University of Miami Mauritania OLPC

School: University of Miami, Florida

Team Members: Stephanie Selvick & Sydney Owens

Deployment Location: Mauritania, specific local TBA

We are a team of two African literature Ph.D. students / lecturers at the University of Miami looking to empower the next generation of African women in Mauritania. In particular, we have teamed up with a group of Peace Corps volunteers who support 22 Girl’s Mentoring Centers across the country. While these centers are currently run by both Peace Corps and local Mauritanian volunteers, the goal of local, long-term sustainability means these centers will be solely run by Mauritanians in the near future. At present, the mentoring centers execute several practical (such as, cooking and sewing) and educational (such as, foreign languages and sciences) curriculum for females who don’t have the means to afford schooling. My teammate and I believe that allowing these females access to laptop technology is an important step toward minimizing the gender gap in the fields of science and technology. In addition, these laptops will give young girls an avenue to explore their creativity and express their identities.

We are currently working on specific pedagogical ideas geared toward children age 6-12. Since illiteracy will be one challenge when working with children this age, these activities will address reading and writing skills, while also providing other avenues of learning, such as visual images, games, and film.

We are currently working on our project proposal, and will post it here as soon as we have a working draft. For more information, you can contact us at selvis42@gmail.com