Working in the field

Just before the resuming of classes after 3 weeks of winter holidays, Educatic invited some of the more motivated and IT-literate teachers for a 2-day workshop on digital content production. The game digitalization process I described in my post about the last workshop is taking up a lot of time and resources with high-quality, greatly localized and personalized, but hardly efficient results. Teachers have started to enquire on how to develop their own games without having to rely on the technical support by Educatic. Therefore, as opposed to the complex game development approach which involved many people during the last workshop, this time, it was all about how teachers could create their own digital learning resources.

With 8 teachers participating, some of whom had to travel for hours from remote rural villages, almost all those invited attended and thus five different “unidades educativas” (educational units, schools or educational centers of a certain level) were represented.

The tools chosen for the workshop were Jclic and HotPotatoes – both are software written in Java and allow the creation of simple educational games such as multiple choice quizzes, puzzles, riddles or association games. One of the main reasons for the selection is that they are both localized into Spanish – a requirement which is essential as, although taught at school, English is not understood by many in Bolivia.

The first day was aimed at teaching the basics of Jclic. Teachers quickly learned how to create an empty project, fill the media gallery and soon started to create their first rompecabeza (“break your head” – a Puzzle) or association games using sound, (moving) images and text. With the teacher’s computer skills varying from being able to manage a variety of software applications until just learning to hit the right spot when clicking the mouse, the instructor, Ronald, did a good job in adapting its explanations accordingly.

On the following day, HotPotatoes was introduced in order to give the teachers the opportunity to select their favourite tool. Both applications are available across platforms, allow multimedia integration and have a functionality to combine exercises to a teaching module, thereby defining secuence of exercises and levels of difficulty.

After taking the seminar, the teachers came to the conclusion that they preferred using Jclic for usability reasons. HotPotatoes, they found, required many more steps to accomplish a certain function than does Jclic. They complained that HotPotatoes offered less exercise types and lacked behind Jclic both, usability-wise as well as graphic-wise. Integrating multimedia – something all teachers were very eager to learn about – seemed easier to accomplish in Jclic as well as it comes with a media library concept where all media resources are stored and can be reused across different projects. However, for creating crossword puzzles, HotPotatoes was by far easier to use.

Profesor Walter, a teacher from the municipy of Challapata, had already attended a seminar on Jclic and came for the HotPotatoe extension. He has succesfully integrated Jclic in his mathematics lessons and finds that students are having more fun learning with the computer and ironically remarks that they often listen better to the machine than to the teacher.

Meanwhile, the challenge remains: how can you succesfully and efficiently capacitate teachers with poor computer literacy in a content production software obtaining high-quality pedagogic results at the same time? How can a technology-driven result be avoided? Couldn’t the games produced be played just as well with paper and pencil?

The answer is probably complex: on the one hand, technology should never be applied as a goal in itself but rather as a means to an end. On the other, the goal of the Educatic project is to integrate ICT in the school curriculum and to enrich classroom activities. Therefore, the quality of the project outcome should probably not only be measured by the quality of the content produced, but also by the skills as well as the motivation to understand acquired by teachers and students alike. What is more, I believe that each student who has begun to understood and gained interest in the vast potentials that offer ICTs is worth the effort. Soon, this student will have understood the “secrets” behind much better than his teacher. And be it for having played a crossword puzzle in his maths class.

Anne Schanz studied International Information Management at the University of Hildesheim, Germany. In her master’s thesis “Web-based communication in an intercultural learning project – analysis and development potentials of the Global Teenager Project” she investigated the effectiveness of use of online communication software within the GTP and analysed data from 258 participants in 11 countries. http://anneschanz.de/blog/tag/ict4d.

Read more about the 'ICT in Primary and Secondary Education' project which Educatic executes and IICD supports.

Last weekend, I was able to be part of the first capacity building workshop held by Educatic during my stay in Oruro. It was the first of a round of 5 workshops during which local teachers will go through various phases of digital content production. At the end, this will result in a number of educational flash games invented and designed by the teachers themselves and implemented by the team of Educatic.

This time, a group of 10 teachers that were very new to ICTs came – a challenge in a way, as they will have to think about how to adapt their functional game design in a way that it will be feasible to digitalize it. Unfortunately, winter holidays had just started, so that the normal group size of around 30 wasn’t reached. During this first one-day workshop, the teachers – recruited through the local branch of the Ministry of Education – were presented with the main objectives of the project and got to know their fellow teachers who will likewise design their games in the same round of workshops.

The first challenge they were presented with was to think about an educational problem from their subject in a specific age group, e.g. sorting of natural numbers or spelling of specific words. They were then asked to think about an (offline) setting which is specific to their region or cultural group. This might be a game, or simply the natural surroundings of the villages they come from. As this region has always been a mining region, one setting was the entrance of a mine with the worker encountering various co-workers as the levels of the game increase. Another setting was taken from a children’s game which is played outside, where seeds are thrown towards an object. The closest seed wins. Thanks to this contextualized approach, the students will hopefully be more inclined to identify with the games and have more fun while playing and learning.

During a well-facilitated session, all teachers were able to come up with a first idea on paper. Initial drawings of the game design supported the imagination of the course of the game and identify potential difficulties. During lunch, the shy group started chatting over the traditional “charque”-dish (dried lama meat with a hard-boiled egg, potatoes and dried corn and a piece of goat cheese).

As it is not always easy to find an address here in the maze of small streets and shops, two teachers only managed to find us when the rest had almost finished. However, they were not sent home but welcomed just as warmly and received their private introduction which ended in them producing some very nice ideas.

During the coming sessions, teachers will define their ideas more finely, adapted their drawings and explanations and finally evaluate the prototypes produced by Educatic.

I admit that this way of digital educational content production is a long process. Teachers will have to travel several times and spend their weekends working. They will have to make a great effort to get involved in a new medium they might have no experience in. However, from what I have seen and heard, I do believe that in the end, the results are very valuable. Teachers will have developed a pride in their own achievements, feel the effort they have spent and are thus more likely to adopt the games in their teaching routine. Last but not least, they will leave with the feeling that they have been listened to and were able to apply their didactic and professional knowledge.

Anne Schanz studied International Information Management at the University of Hildesheim, Germany. In her master’s thesis “Web-based communication in an intercultural learning project – analysis and development potentials of the Global Teenager Project” she investigated the effectiveness of use of online communication software within the GTP and analysed data from 258 participants in 11 countries. http://anneschanz.de/blog/tag/ict4d.

Read more about the 'ICT in Primary and Secondary Education' project which Educatic executes and IICD supports.

As the Managing Director of IICD, I participated in the end of January in the World Bank’s “ICT Sector Week: Enabling Development” in Washington. This event was organised by the World Bank’s Global Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Department for the Bank’s staff and the staff of the International Finance Corporation, a member of the World Bank Group.

The purpose of the week was to engage IFC and WB staff, senior industry executives, and sector experts in discussion how to leverage ICT to scale up the development impact of the ICF and WB operations. 

Strategy sessions were held on increasing the reach and impact of services in public sector management, education, health, agriculture and rural development.

IICD was involved as speaker in the ICT for Health session and contributed to the panel discussion of the agriculture and rural development session. I also presented IICD in the ICT for Education session.

Find below my personal findings on the Health and Education sessions.

Working towards innovative health services delivery

The workshop on health was very interesting and included participants with lots of experience and key positions. After a well-received presentation the participants discussed: What is e-health? What long term commitment do we need from the bank? What is the role of, amongst others, health insurance and privacy of data?

A much respected female senior advisor of the World Bank suggested that the World Bank thinks about new ways to deliver health services in developing countries. She pointed out that the WB should not be willing to finance projects that are just replicating what was done in the past in the ‘North’. From this point of view she considered that there was a bright future for telemedicine and distance learning education.

“ICT is giving the opportunity to review what is done and to explore what should be possible and what should be adapted to the context of the developing countries.”

My view and experience on this is that ICT create opportunities for institutions in developing countries to do health service delivery in an innovative way: not matching Northern traditions but to be answering institutions’ own specific challenges. IICD is working much in line with this. What IICD is doing in the health sector attracted positive attention in particular because of our integrated approach (guiding principles or what I call ‘true capacity building’). Examples of our work within health services delivery are the Teleradiology project in Mali and the Telemedicine project in Tanzania.

Moving towards smart use of ICT in Education

As is already the case in the area of health services delivery, ICT is creating opportunities for developing countries to do education delivery in an innovative way: not according to Northern approaches but responding to its own specific challenges. The World Bank staff has an advisory role to governments in developing countries and should be prepared for these opportunities.

For IICD, it is worth to think about: do we want to mainstream ICT in education (using ICT to help teachers in their traditional education approach to make their work more attractive for the students) or do we want to stand in a new education paradigm (providing opportunities for innovative approaches) and look at how ICTs can play a role for this purpose? At the moment we are involved in both ways of developing education.

The current education system is a product of the industrial revolution, from 200 years ago. How will today’s digital revolution shape the future’s education? Education should be designed to help students to think creatively, reason systematically, and work collaboratively.

November 5^th 2008, Bamako, Mali, 7 in the morning. A special day had started. 

The first day of the long awaited Cross-Country Learning Event (CCLE) on Livelihood Opportunities, the event that IICD organises for project partners by theme once every few years and that in this occasion has fallen under my ‘livelihoods’ range of responsibilities. The bus to Sikasso was waiting in front of the hotel, already loaded with four translators and their technician with his equipment, two ladies introduced to me as ‘hostesses,’ Mady, the cheerful local co-organiser representative, bananas, peanuts and bottles of water and flavoured sodas, a shy boy that never revealed his role but that would smile to our greetings in poor French, and of course, the driver. The bus is to take us to Sikasso, capital city of the southern region with the same name, where many of IICD’s supported livelihoods projects in the country are located. It is my first time in Mali, as well as for 21 other participants coming from 7 different countries. They are expectant. I am expectant. We have invited them to a tri-lingual workshop in rural Mali to exchange experiences about rural content for rural lives, how farmers in the most disadvantaged areas are working with information and communication technologies (ICTs) to create and disseminate local content in ways that are meaningful for them. And in this context we are all first timers.

Fortunately, most of the participants had arrived on time to Bamako the night before, and the two Zambians that missed their flight (for those mysterious excuses given by airlines) would be arriving later in the day. With the help and mobile phone of my colleague Bénédicte Marcilly, the connoisseur of the local logistics and my partner for the event, we were getting a transport for the two we were leaving behind to catch up with us in Sikasso. We were promised they would be picked up upon arrival. Yes of course we would pay all the extra expenses. So we departed, Sikasso there we go.

But the day had not started here. From early hours many participants, myself, and about half of the world had been watching the results of the 2008 United States Presidential Elections. “Yes we can” had replaced the greeting “Good morning” that day. The Mirabeau Hotel TVs seemed to be all connected, tuned in the same channel that showed a large picture of Barak Obama in the background, with French journalists discussing the implications of this election for us all. We had had breakfast smiling, watching the screen. Excitement was in the air, and for me, a white Latin-American woman, receiving this news surrounded by African colleagues made those mixed feelings for history, race, humanity and development come together in a very moving awakening. This was a historical moment, and we were living in it.

The 5 hour road trip on the air conditioned bus went so smoothly that left us pleasantly surprised. No incidents, neither caws nor goats blockades, they would just run away from the loud bus horn. In Sikasso, the Hotel Kaaki Palace’s receptionist was ready for us, with all the room keys spread on the counter: Pick your room! Great. Someone handed me key 306, a room which I later  discovered had no working TV, no mosquito net, and was too far from internet reach (afterwards we learned only 4 rooms in the ground floor could get signal). That was ok, I somehow had the feeling that would not have time either to watch tv or worry about mosquitoes. And for the internet, that was to be solved by quietly camping outside those four ‘connected’ rooms around midnight.

Despite all the bananas and peanuts provided during the trip by the hostesses, we were hungry. So all on to the bus again through the Sikasso market to arrive to the facilities of IER (National Institute for Agricultural Research), where the 3-day workshop was to be held. The group of ‘transformatices’, women that work in the transformation of products like mangos, coconuts and potatoes, received us with music and dancing, playing drums with such a skill that even surprised local Malian men participants. This would only be a first introduction to what we would later experience of Sikasso’s music richness. We were then kindly served salad, chicken, couscous, fruit. Welcoming remarks by our hosts filled the atmosphere, which together with those women that were cooking, dancing and chanting for us, made us quickly leave behind all the trip exhaustion, doubts and challenges since deciding to plan this event in Sikasso months ago.

And the activities began, only two hours later than planned, that afternoon. Introductory remarks, ice breakers, story telling. Everybody participated actively, and people had this extra energy that we organisers recognised as reflection of the excitement and power of coming together.

We finished that day with a visit to the IICD supported Sene Kulafoni Bulon project. We toured the facilities, the computers, looked at the produce display window and got introduced to this concrete example of close collaboration between three large farmers' organizations in Sikasso (the Union of Mango producers, the Federation of Potato producers and the Federation of Women Mango Transformers) and the regional branch of Mali’s IER that focuses on the transformation chain of products.

What particularly struck me was the lecture of a poem in Bambara, written by a member of the project, and using the IICD acronym as inspiration. See the bigger and readable version of the poem.

We soon had become part of the Sene Kulafoni Bulon’s fans club, wearing their t-shirt and taking pictures with each of their team members.  And as if it could not get any better, the left behind Zambian participants arrived right on time to get to sit at the dinner table.

“As you can see here, computers are not longer a taboo for farmers” were the words of Dede Togola Konde, a very charismatic and energetic women and one of the project directors, when thanking us for the visit. As everybody clapped and smiled, and started digging into their chicken plates, I wondered how many things were not longer taboos, starting today, for all of us sitting at that table and for the world. That was a very special day, from dawn to dusk. I am sure will certainly stay with many of us for years to come.

What determines the success of an IICD Projectnode meeting? Is it the number of participants? Is it the location? Is it the topics on the agenda? Or the vibrant discussions on practical subjects? What was clear on the 18^th and 19^th September 2008 at the Gemistar Lodge in Lusaka Zambia, is that it was a big success, because everyone went home with a feeling of satisfaction and belonging.

The project node meeting started almost on time with all IICD project partners in Zambia. With the new health project partners on board: Zambian Union of Nurses (ZUNO), Zambian National Blood Transfusion Services (ZNBTS) and Caritas Catholic Diocese of Mongu (DOM-HBC) who attended for the first time, a lot of time was spent on introductions. This was done in a special way. All projects were asked to make a short presentation, based on a template. These presentations were stuck on the walls. During the breaks people could walk around and read each others' presentations. Later in the day there was time to ask questions about eachother's projects.

From the presentations all challenges were clustered around four themes: Technical issues, Management issues, Logistical issues and Culture/Motivational issues. In three groups (Logistical and Cultural together) each theme was extensively discussed and potential solutions were presented to each other. Challenges were sometimes similar, but slightly different, and solutions for one challenge were generating more ideas for other challenges as well.

The challenges that came out was the difficulties to use Open Source software without proper training. This was an issue many of the projects had fased. The project teams had just received two CD’s called NGO-in-a-box (the base CD and Open Publishing) so the solution was easy. Some project teams had more experience than others. E-Brain, the national ICT4D network, has established a Technical Support group with techies from within the IICD supported projects (and other interested techies as well). On the D-group everyone can ask each other questions on Open Source Software or other technical issues. E-Brain will also organise some very practical Open Source Software training to project partners as well. Jennifer from ZUNO:

“I thought that we were the only one with Open Source Software issues, but now I understand that there were more projects with similar challenges who have now already more experience than we.”

Our Monitoring & Evaluation (M&E) partner Kelvin Luputa presented the M&E system again especially for the new project partners, but also as a refresher for the others. A Question & Answer session started with a lively discussion. More partners are now enthusiastic about the M&E system and will go back to collect the necessary questionnaires for an End-user Focus group meeting at project level so that more can be learned about the impact of their projects.

The second day was much more practical. Lee Muzala shared several ways to get connected through GSM dongles and blue tooth connection with your GSM. Many questions were asked and answered.

The last presentation was a joint presentation from Lyson Chikunduzi from the Copperbelt College of Education and Gonzalo Portal from the Mpelembe Secondary School (ENEDCO project) on Local Content Development. Their presentation covered some challenges that both project were fasing, for example how to motivate the teachers. However, the highlight of their presentation was a demonstration of lessons that were developed with the help of Powerpoint and Scratch (animation software). Everyone wanted to do more hands-on training in order to work with it in their own projects.

Most participants went back to their projects with a lot of new ideas that hopefully will find their way to more project staff and end-users to continue the sharing of knowledge and experiences. To get an impression of the project node meeting watch the video 'Project node meeting with all IICD partners in Zambia - Sept 2008'.

Time to visit Jamaica. It seems a long time since I was Manager of the Jamaica Country Programme, back in 2004. I got to know Jamaica as a beautiful island, with spicy food and spicy people. I cycled around the island, walked the Blue Mountain, famous for its coffee, and drank cocktails once stirred by Tom Cruise at the Blue Lagoon, and gained a price in moving to the groove of Dance Hall. Off course in all assisted by my colleague Denise Clarke. I learned that indeed all Jamaicans are creative and full of ideas. I also learned that implementation of ideas in Jamaica is a complete other ball game: less practised. This resulted in many project ideas, with few implemented.

Now back in 2008, some good surprises were waiting. First, yes o yes, the Agriculture Business Information System (ABIS) project by the Rural Agriculture Development Agency (RADA), an executive agency of the Ministry of Agriculture, providing farmers with production and market information through, is in full swing. Since I left, over 100,000 - or 40% of the total - farmers have been registered in the database, and increasingly production details are updated www.abisjamaica.com.jm. Recently, extension officers are equipped with Blackberries to collect data in the field. The database will serve to inform extension officers and farmers on better production methods, what fertilizers to use where, and so on. Also, as the number of participating farmers has grown so fast, it can provide insights in production and assist in better forecasting of national production and movements in the markets. This is really nice, particularly now also the Jamaican agriculture sector needs to boost local production to counteract the sharp price rise in imported food products.

Second surprise is that the old project team of an ambitious education project started in 2000 is now spear heading a national million programme that introduces ICT in all secondary schools in Jamaica, under auspices of the Ministry of Telecommunication and the Ministry of Education. The initial pilot project, the Instructional Technology Institute , was started to develop interactive learning materials by three leading educational institutions in Jamaica. At that time, the project could not fully flourish lacking experience in this complex area, and with insufficient awareness yet in the Ministry of Education. This has changed now, in a meeting with Minister of Education and the national network ICT4D Jamaica, it became clear that the government is now fully into ICT for education. Nice to find out that the pilot project did generate a group of experts in the field, now leading this national programme. Director Avrill Crawford, former director of ITI. tells us: “Currently in Jamaica, while voice telephony has achieved practical universal access, there is relatively low demand for access to data and data-related services due to the relatively low level of education. This is a major hurdle to the creation of a knowledge-based society, critical to global competitiveness. The Ministry of Industry, Technology, Energy and Commerce (MITEC) is collaborating with the Ministry of Education and Youth to implementing the e-Learning Project in grades 7-11 in all approx. 165 high schools in Jamaica and utilizing information and communication technologies (ICT) to enhance the teaching and learning processes and improve the level of passes in the school-leaving examinations”.

As for the IICD support, we work with national ICT4D Jamaica network, focusing on knowledge sharing and policy influencing. They have become a vibrant and recognised network in Jamaica, and have been able to find co-sponsors of the network, one being the Heart Trust/NTA , the national teacher training organisation in Jamaica. Heart Trust/NTA supports with office space and partial time of the network coordinator. Apart from a very professional website, the network published a connectivity study and case study booklet .(They also achieved funding for an ICT-supported community centre project focused on literacy training of drop outs with highly interactive teaching materials. Another interesting activity is the ICT policy course developed for practitioners.

Well, as you can see, much is achieved by the partners in their own Jamaican way. Good thing of this is that it provides some time to enjoy the other good ol'Jmacian live. I could not visit the Blue Lagoon, but in order not to forget my good local experiences, I did find time to spend an evening at Strawberry Hill, owned by Blackwell, famous producer of Bob and Bono…

What I actually expected on forehand I do not recall, but to act as one of the main presenters and main resource person at a workshop and present in French on how to write for the web was not as hard as I expected it to be. Maybe it was the people who participated; maybe it was the heat that makes you automatically slow down and become more relaxed. We simply kicked off and the workshop immediately took its own course.

The workshop ‘Ecrire pour le site web’ was organised to meet the demand of the members of the thematic network group on ICT and agriculture. The members, all project partners of IICD in Mali who had started to use ICT to improve and strengthen the activities of their own organisation, wanted to improve their writing skills to better document and share their experiences with others. Some of the participants had some experience with writing, others not: but all were eager to learn more.

Though I had proposed to hold this workshop, it was not completely without self-interest. As a member of the communications team my constant concern is how to get interesting stories about IICD’s work on the ground. Stories that give our stakeholders a better idea of how ICT can help to overcome the shortfalls of basic public services like health care, education, but also the lack of good governance and the obstacles that prevent small entrepreneurs from earning a decent income. Not an easy job if you are miles away from the place where everything happens. It is even more difficult as we do not know all the people who work on these projects in person. Hopefully, giving the project partners and members of the thematic network group some experience with writing would result in a growing number of interesting stories published on their organisation’s website or on www.mali-ntic.com, which could feed into IICD’s website.

Full of good spirit I had started my preparations, but the closer I came to the date of departure to Mali and Burkina Faso, the more nervous I got. It was years ago since I had spoken French and how much experience did I have anyway with workshops? And what about cultural differences: would they respond to what I was saying and ask if something was not clear? And if they attacked me with questions, would it be possible for me to answer them all? Or would there be no interaction at all: me being the only one talking, trying to encourage people to come forward with their ideas? My colleague Bénédicte Marcilly reassured me: yes, the participants were used to people who were not at ease in speaking French, and no, I did not need to be afraid of silent intervals. Still, I had my doubts whether I would withstand or fall.

What discouraged me a little was the fact that there was unfortunately no opportunity to discuss the programme of the workshop with the other resource person of the workshop, Filifing Diakité, in advance. His role was quite essential: not only would he explain about the sort of content on ICT and agriculture he was focussing, he also had to keep the fire burning directly after the workshop by following up on the articles participants of the workshop were supposed to finalise for the website. But Filifing Diakité was not able to arrive before 10 am on the day of the workshop itself due to other pressing matters.

But then on the day itself: all my worries and foreseen problems disappeared one by one. The people showed up, and on time. Filifing Diakité arrived during my own presentation. He showed his flexibility by changing his presentation on the spot; he presented some very interesting showcases of how to write articles. My French was of course lacking, but somehow with the help of Bénédicte Marcilly and the participants themselves, we were able to understand each other. The attaque of difficulties turned out to be nothing more than an introduction to an article, my downfall - the chute - was nothing more than a round-up of the whole article. It was a good learning experience: not only for our partners, who participated in the workshop, but also for myself. Never be afraid of something what you do not know.

During my business trip to Tanzania, I planned to visit Magu for a Focus Group meeting with farmers. However, getting to Magu was a slight challenge... 

Part of the reason was the visit of “the esteemed president of the United States” to Tanzania. Days before the visit, from all road corners in Dar es Salaam, his grin would look at you from billboards with backdrops of the Kilimanjaro or the Tanzanian flag.

When he finally arrived, his visit turned into a practical problem: three out of probably five major roads in the city closed down, which made it hard to get around, and more specifically, to get to the airport. A day before my flight to Mwanza (in the Northwest of Tanzania, about 1,5 hour drive from Magu) we received word that the flight was moved two hours back because of this. Add to this: five more delayed and two cancelled flights at the airport, no luggage allowed on the plane because of fuel problems, boarding and then having to go back because of engine troubles, 300 waiting Tanzanians, 35 degrees centigrade, sticky airport food, incomprehensible messages over the airport intercom, wailing children, and 20 people hanging out of the airport bus taking pictures of Air force One. We waited for 5 hours, but - to my surprise - in the end the plane did leave. My biggest challenge was not to show my slight frustration, as the Tanzanians surrounding me remained their happy self, thanking God for finding the engine trouble before we left. 

The value of the Cromabu information centre

The following morning we left early from Mwanza for Magu. Together with Dr. Ngaiza, one of the Tanzanian partners for Monitoring and Evaluation, to be part of the end user Focus Group meeting. Our intention was to reflect with a group of end users from Cromabu, a price information project for farmers, on the data that the project collected over 2007. From the data we already knew that there were very little complaints from their side: the information that Cromabu disseminates was highly valued, both for its quality and for the service given in the information centre and the different farmer groups felt very much connected to all aspects of the centre. Apart from farmers, there were other people using the (paid) services of the centre. A local representative of the Salvation Army explained how he used the Internet service of the centre to stay in contact with his organisation’s headquarters in Dar es Salaam. 

Several groups of farmers had prepared a role play, explaining the daily process of getting the price information together, and disseminating it to the various communities in the Magu area. Impersonations of Cromabu’s manager and the mime of how bicycles are used to visit the communities were received with laughter and loud applause by the other participants. As was a sung poem on IICD’s assistance to the centre. Afterwards, we asked them to discuss some additional aspects found in the data analysis. Why did some people for instance not – or no longer - visit the centre and what could be done to remedy this? Or: would women also like to be involved in the use of the electronic media de project offers and if so: what impedes them to do this right now? Nobody seemed to feel shy getting into the discussion; everybody contributed and gave suggestions and ideas. 

The meeting started, ended and was paused with a great number of speeches: we were welcomed, thanked for being there and for our assistance and many farmers took the opportunity to tell in detail about the impact the project had had on their life. 

One of the things I learned working for IICD (apart from, for instance, eating a complete guinea fowl with just my right hand) is to come up with opening and closing speeches on the spot, a skill that came in handy during this visit. 

The impact of Cromabu on farmers' daily lives

As usual, I did feel somewhat uncomfortable with the speeches of gratitude. I feel I have a wonderful job working together with dedicated and professional local partners. Not something that I should particularly receive praise for, the way I see it. That said, it was amazing to hear from first hand all those stories that we confirm by means of formal questionnaires on a yearly basis: the impact Cromabu has on the daily lives of the farmers. In the open answers in the questionnaires collected by Cromabu and during the meeting users described that with the extra income they’ve earned from the information received, they send their children to school, buy cows, repair their roof or buy a bed. Statements that make it very clear that information for development is far from a luxury! 

Looking back on the day, one of the participants indicated that he was happy and proud that no issues were left out of the discussion. According to him, this showed that “it was both possible and necessary to have farmers be part of a process like this”. In my opinion a great compliment for our evaluation process and for the involvement of Cromabu with their user group. It’s very much worth coming to Magu for, despite all roadblocks and delays. Before we left, the users sang one more song. It was based on a well-know song for the emancipation of women, but with a spontaneous and small adaptation of the lyrics, they all sang: “Don’t go to sleep yet, Cromabu, there is still so much to do!”   

Anne-Marijke Podt

Officer Monitoring and Evaluation Tanzania, Ghana and Ecuador

It is not easy to give a training on Web 2.0 tools for development, when the internet connection is slower than Sylvestre’s 2CV and power cuts paralyse the whole network. It is a daily reality in Ouagadougou nowadays. Whereas the internet connection in most countries is getting faster, the connection in Burkina is getting even slower.

Still, Mohamed Ag Acharom of Afriklinks managed to inspire more than thirty members of Burkina NTIC, the IICD supported national ICT4D network in Burkina Faso. He was invited by IICD to follow a web 2.0 course at the international conference Web2forDev in Rome in September. Since the national ICT4D networks in Mali and Burkina Faso had Web 2.0 training high on their priority list, IICD asked Mohamed to train both networks in Bamako and Ouagadougou.

Burkina NTIC made a film on Burkina blogs, which served as a perfect kick-off for the training. Participant Ibaranté Momo, manager of the Telecentre ADEN in Gaoua, commented: ‘I have always wanted to publish on the web, but I did not know how. Now I have seen the film on Burkina blogs, I want to know how to start my own blog.’

Apart from creating a blog, participants discovered how to use free, online tools to share bookmarks, documents, photos and videos, and to make free, online phone calls. Mohamed: ‘This is how you can create a wiki, for example titled ‘The Slow Connection’.’

Blogs captured the attention of the participants. Burkinabe bloggers in the film receive up to 2000 visitors per month. The blog provides ‘an exit door’ according to one blogger. They get reactions from all over the world, especially from the Burkinabe Diaspora. For them, blogs are a way to stay up to date and get unorthodox views on the developments in their home country. If the internet connection allows for it, the blogosphere will soon be besieged by Burkinabe blogs.

Some Burkinabe blogs:
Journalisme engagé
L’heure du Temps
Quophy Bloguer
Zwan & Vous

Participant Herman Ouedraogo, here with his grandmother in front of her house.
He now knows how to share this picture with the world using flickr.

At first glance Apac town looks like a roundabout surrounded by a few blocks of houses and some dusty tracks, though there is more to it then that.

Over 26 CSOs (Civil Society Organisations) and the district headquarter are established in the village. They tended to have contrary interests, however in the E-Society project they work side by side to promote civil services for the Apac society. After a handover of a day, my colleague left me with the partners to do some hands-on work. The first steps to link CSOs and the district government in a structural way were achieved in the in the first stage of the project. This visit more clearly ironed out the shared roles of the different entities. Through meetings with a couple of CSOs a pool was created, which could provide content for civil services, as for example Child Health Information for women, Market Price Information for farmers or Information on grant possibilities for youth. While at the same time the district would facilitate the process of digitisation of their accounting system and operational processes, so that the civil society will have better access to the district expenditures. It was good to see that despite the differences between the district government and the CSOs there is willingness to create openness and work more closely together.

On the 27th of October I started my first day on the job as Officer Knowledge Sharing for Zambia and Ghana. Not in the office in The Hague, but in Lusaka Zambia. Which was a perfect start, because it was not only an introduction to IICD in Zambia, but a return for me as well. I lived for three years in Zambia, until December 2006.

Olaf introduced me at almost all the Lusaka based projects and in the 4 days in Lusaka we had a busy schedule. We visited in a short time 2 of the 4 Health projects, 3 of the education projects and 5 of the livelihood projects. Especially the trips to Chawama Youth project (in one of the Lusaka compounds) and ZARI (Zambian Agriculture Research Institute, just outside Lusaka).

I also was introduced to the Zambian Project node core team, where we discussed on the plans of 2008. But a main focus for my introduction was with e-brain the Zambian ICT network. I met the board and the office manager of the network, who could introduce me to the way they work, there 3rd quarter report and the plans for 2008.

During this week, there was also a Dutch consultant (John) in Lusaka (from one of the IICD partners, Altran). He worked with one of the partners in Zambia, OPPAZ (Organic Producers & Processors Association Zambia) to define the requirements for the design of an Internal Control System (ICS). The internal inspectors of OPPAZ could use the ICS system to assess the farmers, who are in the Organic certification process. They can do this in the field, together with the farmer, using a handheld computer and send this to a central database with GPRS. This system would be vital in the certification process of small scale organic farmer and will be piloted in 3 districts (Chongwe, Mpongwe and Mongu).

So all in all an interesting, busy first week where I could see what IICD is doing on the ground and where I could met most of the people in Zambia with who I will work.

Martine Koopman
Officer Knowledge Sharing Zambia and Ghana

As I am usually mostly working from the hotel or inner-city project headquarters when in Ecuador, paying a visit to a local site of one of our project partners is both interesting and a pleasure… even if it means that you’d have to get up at 4:15 in the morning to be picked op by our partners who runs the IICD supported CAMARI project.

The original plan was a two-day up-country visit to two communities that the project partner is active in. Unfortunately, one of the sites turned out not to have any connection, as they apparently forgot to pay for their electricity and had to go and fix this on the day of our visit. At least it was good to hear that connectivity problems are not only related to thunderstorms, bad equipment or political turmoil…

The adjusted plan therefore included one site about 4,5 hours from Quito. One of the persons responsible for the project and I talked about pets, favourite music and sports and of course the project itself in order to keep awake. In the meantime, scenes familiar from many Ecuador coffee table books unfolded: a sunrise over huge snow-capped volcanoes, indigenous women dressed in bright purple ponchos and black skirts and lazily grazing alpacas on the side of the road.

We passed a village with a large statue covered in different colours of bathroom tiles. “Do you know what that is?”, the partner asked. As I did not want to insult anyone, I did not dare say that the thing looked like a huge popsicle to me. “It’s a popsicle!” he said, “people here really love their ice cream.”

We arrived at the partner organisation’s office in the late morning (the project partner we work with again works with local partners in different communities). This local partner is responsible for getting certain amounts of produce, all carefully planned out on large hand-written boards, from the communities’ farmers and handicraft (wo)men to the selling point in Quito. Additionally, the information centre gives information on prices for the local produce. All tested ways to increase income of local producers and improve their decision-making on where, when and what to sell.

This was the theory. Walking around the community and talking to users of the projects I not only found out that the theory seemed to work (also proved by the encouraging evaluation data that had been coming in from the projects’ users for the last two years now), but that there was much more to it. In the first place: I probably had never before seen such an industrious village in my life! In a 2,5 hour walk I met cheese makers, sausage makers, mushroom dryers, furniture builders, football producers, nougat makers, chocolate makers, workers from the thread-factory and a group of women that knit sweaters from the thread produced in the factory. All of these micro businesses use the same communications network originally installed for the info centre for a nominal fee, which in turn helps coving a part of the info centre’s cost. The cheese factory communicates with surrounding communities that produce part of the cheese that they distribute all over the country. The chocolate factory sends e-mails back and forth about orders and packaging with Italian buyers.

The sheer existence of the info centre has over time sparked many of these initiatives. They are currently preparing to set up a VOIP-telephone, to compete with commercial (expensive and low quality) telephone provider Porta. And a Virtual Aula has been set up to provide all community members with internet access in an internet café setting. Contrary to international trends, the activity and communication possibilities have actually resulted in people moving into the community, rather than out of it, towards the city.

Talking to one of the “community economy”-founders, an Italian priest who has been in the village for over 35 years, it became clear that the effect of the network goes much further even. When asked about the most substantial changes for the community, he became really enthusiastic. Instead of elaborating on economic success or export, he talked about how the project opened up surrounding communities, till recent almost completely shut from the outside world. How young people there were seeing new possibilities, talking online with their friends in other communities. That, claimed the priest, was what was amazing about the new technology.

Every day, behind my desk in The Hague, I’m busy with the impact of our programmes: the statistics, the percentages, the lessons learned. The real life impact as seen in the community will probably always be impossible to capture….

Mr. Paul is running a telecentre in Katesh, in the north-east of Tanzania. His telecentre provides computer training, the only one in the region. His customers need information from the internet, like market price information. But the internet has not yet reached Katesh. Mr. Paul is planning to have an internet connection and an email address soon, but he needs information on how to go about it. 

I met Mr. Paul last week in Mwanza. He was one of the participants of the first Tanzanian Telecentre Network workshop. Together with many others, I have been planning this workshop for months. Meeting Mr. Paul made again clear to me why a telecentre network is needed. All participants came with questions and all came with answers on: How to improve their services to the community?. Where to get ICT support? Telecentre puzzles were solved in the workshop and its grapevines. Still many need to be solved. By sharing and by joining forces. 

In a speed geek session, every telecentre presented its approach to provide services to the community in a sustainable way. Some provide market price information to farmers; others provide computer courses to students, women, elderly, disabled, helping them to get a job. Some provide a community radio to inform the villages on burning issues like HIV-AIDS prevention, others provide library services. Some are entirely financed by the community; others share their internet connection with nearby schools. Some use VSAT connections; others have switched to recently available broadband. The telecentre leaders advised Mr Paul on all the available options. 

Through a mapping exercise, the telecentres present were indicated on a Google Earth map. Mr. Paul found out that other telecentres actually were not that far away from him! He now knows who he can contact for support. 

Then, after two days of workshopping, it is 4pm. It has been an exhausting day; participants discussed a vision, mission, objectives and organisational structure of their network, and made extensive use of the left part of their brains.

Would there still be anything wise to do, apart from calling it a day? Yes. Let’s use the right part of the brain and create a logo for the network! I was amazed by the sudden energy and creativity burst and tried to grasp it in a picture: the designers, including Mr. Paul standing in the middle, present the winning logo. 

Mr. Paul went back to Katesh, connected to a whole new network of colleagues through his mobile. With confidence he told me that the internet connection will soon follow.

This week is my first visit to the IICD country programme in Uganda. Within IICD, I am changing position and will be taking over the responsibility for project management in Uganda. In this trip a colleague is introducing me to the programme. So far the projects are really exciting. It is impressive to see how committed people are towards the projects. This weekend we visited the Health Child project, a new project which we are implementing together with Cordaid. Last week the project coordinator identified two rural communities to start Information Centers where women can be trained on Health prevention. The coordinator was a young woman, like myself. She quit her job in Kampala to live in the rural area to set up the centres. During the visit she and the rest of the implementing staff took us to one of the communities. The people were really keen on meeting us. They raised interesting questions, like how we would make sure that the elderly women of the community wouldn’t be excluded from this ‘innovative’ project. This shows that, fortunately, our end-users dare to be critical towards IICD.

I am already back in The Netherlands but I still owe you a reflection of the third and therefore last day of the Cross Country Learning Event (CCLE) in Tanzania. The first and second days are also covered in blogs.

During the third day we had a ‘ peer-to-peer assist'. For those who do not know the term, a peer-to-peer assist is a session whereby a project owner presents a problem/challenge to other project owners, with the request to come forward with suggestions for improvements or solving certain problems. People came forward with realistic problems and this session evoked sparkling discussions. For instance a certain project owner in Uganda was struggling with setting up a maintenance system in the periphery. How do you maintain contacts with the help desk organisations if your computer breaks down? And therefore if there is no communication, how do you financially maintain such a support/maintenance system? One of the options discussed was the suggestion for setting up a kind of fee for members/users so that we can finance such a maintenance system. A Tanzanian organisation had some experience with it, which helped actually its Ugandan counterpart to move forward.

Generally I learned that the peer-to-peer sessions indeed did assist the project owners with their problems and that the interaction between project owners did bring forward suggestions based on practical experiences. Is this remark an open door? I hope so.

We ended the three-day seminar with an evaluation session. It brought forward some nice remarks which I want to share with you.

• “Out of the three expectations I did only meet one. I expected Power Point presentations: no Power Points. I expected hand outs every evening: no hand outs. I expected knowledge: there was an overwhelming amount of knowledge.”
• “5 th October ( the closing date of the CCLE ) should continue.”
• “CCLE is a big library.”
• “Mali has inspired. It gives courage. Hope to meet again.”
• “Thanks for the commitment of IICD and Cordaid.”
• “Expectations were met. Do not stop here.”
• “We shared much more than in other types of seminars. It was not possible to sleep at this seminar.”
• “The level commitment was very good. Health does not know any boundaries and this is also shown in the East-West exchange.”
• “You made us take part of the whole process and the added value will not run away from me. “
• “Simple is beautiful. Very interesting and wonderful. Asante Sana.”

Thursday, 4th October 2007, the second day of the Cross Country Learning Event (CCLE) in Tanzania. A blog on the first day has also been posted.

It is remarkable to see how many people exchange information during a CCLE and it is a pity to see that you can never capture all the information which crosses the table. For me it also proves that there is a huge demand for information exchange and that the methodology used (open space) does bring forward the most important issues at stake, such as human resources and leveraging. In itself this is in line with the outcome of IICD’s M&E analysis. It is also encouraging to see that creating the right scene open ups the mind for an exchange. For the specialists in facilitation this might be an open door, but for people who are more focussed on determining directions it is good to be part of these exercises.

Leveraging
It also appears that leveraging is not just an IICD issue. It is a natural phenomenon which already takes place since ages. The only difference is that we tagged it as an IICD phenomenon. It is obvious that leveraging takes place if there are results, political willingness to expand and if there are the right circumstances. For instance in Uganda the project ‘Promoting Continuing Medical Education among Rural Health Workers by use of ICT’ of Uganda Martyrs University (UMU) is successful. UMU was approached by the Ministry of Health to expand the project to three other hospitals. At the moment of the request UMU was not ready to expand and therefore they turned the request down. The same accounts for the Kinondoni project, which I visited last Monday. People of Kinondoni are approached by other local governments to implement the project in their municipality. For these organisations it is difficult to do that because you need also the methodology to introduce such kind of projects, which means that they also use the methodology which made the projects so successful. This visit also taught me that maintenance of projects in some kind of form is important. I saw outdated software and a server room which was not suitable to be a server room. Leaking airconditioners does not create the right environment for a server room.

Dealing with governments
Another remark which strikes me is the fact that dealing with governments is not as difficult as often expressed by civil society. It is a matter of managing expectations and informing and even involving them at the start of the project. For some countries this might not be such kind of a problem because the mechanism is available to inform the government. What I understood is that Uganda has such kind of a mechanism in place. For some of the projects of civil society you need to seek the approval of the Ugandan government. Despite the fact that it might be a cumbersome process it also has positive effects.

At the CCLE, representatives of Malawi (CHAM and the School of Medicine) are present. I had a chat with them about our possible involvement in Malawi with Cordaid. They are very enthusiastic. Not so much for the funds, but more for the methodology we are applying and of which the CCLE is an example. I have been trying to temper their expectations and despite the fact that they were nodding I am not sure if I was that successful in the management of expectations. The fact that they are heavily involved in World Space receiver might be a hurdle to take, but may be we can integrate that in the approach.

Publicity
Another thing: there was an article published about the workshop in an English newspaper and it appears that the same article will be published in Kiswahili today. Coming weekend another article about ICT4 health will be published. Therefore COSTECH and IICD made a major step forward in putting ICT on the political agenda. What I also learned from this exercise is that journalists are stubborn people. You have explained very clearly the message you want to get across and they pick out one sentence. They have picked out my remark about the fact that the health services have improved as compared with seven years ago. Conclusion and lesson learned: journalists are independent but as interviewee you are confronted with the consequences.

Love for Africa
Enough reflection for the day. I am just looking out of the window and the first rainshowers are starting to poor in Dar es Salaam. It reminds me of one of the factors why it is always pleasant to be back on this continent despite all its challenges and difficulties. It is the sky. The combination of grey clouds coming in from the ocean, light softened by the rains and trees illuminated beautifully by the raising sun (it is just after 6:00 in the morning) makes the continent so beautiful.

See you in The Hague.

Deem

Wednesday, 3rd October 2008. First blog session from Dar es Salaam. It will be a kind of diary, through which I want to share with you some impressions on the cross country learning events (CCLE). This annual events brings together people working with ICT4D in the health sector. It’s a perfect opportunity for exchanging experiences, learning and therewith adding value to the development of ICT applications in the health sector.

First impressions are good. There is a lot of exchange and indeed what I also detect, is that there is a huge need for interaction. Discussions are lively and people are eager to share their experiences. There is also a lot of laughter and that shows that the atmosphere is excellent. Quotes reflect general ideas. The following were made during the first day.

‘A CCLE is a kind of library’ or ‘a thinking might create problems and other thinking might create challenges’. The best one of the day is the following: ‘I was only thinking in terms of the broadening bandwidth. Face-to-face meeting like the one over here creates the broadest bandwidth’.

Official openings in Africa are a special kind of sport. The Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare (MoH) was present and the highest authority of COSTECH. Nice speeches which were far too long. Leveraging was highlighted and I think that through the presence of the highest civil servant of MoH we have an entrance at the Ministry for leveraging. We should take advantage of this significant step forward. There were also a bunch of journalists representing different newspapers and television stations. This resulted in an item on the 19:00 hours news of approximately 5 minutes. I have not seen the newspapers yet and how many times IICD is mentioned. Pity that the papers are not read in Europe as it may assist us in the acquisition of funds.

During the first day we exchanged information about all the projects which have been or are being initiated. This brought forward a lively exchange and in between the different sessions people also started to extract knowledge from each other. It is a pity that all the knowledge exchanged can never be captured completely. In general the projects in Eastern and Southern Africa can be clustered in a few categories. There are projects focussing on health management information systems, e-learning/distance learning, tele-consultation. There are also projects which cannot be captured in these categories, such as the one about data for blood transfusion in Zambia and the one about community health.

The projects of Mali are very interesting for the participants coming from the other side of the continent. I am afraid that there is an eagerness to adopt this project also for the Eastern and Southern region. The reason that the people like this project is that it is very focussed and practical. Think big and act small is an adagio which should also be a guideline for the other projects.

Some of the projects are still in the formation phase. That is not a problem for the participants, but I am of the opinion that it also dilutes the CCLE a bit. The exchange remains vague because it can not be based on true experiences during the implementation phase.

The analysis of the M&E data done by my IICD colleague Hannah is shared extensively. We sticked the lessons learned to the wall and requested for comments. That is happening now. It is nice way how we can use the M&E in a project. The challenge remains how we can specify the lessons learned better. Maybe we should add some qualitative data and a qualitative analysis. I am wondering if we can extract more lessons learned on the basis of the data we are gathering as lessons learned are usually also context dependent so-to-say.

The Health Management Information Systems are at different stages of development. Most of them are still busy with the organisation at central level, whereas the step of organizing the data at the more peripheral level and especially the jump that the peripheral health units should make use of these data for the improvement of their management is not made. I have the impression that many of the managers also did not make the jump mentally so there is a lot awareness to be done.

What also strikes me is that there is hardly any discussion about software, like was the case in discussions on the CCLE online Dgroup.

So far the first impressions. Shall try to share some more of the experiences tomorrow.

Today I received a mail from Sylvestre Ouedraogo, the coordinator of the Burkina-ntic network in Burkina Faso. He’s been uploading video’s they have recently made on YouTube. Bad as the connection is here in Bamako, I can view images of farmers using ICTs in Leo, the latest TV-Koodo film on the projects IICD supports in Burkina Faso, and even other stuff on traditional dances and on the reggae scene in Ouagadougou. It’s been only two months that we started to train our partners in Burkina on the use of this kind of multimedia tools, ant it already is starting to pay off! For me, this is one more proof that with relatively little effort and investment, ICT can gain access to worldwide audiences for people who have been relatively isolated up till recently. The empowerment that goes along with this access is hard to measure, but I can’t deny that I feel a lot of respect for the ones who are doing this under still difficult circumstances. Check it out on: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3BFGH8YNClY (and click on More Videos from this Channel to watch the other films). Or go directly to the site: http://www.wagues.org/

In 2002, the IICD-supported project ‘ICT Basic Training’ (IBAT) was launched at Kyambogo University in Kampala, Uganda. Through this project, an ICT training centre equipped with 42 computers was set up to train student-teachers and lecturers for the duration of a full semester course. Aside from being taught basic computer skills they were also shown how to use ICTs (Information and Communication Technologies) in the standard curriculum. 

In July 2007, after five years, the project was successfully integrated into the University’s curriculum. During the final stage of this process, a discussion took place about the number of students and lecturers who had been introduced to ICTs via this project. A chaotic and protracted debate ensued in which various figures were bandied about, ranging from 6,000 to about 25,000. This discrepancy did not arise from the fact that it was impossible to say how many participants actually took part in the training courses (according to the registration figures, this was 6,200), but rather because it was difficult to estimate with any accuracy the total number of people who had benefited, both directly and indirectly, from the project. First of all, it is not known which percentage of the student-teachers actually uses these skills once they become a teacher. A short survey revealed that 65% of the participants are reaching out to an average of 50 students a year. Secondly, at any university the average computer is not being used by just one student at a time: students who are entitled to go for training have been taking along their friends, brothers, nephews, etc... 

In sub-Saharan Africa there is a concept called “Ubuntu”. This concept is difficult to translate: it means something like ‘an individual only exists because of others’. 

Nelson Mandela explained Ubuntu as follows: “A traveller through our country would stop at a village, and he didn't have to ask for food or for water. Once he stops, the people give him food, entertain him. That is one aspect of Ubuntu but Ubuntu has various aspects. Ubuntu does not mean that people should not enrich themselves. The question therefore is: “Are you going to do so in order to enable the community around you to improve?” 

In other words, Ubuntu when applied to telecentres or computer labs could be taken to mean: ‘If you are entitled to use a computer, you should also take your friends and family to this new world’. Therefore, every time I walk into such a centre and see that the ratio computers:users is 1:3 (or worse) I think two things: “More computers are needed” and “Ubuntu in practice”.

The Microsoft Unlimited Potential programme (‘Connections, Communities, Partnerships’ – they know how to sell the programme with nice slogans) is a new version of the human side of Microsoft; the company is putting an enormous effort into promoting this programme amongst others in Africa. One of the ways to do this are the ICT Best Practice Forums that Microsoft, together with ECA and national governments, this year organises on West, North and East and South-East Africa. The first edition takes place in June in Ouagadougou, and as an important player in Burkina Faso I am supposed to represent IICD. When I read the programme the first thing that gains my interest is the absolute lack of best practices of Burkina Faso itself and that while Burkina Faso is hosting the event… and a number of by IICD supported projects in Education and Agriculture are nice examples of how you can use ICT for local needs. Were this projects not good enough compared to those of best practices of other countries? Did Microsoft/CEA miss out on them? Did the local government not put them forward? The Minister of ICT is capable enough doing so out of disrespect for the civil society. .. However it may be, we have to deal with best practices of countries like South-Africa, Tunisia, Egypt and Nigeria – and there are a few interesting presentations to attend. Are the best practices applicable in Burkina Faso? I doubt it. All these countries are miles ahead with regard to governance, economic situation and infrastructure compared to Burkina Faso. And why do we always have to look at best practices? A Forum addressing worst practices would probably be more educative!