By Paul Towne | Sr. Director of Strategic Partnerships
The use of the PCs in the comfort of a classroom provides a safe space for girls to develop social networks amongst themselves. Outside of the home, schools are one of the only places girls may meet with other girls in a social setting. The secure environment provided by the school helps girls in developing their confidence without fear of outside intrusion. Thus, schools provide the only safe space, outside the home, for girls to meet with each other, learn together and share ideas. The ease of access to the internet and computer training should help girls link with their counterparts globally, enabling them to expand their worldviews. Through these connections, girls can develop methods for engagement in civic action projects, further increasing their social networks and development of leadership skills.
The CARE-Intel collaboration has helped in fostering positive change via the following outcomes:
CARE has provided computer training to teachers and students. The computers have been used for classroom instruction and after school for extra-curricular activities such as computer clubs. CARE helped in enhancing learning opportunities and leadership skills particularly of girls, proving great opportunity for girls to network and practice extra-curricular activities.
CARE has helped enhance learning opportunities and leadership skills in India through expanded computer use. The acquisition of the computers significantly increased resources and learning opportunities for students as it helped in bringing the computer-to-student ration close to 1-1. The extra resources helped in solidifying students’ reasoning and analytical skills and the computers also provided the students with opportunities for extracurricular activities such as developing social networks online.
Teacher training workshops aimed at providing school-based academic support to instructors. While most of the teachers in the schools have a basic knowledge of computers, the trainings intended to ensure they are using the technology to its full potential in the day-to-day teaching-learning process in the classroom using the teacher-laptop and classmates.
Acquiring leadership skills through computers further empowers girls by building their confidence, enabling them to make informed decisions about their lives. Girls were also given the opportunity to develop social networks using the computers in their classrooms. Within this framework; Computer friends groups have been formed under the supervision of the IT teachers in the schools.
Ultimately, the CARE-Intel partnership is leading to increased instructional capacity of teachers, computer literacy skills for students and the creation of girls’ active social networks.
By Heather Levine, an applications engineer at Intel | Posted by CARE
By Rosa Singer | Director, Strategic Partnerships & Alliances, CARE
Project reports on GlobalGiving are posted directly to globalgiving.org by Project Leaders as they are completed, generally every 3-4 months. To protect the integrity of these documents, GlobalGiving does not alter them; therefore you may find some language or formatting issues.
If you donate to this project or have donated to this project, you can receive an email when this project posts a report. You can also subscribe for reports without donating.