Empower Women & Girls in Guatemala with Technology

The following is a postcard from Lydia Sorensen, GlobalGiving's In-the-Field Representative in Guatemala, about her recent visit to The Frances and Henry Riecken Foundation.

In the community of Parramos, about a half hour outside the city of Antigua, Guatemala, sits a new library that any town would be proud to call their own. Completed just last week, it's already abuzz with children darting in and out as Hans and Marta (the librarians) teach word games and chess. Its yellow walls and cool tile floors shine as a beacon of hope in the middle of a dusty field that the community hopes will someday hold a school as well.

Back in a quiet corner next to a bookshelf holding the technology related books, are three new Apple computers. More and more Guatemalans are using the internet for work, school, and fun, but in rural communities like Parramos it’s still not common for families to have their own computers. The library and it’s free computers mean access to a world outside this town, and for some their first opportunity to access learning tools as simple (and yet valuable) as Wikipedia. As Guatemalan public schools are rarely able to adequately prepare students for anything more than the most basic of jobs, access to additional education at the library enables these children and their families to dream of a better future.

Slowly but surely offline education content is become more and more available.  Last week a group of middle school students told the story of how they completed a science project using RACHEL, the offline educational content available from www.worldpossible.org.  For $100 the content is available using a Raspberry Pi.  As the girls have yet to have access to badly needed computers or tablets they shared a single wi-fi enabled phone.  One of them used the phone to access the content while the others took notes.  Using the information from the Spanish language version of RACHEL they were able to build a drip irrigation system using recycled liter-size plastic bottles.  Just think what they could do with computers and tablets rather than just a single phone!

The library in Xolsacmaljá, Totonicapán, Guatemala eagerly awaits your help in providing new computers and tablets to make the offline educational content available to all of the girls and women in their community.  The feedback that we are getting is that the greatest usage is for doing research for homework.  RACHEL allows users to search Wikipedia without having access to the internet and to watch Khan Academy math and science videos in Spanish WITHOUT internet.  We look forward to being able to offer technology based educational content to everyone with an interest and there are many.

Links:

• World Possible's Facebook page
• Riecken Community Libraries Facebook page