Say what you want about the greatest DJ alive - Bounty Killer, one thing you can’t say is that he never put his money where his mouth was. Long before it could be considered ‘en vogue’ to donate to charities, the Warlord has been supporting social causes such as the Upliftment Jamaica foundation.

Its nice to see two of his proteges, Mavado and Busy Signal, making the news for similar efforts. In Busy’s case, its a one-off donation of $150,000 to two students of St. Jago High School in need of medical attention.

It’s Mavado’s charity that has stirred my interest the most though, given its ICT4D bent, an area of interest of mine. The DJ has been spearheading a new charity called Connect Jamaica who’s purpose is to donate at least one computer and printer to every school in Jamaica.

Mavado - Thefader.com photo

First reaction: "That’s a whole lotta schools enuh." This search on the Ministry of Education’s site shows 1299. Calculating it at an EXTREMELY nominal cost of, say, $14,000 a pop which is the cost of the OLPC initiative’s XO laptops(calculated at US$1 = J$70), thats over J$18,186,000. To the best of my knowledge whatever system he’s donating is not one of the XO laptops and will probably cost at least J$10,000 more.

Mi moomah!

The One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) - Wikipedia.org phto

Unless the artist and his team aren’t being sincere then somebody never did their math homework at all… OR… dudes cake is stacked higher than a tack on the roof! I mean, if Beenie Man can owe over J$30 million in taxes (+ $20 million in penalities) its not hard to imagine that over a period of 3 or so years that this project could be realistically funded.

Feasibility aside, I must say its an excellent start. First world readers are probably seeing this and going ‘one computer per school?! I have five for my penis alone!’ but trust, on the ground reality, especially in rural areas like my home community is that most schools are a collection of all the students in a single large room with chalk boards as dividers between the different classes.

I am hoping though, that another entity can step in to offer some reasonable level of sustainability to this project. How/Why? Well throwing some technology at situation is really no different than giving a man a fish. Sure he’s gonna eat it up and lick his fingers but he’ll be shit out of luck and hungry to boot in another few hours. Training in the management and use of these computers is needed for the teachers and students themselves.Some savvy, sensible (and perhaps publicity hungry) training organisation could offer to provide some free basic training in Desktop productivity, using the internet for academic purposes as well as computer troubleshooting.

Otherwise, this could be some wasted money down the drain of wastage.

That aside, I say Mavado for PM. Ok, fine! At least ‘artist of the week’ for his efforts at breathing more life into the Ministry of Educations 9 year old ICT policy. All efforts like these need are some guidance.

The Alliance isn’t just talking about it, they’re being about it too!

Technorati Tags: ICT4D , Jamaica , Mavado , Alliance , Education