HELP ME TAKE DIGITAL LITERACY TO RURAL AREAS

I am Psalmdavid ekpo the director of De-psalm Intl Concept. am also a Singer, film maker and a career coach. My company is focused on IT and Multi Media and we have over time used our company to give back to the society most especially My countryNigeria. I have been trained in various fields on IT and Multimedia and i have for so many years worked with lots of people in the industry. I have a great passion for human development and i don't accept mediocrity. I believe everyone should haveequal access to knowledge as that is how we can turn a third world country to a first world country.

THE CAUSE

I fear that with the fast rising technological development around the world majority of Africans wont measure up with the trend of things. most especially those in the rural areas who make up more than half of the population of the citizens.This will only increase the level of poverty in those areas as information is power and without it one is incapable of taking vital steps towards any goal. This fear led to this movement; TEACHING DIGITAL LITERACY IN RURAL AREAS. With this I intend to reach both adults and children who don't know how to use computers, smart phones, applications and multimedia gadgets to do so. I want to further train farmers in the rural areas and local traders in the interiors to cease the boundless opportunities on the internet to sell their produce and to collaborate with others over the web. We also want to train children in these areas to use these facilities too so that as they grow in these rural communities they can spread the knowledge among the upcoming ones.

FORECAST

Based on our research, if in the next 5 years a substantial amount of information on how to use these digital elements is pass across to these interior areas in Africa we will have lots of entrepreneurs in these locations that are occupied by mostly farmers, craft men and fisher men. I strongly believe if we can bring this endless world of opportunities to them, it will not only be a solution to them but also to the rest of the world since it will enhance collaboration and networking. In one of my travels i and my team stumbled across a couple of college kids who were so fascinated by our Ipads and as we were flipping through images from FaceBook the 3 kids were arguing that it was a TV. Obviously they have never heard the word Ipad before not to talk of knowing what it does . these are kids above 18years old and through out my stay in Agaja i couldn't find anyone who knows what google is. In Nigeria where i am from the syllabus contain computer knowledge as a subject that should be thought in primary and secondary schools Schools in town use desktop to teach children about computer knowledge. most privileged kids in town further take private lessons to know more about the Digital world and learn to become Digital citizens. Who is teaching the children in the villages who don't even have access to desktop computer not to talk of laptops and Ipads or smart phones. should they be left out on becoming digital citizens. soon the Internet Of Everything innovation will spread all over the world. How will people in this category cope when everything they need to use is digitized. Someone has to teach them, its not easy but it has to be done. I and my team have currently started with Nigeria when we are through with Nigeria we will go to Ghana, then the rest of west Africa.We also give them gadgets like Ipads, Smart Phones, text books on digital literacy as that will further strengthen their memory.

STRATEGY

I and my team travel to a state, make list of local government areas there, then find out how many villages are in the local governments. We then test their digital knowledge ward by ward. its time consuming, but we are able to reach more schools and adults with these strategy. After teaching most time, we give them fairly used gadgets that were given to us or that we bought. we also give them clothes school bags, books on digital literacy with lots of pictures in it to captivate them and white boards.

WHY WE NEED MONEY

We spend lots of money on gadget, transportation, crew maintenance, lodge, feeding, most cases paying for town halls to hold the trainings. We also spend a lot of money in powering the environment where there is no electricity. These moneys we spend are most times loans and support from friends. At this time, there is no money to make us further the cause as the economy of country is unbalanced. We have for now visited 3 communities and for each of these trips the minimum we spend is 25000 dollars including gifts. We dont only need cash we can take gifts like iPads Laptops, Smart phones, IP boards and multimedia gadgets to donate to these small communities after teaching them. We will be using your donations for gadget, transportation, crew maintenance, lodge, feeding, paying for town halls to hold the trainings, buying of instructional materials for these people and above all, internet Data as we make sure they browse, create facebook profiles, twitter and instagram. We also ensure that they create a Gmail account and we teach the farmers and market women how they can place their produce on google.

WE NEED YOUR HELP

I cant carry this burden alone, as good as this cause is its expensive and risky. i wouldn't want to quit because it could have been me among these people who don't have access to digital knowledge but am privilege to have various certificates on digital literacy and the least i can do is teach it for free to those who cant pay for it. its one way to empower Africans who are seen as an under developing part of the world. we need your help in cash, materials or volunteer work to help this cause thrive. I believe in Africa and i believe if Africans have access to the right information and are thought how to process it, in five years time we will have more entrepreneurs than we would if we spend that time depending on the government. Please kindly help us make this cause thrive.

CONCLUSION

I believe that i and my team are doing a great work, and i feel very fulfilled each time a little boy tells me thank you for teaching me or i get a message on social media from one of the hundreds of kids or adults i created an account on facebook for, who never had an idea about social media or the internet. Most times the messages come when am finding it really difficult to access funds for the next trip and it encourages me to want to do more. On behalf of my team I thank everyone who read to this point. Am really happy to share, thanks for sharing the burden with me.