So what can we do? Take this as the LUG offering to help, now the ball is in the court of the University.
Tim On 14 September 2010 15:29, J.Mwebaze <[email protected]> wrote: > Tim > > I specifically like the statement - what LuG can do - For sure the > university has been trying to teach both theory and 'interesting stuff' and > arranged for initiatives that should introduce students to such great real > life problems, but the response hasnt been that good. > > e.g. IBM launched Makocha Minds mentoring program now has more than 250 > mentors, 24 African universities and a growing number of participating > companies, including Coca Cola, Cisco, FedEx and Symantec. I am not sure how > many students could have benefited from this. > > The British Council set up an office that is dealing directly with the > Private Sector, an organization comes up with a problem, British Council > brings this problem to the University where a member of staff is identified > and a student British Council facilitates the academic staff to supervise > this project and the organization will facilitate the student who is solving > the problem. > > Nuffic provided funding for public-private sector linkages where we expect > such issues to come -up........... > > but how many of the students have benefited from such schemes? > > This issue has been discussed a lot, and perhaps we need to start suggesting > solutions. We do have very interested and bright students, but perhaps they > lack confidence. Little mentoring and pushing could do the trick, and here > is where LuG can come in. > > There is really a lot to be done, but i think it begins with the mind-set.. > Majority of our students do not to work hard, they just want to get papers > and burst. > > Considering how many universities we have to the number of students applying > to join these universities, leacturers shld be over whelmed by the numbers > and 1-1 mentoring may be not possible. > > J.. > > > On Tue, Sep 14, 2010 at 3:45 PM, Tim Schofield <[email protected]> wrote: >> >> This is a really interesting and important discussion, which I am >> enjoying reading. >> >> I don't think there is a single answer, but here are a few views of my >> own. >> >> I agree that GSoC is a not a perfect indicator of how good and how >> interested students are in programming, but it is an interesting >> indicator. USD 5000 pay for a few months of coding is a great >> incentive, and a much bigger incentive in EA than for a student in >> Silicon Valley, so why no one accepted? Either they are applying and >> getting turned down (maybe the university should be offering to help >> to them to apply. Maybe we could help them to apply??), maybe they >> haven't heard about it (does it get publicised at the University? I >> haven't seen it), or maybe they lack the confidence to apply. I don't >> know. >> >> Governments do have a role to play here. Which is the country in EA to >> have invested most in IT? Rwanda. Which is the only country in EA to >> have had anybody accepted onto GSoC in both of the last 2 years? >> Rwanda. Maybe a coincidence but...... >> >> I'm sorry to say that the standard of the education at Makarere also >> has some blame here. I have seen first hand that they lack some basic >> knowledge of real world programming. a simple thing such as proper >> code indentation and formatting was lacking. >> >> Spending too much time on facebook, and a lack of a reading culture is >> a problem wherever you go in the world, not just in Uganda. >> >> Is there something the LUG can do? I think there is a lot we can do to >> highlight the benefits to the students of writing and using open >> source code. I have come across the view many times that writing open >> source is just for rich westerners. We need to show them how they can >> leverage open source to work for them. The project I am mentoring on >> at the moment has real world commercial value, and their incentive is >> to get it working and I will start a company with them to market >> services around this software. There are many such possibilities, >> maybe others here can start their own similar initiatives. >> >> Thanks >> Tim >> >> -- >> WebERP Africa Ltd >> +447710427049 >> +256752963327 >> +255784602561 >> www.weberpafrica.com >> _______________________________________________ >> LUG mailing list >> [email protected] >> http://kym.net/mailman/listinfo/lug >> >> LUG is generously hosted by INFOCOM http://www.infocom.co.ug/ >> >> All Archives can be found at http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/ >> >> The above comments and data are owned by whoever posted them (including >> attachments if any). The List's Host is not responsible for them in any way. >> --------------------------------------- >> > > > > -- > += Johnson > -------------------------------------- > Mob UG: +070 1 735800 / 0392 948 368 > http://www.astro.rug.nl/~jmwebaze > skype: mwebazej > > _______________________________________________ > LUG mailing list > [email protected] > http://kym.net/mailman/listinfo/lug > > LUG is generously hosted by INFOCOM http://www.infocom.co.ug/ > > All Archives can be found at http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/ > > The above comments and data are owned by whoever posted them (including > attachments if any). The List's Host is not responsible for them in any way. > --------------------------------------- > > > -- WebERP Africa Ltd +447710427049 +256752963327 +255784602561 www.weberpafrica.com _______________________________________________ LUG mailing list [email protected] http://kym.net/mailman/listinfo/lug LUG is generously hosted by INFOCOM http://www.infocom.co.ug/ All Archives can be found at http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/ The above comments and data are owned by whoever posted them (including attachments if any). The List's Host is not responsible for them in any way. ---------------------------------------
