can also assist others with the wiki page. I am enthusiastic for the development of the support committee and would love to have an active role.

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Promotion Team

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Fundraising Team

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Media Team

Henry Loeser

• Contact hloeser@radioexpert.org
• Short bio Research, practice, training, consulting and advocacy of independent community media worldwide. Returned US Peace Corps volunteer, board member of CMFE, AMARC; OLPCorps Africa applicant. Instructor of Media Studies and pursuing PhD at Masaryk University in Brno, Czech Republic. Director of www.radioexpert.org Amateur video producer.

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