OLPC Nepal

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Flag of Nepal.svg

Nepal

 Country Information
 ISO Country Code NP
 Wikipedia Article Wikipedia Link
 Government Support Sponsored Trials
 Deployment Intermediate Trial (500 to 5000 machines)
 Languages
 Keyboard Layout Nepali Layout
 Written Nepali (ne)
 Spoken Nepali (ne)
 Secondary Written Various dialects
 Secondary Spoken Various dialects


'Nepal नेपाल
'
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Nepal_map.png
Capital Kathmandu
Official languages Nepali
Area 147,181 km²
Population
 - July 2009 estimate 28,563,377
 - 2007 census 28,875,140
 - Density 184/km²
Education
 - Literacy (%) 48.6
 - Compulsory Years 5
 - Compulsory Age 5
 - Pop. in School Age 3571
 - Pop. in School 2828
GDP (PPP) 2009 est. USD 33.024 billion
 - Per capita $1,183
GDP (nominal) 2009 est. $12.521
 - Per capita $449
HDI  (2007) 0.534 (medium)
Gini Index  (2003–04) 47.2
Time zone NPT (UTC+5:45)
Internet TLD .np
Calling code ++977
More statistics...

Nepal has had perhaps the most active grassroots OLPC community, that became active in the fall of 2006. The OLPC Nepal movement has needed to develop its deployment plans, school server architecture, and strategies of interfacing with government. The most active members of the OLPC community within Nepal formed a local non-profit organization in July 2007, OLE Nepal, to implement Nepal's initial OLPC deployments. All of these became the exemplars for later deployments.

Implementation and Deployments

The OLPC-Nepal project began with the efforts of two Nepali engineering students named Shankar Pokharel and Ankur Sharma. These two students were responsible for raising awareness at the grassroots level of the potential of OLPC to positively impact the educational system of Nepal. They contacted OLPC expressing their interest in starting an OLPC chapter in Nepal.

Soon after, the project was taken over by OLE (Open Learning Exchange). OLE-Nepal is a non-governmental organization dedicated to assisting the Government of Nepal in meeting its Education for All goals by developing freely accessible, open-source Information and Communication Technology (ICT)-based educational teaching-learning materials [1]. OLE’s responsibilities have ranged from the distribution of laptops to the training of teachers and the technical support. Meanwhile, the Nepal Government has three-tier committees to implement OLPC in Nepal under Ministry of Education: Steering Committee (the chair is the Secretary of Ministry of Education), Coordination Committee (the chair is the Director of Department of Education), and a Task Force (the chair is the Deputy Director of Department of Education). This combination of grassroots and government support was an important factor in the success of the project in Nepal. In fact, this project has inspired others, such as Robbie Karmacharia, to start their own OLPC pilot projects in Nepal.

OLE partnered with the Nepalese Government Department of Education in order to distribute laptops in the Lalitpur District. Pilot schools selected were the Bishwamitra Ganesh Secondary School and the Bashuki Lower Secondary School. There were 135 laptops deployed to students in grades 2 and 6 in both schools on April 25th, 2008. 3 Uttam Sharma, a doctoral student at the Department of Applied Economics at the University of Minnesota (sharm061@umn.edu), has done the evaluation of the initial pilot phase.

OLE conducted an extensive teacher training program in cooperation with Nepal’s National Center for Educational Development (Nepal’s national teacher training organization).

A second deployment happened in April, 2009, consisting of 5000 laptops. See OLE Nepal Blog

As per the request of the teachers, students, and parents, they have set up a digital library (E-Pustakalaya) that literally translates from Nepali into English. This “E-Library” includes all required curriculum textbooks.


News

8/27/08 NPR Robbie Karmacharia is running a small OLPC pilot in Nepal. He says that even though the Nepali government is skeptical of the entire concept, he compares his efforts to what happened in Nepal over 50 years ago: a widespread literacy and education campaign. He believes that this is the time to take the next leap.

5/30/08 Rabi Karmacharya, executive director of OLE Nepal, gives a presentation at OLPC headquarters about Nepal's progress

5/19/08 Express Computer The OLPC team has also done some pilot project in India and Nepal… “As per my knowledge, the Nepal government has provided laptops and is planning to introduce this project across the country,” added Shailendra Badoni, Chief Operating Officer, Datacraft India.

4/25/08 OLE Nepal launches wide trial in Bashuki and Bishwamitra schools

2/8/08 Advogato While Richard Stallman was visiting southern India to speak in January, the folks at the OLPC Nepal blog caught up with him and managed to do an hour-long interview. The interview is available… In it, Stallman expresses his support for the OLPC project and, in particular, it's use of free BIOS. He says he is even thinking of replacing his old Thinkpad for an OLPC XO. His only complaint is with the use of proprietary code for wireless networking.

6/2007: Members of the OLPC Nepal community form OLE Nepal to implement Nepal's pilots

1/15/07 PSFK: “Children’s Machine Implementation Debate” “Amidst all the buzz, though, skeptics worry that the implementation plans being outlined are unrealistic. $100 does not factor in training costs, hardware and software maintenance, as well as internet access. One estimate from Jon Carnfield of OLPC News brings the bill up to over $970. Meanwhile, according to OLPC News, Libya is earmarking $208 per laptop and a Brazilian professor puts his country’s cost at $235. The debate has spilled onto Slashdot and Newsforge as well. Think you can solve the problem? OLPC News is soliciting implementation plans for Nepal.”

Additional Information Sources

Deployments and Trials

OLE Nepal in Bashuki and Bishwamitra schools

On April 25, 2008, OLE Nepal launched Phase I of the Nepal OLPC deployment. This involved distribution of 135 XOs at two pilot schools, with accompanying curriculum both developed and in development. These XOs joined 22 XOs distributed a month earlier to teachers, who received training prior to developing classroom lesson plans for the Phase I launch.

Historical Planning Documents

These pages are preserved to show the history but they are dated now and do not show actual deployment design.

Groups

OLE Nepal

OLE Nepal is a local Nepali NGO that has a memorandum of understanding with Nepal's Department of Education to implement Nepal's pilots at Bashuki and Bishwamitra. For more information visit their wiki page or [website].

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