The University of Nairobi visited Kambu on 31 July. The area has been hard hit by drought and famine, with the result that some students are forced to drop out of school, and people are concerned mainly with obtaining their next meal.

Prof. Waema donated a flash disk for transferring data to Silanga School. The school had also run out of credit for mobile internet access, and Prof. Waema donated Ksh 1000 for this purpose; the next payment will come from the school board.

No soil measurements have been done using the VeSeL soil sensor due to lack of rain - the soil is so dry there was concern that the soil sensor could not be inserted for fear of breakage.

Some teachers have been using the computer for preparing teaching materials and marking, as can be seen in recent postings on the school's blog. Prof. Waema suggested more training, including in Powerpoint.

Farmer group the Mtito Andei Initiative (MDI) will explore various sustainability plans, including charging to cover events with the digital camera and providing photocopying services.

An online donations mechanism has been set up for Silanga School in Kambu, through the Institute of Education. Donors can go to this link and select The VeSeL Project.

See for yourself at the school's web site. They have been blogging regularly, uploading photos, stories and reports of daily life at the school and in the community.

The VeSeL resource kit consists of a Macbook laptop, powered by a solar power kit which is described here. Network connectivity is achieved with a USB modem which connects to the Internet via the mobile phone network. The VeSeL project funded connection charges for one year while working with the community to find the best sustainability models; providing Internet access can be a profitable local business in rural areas. We have also provided digital cameras and MP3 player/recorders.

Having the laptop and modem as a connectivity hub, our next phase aims to link mobile phones for obtaining and sharing data, and a simple sensor network for monitoring crop growth.

'The school is located in a dry area were the people water the trees daily since we have no source of water.' Photo posted by teacher Leonard Mwang'ombe

Dan Orwa sends the following report:

Day 1

24th October 2008 – Silanga Primary School

Upon my arrival at 11:00 AM, I went straight to Silanga Primary school and met the headmaster and later on the teachers. The headmaster mentioned that they are very happy with the progress made by the teachers and the students regarding ICT, and once again thanked VeSeL for assisting the school with the equipment.

Dominic Mutuku of Silanga School sends the following message:

Today we are training seriously on computer basics, going to the internet, browsing one's emails and we are being taken through by Dan Orwa and Peter Muia. Theyare doing quite a good job. We at Silanga Primary School are really enjoying the classes very much. We have been undergoing this very trainings and we have moved from a point to where we are now. This VeSel project has been received positively the school and the immediate community. The teachers you are bringing to us are really doing well. We have gone through most of the basics and now we are doing well for we can access the internet and send mails as you can see for yourself. We are pretty happy about this. The only bottleneck is the inadequacy of computers to the school. If only you increase the computers and keep on sending these teachers, the we can be computer literate.

Dan Orwa of University of Nairobi sends the following report:

As you may have been aware, the UoN VeSeL team is currently visiting Kambu and Kiangwaci to folow up on the visit my Souleymanne in April. I am a Kambu since yesterday friday and here are some general observations:

We managed to talk to the teachers and the students as well and realized that majority of the teachers were happy to use and learn more about the Macbook. However the internet connection has been down and this was sorted out by Ngechu and the system is OK now. We were also informed that the solar panel does not seem to be able to charge the laptop, though it does charge
the dry cells for the camera and iPod. As an alternative, since most teachers stay at Kambu, they normally carry the laptop home and charge it overnight.

Two teachers, (Rose included of course!) and teacher Mwangombe are at the forefront of using the Macbook and are doing great. The school have been having problems downloading pictures from the camera. This has been solved as we came along with a multi-card reader which they are already using.

"I can't wait to send a full report on Silanga," said Vesel member Souleymane Camara in a message sent the day after delivering a Macbook laptop to Silanga School in Kambu. "But for what it is worth, this was a major success. Instead of just three teachers, we had ten of them. Also, two of the teaching staff have a very good ICT skills. This ensures and facilitates knowledge transfer," he said. "They only needed to be introduced to Mac."

"The headteacher and assistant headteacher have been so upbeat about the kit, and have done so well in mobilising the whole school for the event and training. They understood our ideas and expectations."