Grant Proposal: Women in Technology, Cameroon

Category: Grants

Comments (14)


This side really briefing me thank God i need this it will be the next step to make in my life


I got this question by email.
--
The course program was copied from somewhere else. Was there a permission to use it? https://s3-ap-southeast-1.amazonaws.com/tv-prod/documents/2961-perl.pdf
The project details section has copied contents too.


I wrote this project so many times. I wrote it in several other documents and saved separately, so in the course of correction i have to copy what i have already written to a final document.

The course content was copied but i forgot to give the credit to the original document. I love the way the course outline was structured, which is a similar method which i would like to implement in the project.


The Idea is a very good one. This will help many of our youths who are already deep in scamming, to at least make in life with I.T. I.Y being a vast world where there is a place for everybody!


Hello,
This is agreat project that will inspire girls in Cameroon to develope a passion in Technology.I really appreciate this wonderfull initiative thatwill empower girls for the Tech work force.Thanks.


The committee members had discussion and we would like to know these points:

  • How many prospective students showed interest in the course? Eight-month full time training will require a large commitment of time from you and the students and we'd like to ensure there is enough target.
  • What's the goal of this training? Is it to enable the students to find a job where Perl or programming skills would be useful? If so, after completing the course, how likely is each student going to get hired? (consider various factors, such as job market)
  • Teaching something to somebody else is never easy. What qualifies you and Nfor as a Perl instructor? What's your involvement with Perl or education in general?
  • How do you measure success in a quantifiable manner? As you know, our grant is paid upon completion so we need to agree on the success criteria.


Thank you.


How many prospective students showed interest in the course? Eight-month full time training will require a large commitment of time from you and the students and we'd like to ensure there is enough target.

At the moment we have over 30 students who have shown interest in the course. The full time commitment we are willing to put into this project is worth doing. I come from a region were programming is a rare assets. We live in communities that are faced with problems and the solutions to this simple problems can be solved by us using the power of coding.

What's the goal of this training?

(1)
The target of this project is to train less privileged students with the skills of programming using the Perl Programming language.

(2) We intend to develop the culture of writing code to solve problems using the Perl programming language.

(3)
This course is geared at teaching students to be able to write code to build their own startups from scratch.

(4)
This course is also geared at helping students acquire skills which will help them get jobs either as freelancers of hired in Companies. The likely hood of students from our course earning a job will be very high. The program will be focused on practiced based programming. Meaning at the end of this course each student who have attended the program should be able to build either a web, mobile or game application.

With this ability to handle project single handedly will give much credibility for employers to hire them and for them to earn freelance jobs.

(5)
This project is targeted at teaching students the power of coding using the Perl Programing language so that they can use these skills to be able to build open source projects from a African perspective.

(6)
This project will help teaching the student the power of coding which will enable them to share our culture, society, games, etc on the Internet.

Teaching something to somebody else is never easy. What qualifies you and Nfor as a Perl instructor? What's your involvement with Perl or education in general?

Nfor Yembe owns a company that builds website for his clients. http://yemsgroupinc.com/

Ngangsi Richard has been teaching python programming for girls here in Cameroon. This is an article of what we have been doing.

http://pyfound.blogspot.com/2015/10/python-in-cameroon-success.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+PythonSoftwareFoundationNews+%28Python+Software+Foundation+News%29


Python Cameroon


How do you measure success in a quantifiable manner? As you know, our grant is paid upon completion so we need to agree on the success criteria.

We think with a program like this, we will be able to increase the amount of people who use Perl programming language for 0% to about 5% in our first year.

Also we are still requesting some funds as stated in the project to be able to quick start the project because we have limited resources.

Conclusion:

I have one word for the entire board members. We believe in what we are perusing and we know it is going to succeed with flying colors. We believe that we can carry through with this with a successful ending. Whatever the heart of men can conceive it can achieve.


I read through that link and a few related links. Here is what I saw.

He is very clear on how many people he will teach, and what he will teach. However both in his Perl proposal and past Python work I never saw one example cited of a student who went on to put their programming knowledge to better their lives. I found no names. No companies. No independent articles about successes.

Remember, Cameroon is a country with extreme poverty and corruption. Checking https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/cm.html , the GDP per capita is $3000 per year. Said GDP is very unevenly distributed, most make much less than that.

He claims that his students can easily create a startup. My belief is that the typical student graduating from his class will not be able to afford a computer of their own. Reliable internet is also not available. There are a lot of skills needed for a startup other than the basic computer literacy that he is promising. And even if you solve all of that, you still have local corruption to deal with.

"Create an internet startup" is not exactly a viable plan for the women who went through the class. And I don't see value in seeing X people gain exposure to skills that are useless for their lives.


Remember, Cameroon is a country with extreme poverty and corruption. Checking
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/cm.html, the GDP per capita is $3000 per year. Said GDP is very unevenly distributed, most make much less than that.

@Ben Tilly:
It is good to know you have an opinion and you can make it sound the way your opinions marry with your points.

The link to that statistics you are claiming is showing a 404 error. It does not exist.

If you say Cameroon is a country of extreme poverty i think you need to make your research properly. That is an over say. Extreme Poverty you say? That is terribly wrong.

And if you say the students wont be able to buy a personal computer and you claim that the skills will be useless for them is absolutely wrong and i think that statement is out to set in confusion.

We are having training programs organized by Google here in Cameroon, teaching young Cameroonians how to read and write android applications.

If Google which is one of the most successful Internet company knew that the training programs they organized here in Cameroon will be useless they will never be too foolish to make the investment in the first place.

And also Google wont be too stupid to organize such a program if they knew a normal Cameroonian cannot afford a laptop or a computer as you claimed.

At least 1 member out of every household in Cameroon owns either a laptop or a desktops or they have access to a computer. Except people who live in interior villages in the country.

He claims that his students can easily create a startup

@Ben:

Point of correction, our students will use the knowledge learn to build solutions to problems which they face within their community and around Africa.

The course is going to see that every students having an idea and who develops the idea fully, we will see totally that we help the confounder succeed with their startup because we are also proving a center for entrepreneurs to come and share ideas together and build solutions to problems as a team.

A recent survey done by the IMF totally contradicts the claims you are making. Here is the link.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/chriswright/2014/10/09/the-imf-says-the-worlds-in-a-mess-but-not-africa/

You forgot to mention that one of the most expensive cities in Africa is found in Cameroon, so how comes Cameroonians are leaving in extreme poverty as you claimed?

http://www.africapedia.com/THE-MOST-EXPENSIVE-BIG-CITIES--IN-AFRICA


There are a lot of skills needed for a startup other than the basic computer literacy that he is promising.

Is programming, and building Applications from scratch basic computer skills?

Please can you really go through the course structure an try to understand what and where we are heading to?

Concluding:

I think we all have an opinion. But i think we can deliver the kind of results required for this program to the PERL foundation. We are ready to commit full time to make the project a success.


Re: Broken link

It seems MT4 put the <a> tag wrongly. I have edited Ben Tilly's comment so the link works.


Yes, I have read the Forbes article. In percentage year over year growth, Africa is growing fast. But it is growing from a bad base. Cameroon's GDP per capita is $3000/year. Which places you 189 out of 230 countries that we have stats for. I don't know what Cameroon has decided is the poverty level, but the most recent estimate was that 48% are in poverty. (In most countries in the world, $3k/year would be poverty.)

About corruption, the CIA factbook's economic summary says that a drag on Cameroon's economy is its "endemic corruption". How bad is said corruption? Look at http://www.transparency.org/cpi2014/infographic/global you will see that Cameroon has a score of 27, which leaves it ranked 136 out of 175 tracked countries. That's pretty bad.

Furthermore I'm still missing any independently verifiable demonstration that your existing Python efforts have lead to your previous students having good jobs.


I don't understand the issue here.

@Ben Tilly,
Even if all what you are saying is the gospel truth, shouldn't we support Ngansi for his project, I think that is even more reason why he should be supported. You speak as if Cameroonians are in a total mess. What does corruption has to do with this project?

Programming has helped many people to be self-employed today, me being a perfect example. I.T is surely the tool that will help many poor countries to come out of this poverty.

We are here to help make things happen. Will you prefer to help somebody in New York who already has everything or someone in Cameroon, who does not have any?

So please let's focus on how to help projects like this happen, and stop bringing things that won't help.
Regards


Hello,Technology has brought a lot of nations out of poverty,why not Cameroon.Let's promote ITC for an emerging nation espacially for girls and women to build a sustainable nation.
We need to increase the number of girls in the Teckwork force in Africa.It is very necessary to inspire and motivate the interst of women in STEM. I am one of them doing this. Keep on Richard. Thanks.


@Ben Tilly
This is a report about Cameroon.

http://tech.co/top-15-entrepreneurial-countries-world-2015-06


Sign in to add comment