Great! Mr Eyiah I know you are a teacher and hope you are well prepared as well. The responsibility is greater for the teacher than anyone else for the teacher is the facilitator of learning in the classroom. Have a well prep ... read full comment
Great! Mr Eyiah I know you are a teacher and hope you are well prepared as well. The responsibility is greater for the teacher than anyone else for the teacher is the facilitator of learning in the classroom. Have a well prepared good school year
Paulus Of Indice Hall 10 years ago
This is the kind of write ups we need on Ghanaweb. Bravo!
This is the kind of write ups we need on Ghanaweb. Bravo!
perfect 10 years ago
Rightly put, it's a shared responsibility. Parents lets show our kids, love & care.
Rightly put, it's a shared responsibility. Parents lets show our kids, love & care.
Nyansasem 10 years ago
Thank you, Mr Eyiah. May God grant you more years to help the young one at Brookview and your SDA Church. So remarkable to hear the good work you guys are doing with the youth in your Church. Some years ago, a graduate at Wes ... read full comment
Thank you, Mr Eyiah. May God grant you more years to help the young one at Brookview and your SDA Church. So remarkable to hear the good work you guys are doing with the youth in your Church. Some years ago, a graduate at Western told me, most of the Ghanaian freshwomen there were from Toronto SDA Church. I knew you had a hand in that when he told me that.
Well, I am reproducing the adage you quoted "The early bird catches the worm!" to make a point here. To stay on top of the class, I would say that, the earlier you make the grades, the harder it becomes for you to flunk the class. I will explain further.
Normally, the final exams or mid-term tests are harder than the earlier ones. So it is always important to make the grades in the first tests and the mid-term tests. If your average is in the 90s or upper 80s, no matter how hard the final exams are, your scores fall below 80, which is A in Canada and B in some States in the USA ( I may be wrong here). But how do you stay on top?
To the parents:
1- If your child work at McDonalds, by now, you should have made sure that he or she is not scheduled to work this coming week or the next. She should stop working. Period. There is nothing like - they just open school. They don't cut grasses like we used to do back home and no cleaning tidying around the compound. Once the school opens, it is open and the kid needs to be serious. Especially those teens beginning 12 who will use their first semester grades to apply to Universities.
2- Make sure all assignments are done on time and like the writer said, go through the planner and check what needed to be done. The internet is not only for facebook and twitter...you can get a lot of help from the internet if you seriously need someone to help. As a matter of fact, if you even come here and say, my child needs help in this question, I believe someone might help.
3- I know it is difficult to tell the child to put the phone down or stay away from facebook. So it is important to agree with the child to find out what time she wants to be on facebook or PS3 or phone and the time you want to see your child sitting down and reading or doing something on paper with pen or pencil. Please, not ALL things are done on the internet, so don't believe your child when she stays on the net all day and tell you that she is working on her assignment. Let her show you the assignment, and periodically check on her progress. You yourself might have to stop watching those stupid African Juju and husband and wife cheating movies. It does not help you in any other way.
To the parents, you may be poor and everyone around is buying a house or building a mansion home, so you are trying to do the same by working 2 jobs or having no time for your children. This is wrong. Invest in your child education and look at the big picture.
I know a single woman who has never bought a house or build a house home. She only thinks about her 3 kids. She has dedicated all her life for them; buying books, going to PTA, taking them to games and all. Just this year, one child just finished his medical school and started his residency and the second one is finishing next year. Both of them had full scholarships for their first degrees. The last one just started university on full scholarship. Are you getting it now?
Guess what, these kids have not even started making it, yet but have already planned to retire their mom who is almost 50 years in the next 5 years by buying her a house here and building one for her in Ghana. Do you see how wise she was to take care his kids education seriously. This woman will have everything that her friends have in the next five years. They will still still have may be 20 yrs still paying their mortgage while this woman will just enjoy the fruit of her labor while sitting in her rocking chair and probably enjoy looking after her grand-kids. Not only that, she does not need to think a day about her kids becoming a burden to her again.
KIDS:
This is not for your parents alone. There is no reason to fail in this system. NO reason whatever. Even if, your mom is failing to understand this, please just make sure you get the grades and do your best to get your full or half scholarship to University or College. With Scholarship and not coming back to pay back your student loan, you will definitely succeed.
If you are from a single home, this is the reason why you need to do well and help your mom just like what I earlier told you. Don't give up. No one is born brilliant in this land. With DISCIPLINE and DEDICATION, you will achieve your goal. After all, it is written: WITH CHRIST, ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE.
AYI 10 years ago
PUT MARCUS GARVEY, KWAME NKRUMAH, MALCOM X VISION ABOUT AFRICA/ALL PEOPLE OF AFRICAN ORIGIN/DESCENT INTO ACTION/PRACTICE.
BUILD A ‘MARCUS GARVEY, KWAME NKRUMAH, MALCOM X LIBRARY’ ALL OVER AFRICA/GHANA. AFRICA/ALL PEOPL ... read full comment
PUT MARCUS GARVEY, KWAME NKRUMAH, MALCOM X VISION ABOUT AFRICA/ALL PEOPLE OF AFRICAN ORIGIN/DESCENT INTO ACTION/PRACTICE.
BUILD A ‘MARCUS GARVEY, KWAME NKRUMAH, MALCOM X LIBRARY’ ALL OVER AFRICA/GHANA. AFRICA/ALL PEOPLE OF AFRICAN ORIGIN/DESCENT USE ALL/EVERY MEANS, /AT ALL COST/BY ANY MEANS NECESSARY RADICAL MEANS TO UNITE. AFRICA/ALL PEOPLE OF AFRICAN DESCENT BE SELF-SUFFICIENT, USE YOUR RESOURCES TO FUND YOUR RADICAL MEANS OF UNITY.
PREZ KWAME NKRUMAH MADE A SPEECH DURING GHANA INDEPENDENCE DAY THAT “FROM NOW ON WE MUST CHANGE OUR ATTITUDE AND MINDS”. THAT IS, WE SHOULD NOT ALLOW OURSELVES TO BE RULED/GOVERN/DOMINATE BY ALIENS/FOREIGNERS.
GHANA DEVELOPMENT PATHS IS, GHANA MUST REPENT QUICKLY AND EMBRACE DR. KWAME NKRUMAH AND HIS VISIONS ABOUT GHANA / AFRICA/ALL PEOPLE OF AFRICAN DESCENT, TO HELP GHANA AND AFRICA/ALL PEOPLE OF AFRICAN DESCENT DEVELOP/MOVE TO THE TOP.
AFRICA/ALL PEOPLE OF AFRICAN DESCENT DEVELOPMENT PATHS IS, AFRICA/ALL PEOPLE OF AFRICAN DESCENT MUST QUICKLY EMBRACE HON MARCUS GARVEY, DR. KWAME NKRUMAH, MALCOM X AND THEIR VISIONS FOR AFRICA/ALL PEOPLE OF AFRICAN DESCENT, WITHOUT DELAY TO HELP AFRICA/ALL PEOPLE OF AFRICAN DESCENT DEVELOP/ MOVE TO THE TOP. IT IS TOO FRAGILE/DANGEROUS FOR AFRICA/ALL PEOPLE OF AFRICAN DESCENT TO WASTE TIME IN EMBRACING HON MARCUS GARVEY, DR. KWAME NKRUMAH, MALCOM X AND THEIR VISIONS FOR AFRICA/ALL PEOPLE OF AFRICAN DESCENT. EVERY AFRICAN/STUDENT/ALL PEOPLE OF AFRICAN DESCENT FROM THE LOWEST GRADE/KINGDERGARDEN TO THE MOST HIGHEST EDUCATION/UNIVERSITY/PAU AND EVERY PROFESSOR MUST/COMPULSORY STUDY HON MARCUS GARVEY’S, DR. KWAME NKRUMAH’S, MALCOM X’S TEACHINGS/IDEAS/VISIONS ABOUT AFRICA. GOD BLESSES AFRICA AMEN.
Tekonline.org 10 years ago
No. This is what TODAY'S Africa needs:
Africa now needs more than patriotic fervor and emotional outbursts. We need to replace revolutionary rhetoric with passion about TECHNOLOGY. The time has come to put on an innovative ... read full comment
No. This is what TODAY'S Africa needs:
Africa now needs more than patriotic fervor and emotional outbursts. We need to replace revolutionary rhetoric with passion about TECHNOLOGY. The time has come to put on an innovative thinking cap and march INTELLIGENTLY towards an industrial revolution.
And guess what, the SMARTER Africans have already begun in earnest. Please read on:
Kenya's Silicon Savannah
By Doug Hendrie
Kenya's tech sector is taking off. A new generation of rising stars are making software for the country's vast network of $20 mobile phones - and improving life for those at the bottom, reports Doug Hendrie
A programmer walks slowly down the stairs, holding his laptop in both hands as if steering by it. He passes a mural of Super Mario Bros, circa 1988, and into the entrance of iHub proper – a large, airy space, full of earnest young women and men working on their laptops. A coffee machine hisses in one corner. A quiet game of table soccer is under way. Silicon Valley? Not quite. This is the heartland of the Silicon Savannah, and one of many startup incubators dotting dusty Ngong Road in Nairobi, Kenya.
Everyone is here nursing the same hope – to make the next breakthrough service for Kenya’s enormous and growing population of mobile phone users. More than two-thirds of Kenyans own mobile phones, the highest rate in East Africa. The mobile phone has become Africa’s leapfrog technology – communication, commerce, computing and increasingly, internet access, all rolled into one cheap device.
Kenya is at the forefront of the shift, led in part by the breakthrough M-Pesa system, a wildly popular method of transferring money by SMS from mobile to mobile. Owned by the Kenyan-UK telco Safaricom, the five-year-old service is the world’s most successful mobile money solution, with 17 million users out of Kenya’s 41 million people.
Fully one-fifth of the nation’s GDP now flows by text message annually, jumping from phone to phone, peer to peer. And that is without mentioning M-Pesa’s successful imitators. In mobile money, Kenya is the world’s leader, outstripping developed nations where the desktop computer is only now giving way to tablets and smartphones.
Success in the Silicon Savannah does not come through imitation. Africa’s challenges are well documented. Any digital solutions must be localised, according to Gregory Mwendwa, a program officer with the Dutch charity Hivos, which part-funds iHub.
“Africa’s success should be measured by what innovation is happening by its own processes,” he says. “If China stopped investing in roads in Africa, they would not be built. But M-Pesa would still be here.”
CNBC commentator Larry Madowo, a mentor at another Ngong Road incubator and investor 88mph, says imported solutions often fail spectacularly. “The technologies — and services — that thrive here are those that are distinctly local, respond to everyday problems and fully adapt to the Kenyan psyche,” he says.
And while he advises caution to separate hype from reality, Madowo believes Kenya is well ahead of most other African nations in tech. “When you’re living through a revolution, it’s not always apparent at first,” he says. “But if the current startups in incubation hubs along Ngong Road can scale effectively, monetize and avoid the pitfalls … the Silicon Savannah will be in full bloom,” he says.
The African tech boom is not unique to Kenya. In emerging economies around the continent, entrepreneurs are beginning to innovate in earnest. Elikia, the first African-designed smartphone, was released in the Republic of Congo in September. Founded in 2004, the Nigerian-Kenyan tech firm Cellulant began by selling music to mobile users. Now, it has moved into mobile banking in 12 fast-growing nations in West and East Africa.
In August this year, the Savannah Fund, a Silicon Valley venture capital fund aimed at East Africa, made its first investment of US $2 million in biNu, a fast-growing startup founded by Zimbabwean-Australian Gour Lentel which brings a smartphone experience to the lower end phones still the norm in Africa.
Kenya has earned the lion’s share of attention on the ICT front, trumping even the economic powerhouses of Nigeria and South Africa. Kenya’s education system is envied by other African nations, producing a qualified and literate workforce. The nation prides itself on its openness to outside investment and its relative stability.
And behind the scenes is another force: the strong political support of Dr Bitange Ndemo, the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry for ICT. “He’s the greatest technology evangelist of our times,” says Madowo. Hype? Not at all. It was Ndemo who fast-tracked the four new undersea fibre-optic cables, which made landfall in 2009. Plans are now well advanced for a fifth cable with much larger capacity.
The Kenyan Government has moved towards greater transparency with the Open Data Initiative, placing non-classified government data online. That, too, was one of Ndemo’s ideas, a radical departure from the decades-long rule of autocrat Daniel arap Moi which ended only in 2002. During Moi’s reign, civil servants were prohibited from disseminating any government data.
There is also an ambitious blueprint for a $7 billion tech city modelled on Silicon Valley and Mauritius’ Cyber City at Konza, 60km southeast of Nairobi. On his official Facebook page, Ndemo writes, “The big idea is that a poor country should take a small, empty part of its territory and say: We're going to build a new city here.” Will it work? “I would move there,” says Anthony Wang’ombe, a Nairobi networking consultant. “Every bank would want to be on Wall Street. It is the same. If you are a key player, you will want to be there.”
There are now no less than seven ICT incubators in Nairobi, the highest concentration in Africa. They offer everything from a space to meet fellow developers to a chance to present to angel investors and secure crucial early-stage funding. The enthusiasm is palpable. The problem now is that so many apps and mobile-based products are pouring out of the incubators that the focus is now shifting to quality over quantity.
Mark Kamau, the lead for the almost-completed iHub user experience lab says it is time for Kenya’s mobile market to come of age. “In the beginning, we had a lot of enthusiasm, with people churning out apps every other day. But we need to make sure that our products are designed to actually resonate with users,” he says. “You might have a beautiful app technically – but how will users use it? Will it add value to their lives?”
Sitting behind a Dell laptop papered in NASA stickers is Patrick Mithamo, a Python programmer and self-confessed geek, says iHub changed his life. “I never thought I would meet someone with similar interests,” he says, eyes flashing. “But I came here and I met people who knew what PHP was, how websites worked, people who knew how to program. iHub is aggregating people.”
He’s working on a mobile survey platform designed for microfinance providers. Mithamo spent long weeks in rural Kenya as a survey field worker, walking kilometres house to house in the scorching heat. Back in Nairobi, he realised that technology offered a much easier way. “Walking around kind of sucks,” he says. Why visit the beneficiaries of the microloans, when right there in the hands of most villagers was the most remarkable and the most portable communication device ever invented – the mobile phone. Soon the surveys will come and go by SMS.
But why? What need for indigenous innovation when there are already millions of apps available? In part, the reason is the platform: millions of poor Kenyans own the cheapest possible mobile, a entry-level $20 model. Third-party mobile services in developed nations focus on smartphones through app stores. Here, it must be simpler. Many startups use the USSD protocol, a basic two-way form of communication with a telco’s servers. But it’s more than that. “Why would I want to find out the best jogging route in Nairobi?” asks Mithamo. “Who does that? People don’t jog. We are not a middle-class economy.”
Global companies are getting in on the act. Samsung has released a solar powered laptop and a new fridge with a built-in coldpack, designed to endure frequent power outages. In Kenya, 15 per cent of deaths amongst women of childbearing age are linked to pregnancy. To address that, Marcel Ogweno built Mimba Bora, an application designed to let women track their pregnancies and – if needed – find nearby medical help. And in agriculture, too, mobiles have arrived. Despite the growth in ICT and tourism, agriculture still accounts for almost a quarter of Kenya’s economy. But life for small farmers is hard. It was impossible to know whether they were getting a good price for their produce. That issue gave rise to M-Farm, a mobile app which began at iHub as an idea batted back and forth between three female techies.
“We realised that farmers [in Kenya] were always complaining because the middleman was taking what they should be getting,” says marketing lead Linda Kwamboka, an effusive 24 year old. “And others had no other markets to sell to. So we decided to help these farmers.” The app works through SMS – and by a network of agents on the ground.
Farmers can text in to discover the current market rate of produce in different towns around Kenya. Alternatively, they can find other smallholders and combine their crops for a better rate. And farmers can also find M-Farm approved sellers who offer a price guaranteed by M-Farm. The system is intended to increase accountability by providing a trusted link between buyers and sellers. More than 7000 farmers now use the system.
Another localised solution is M-Shop, a mobile ticketing system for mobile phones of all kinds. The company, MTL, also hails from the iHub incubator, but has since migrated further along Ngong Road to the Greenhouse, a large and open office space. The story behind the system stemmed from a universal problem, says CEO Meshack Alloys. “A friend wanted to go for a date with his girlfriend, and he wanted to go out of Nairobi. But they missed the bus because when they got to the terminal, the tickets were gone.” Now Alloys’ mother, who still lives in a village, can buy a ticket to come and visit him in Nairobi without enduring an expensive and time-consuming 60km round trip just to make sure she can get a ticket.
“We’re building on top of M-Pesa and the environment that created for us, where people already trust mobile transactions,” says Alloys. “Early on, people didn’t trust M-Pesa — would the money really get there? But now they do. And that is quite amazing to see. The strong growth in startups means we can plug another group’s solution in. You don’t have to build it all yourself.”
Perhaps 10 years ago, Alloys – a USAID merit scholar in engineering – would have left for California, part of Africa’s brain drain. But times have changed. “Our future is very bright,” he says. “We are growing steadily. Nairobi is at the centre. This is the best place to be.”
Joe Kingsley Eyiah, Toronto-Canada 10 years ago
Thank you, Nyansasem for throwing more light on my article.
I appreciate your compliments at the beginning of your comment. I sincerely thank God for making my part of His tools to influence the lives of others, especially i ... read full comment
Thank you, Nyansasem for throwing more light on my article.
I appreciate your compliments at the beginning of your comment. I sincerely thank God for making my part of His tools to influence the lives of others, especially in the area of education since my teaching days in Ghana during the early 1970s and in Canada till now!
You mentioned the SDA Church in Toronto. Yes, God has been very gracious unto us over the years. I thank Him again for making me part
of that success. I wish to also thank Pastor (Dr.) Kwabena Donkor, the former senior Church Pastor and the current Church Pastor Damson Oppong for posing confidence in me to lead the Education Council of the church which brought some learned members and few dynamic youth of the church to write proposals and put program in place which has encouraged many members of the church (both young & adults)to go colleges & universities over the years. Now the church has medical doctors, many nurses & PSWs, financial administrators, IT specialists, teachers and managers among others.
I thank God that we the old bones are gradually giving leadership in that area to the youth we have trained over the years and pray God's guidance for the young leaders. With God all things are possible! Glory be to God!!!
Thanks, Nyansasem.
OGIDIGIDI 10 years ago
Hello teacher Eyiah we welcome your community involvement. Your articles are also educative and thought-provoking, among the best on Ghanaweb
Hello teacher Eyiah we welcome your community involvement. Your articles are also educative and thought-provoking, among the best on Ghanaweb
matzcrorkz 9 years ago
JgTFIi Wow, great blog post. Really Cool.
JgTFIi Wow, great blog post. Really Cool.
matzcrorkz 9 years ago
oB4BLT Im thankful for the article. Will read on...
oB4BLT Im thankful for the article. Will read on...
Great! Mr Eyiah I know you are a teacher and hope you are well prepared as well. The responsibility is greater for the teacher than anyone else for the teacher is the facilitator of learning in the classroom. Have a well prep ...
read full comment
This is the kind of write ups we need on Ghanaweb. Bravo!
Rightly put, it's a shared responsibility. Parents lets show our kids, love & care.
Thank you, Mr Eyiah. May God grant you more years to help the young one at Brookview and your SDA Church. So remarkable to hear the good work you guys are doing with the youth in your Church. Some years ago, a graduate at Wes ...
read full comment
PUT MARCUS GARVEY, KWAME NKRUMAH, MALCOM X VISION ABOUT AFRICA/ALL PEOPLE OF AFRICAN ORIGIN/DESCENT INTO ACTION/PRACTICE.
BUILD A ‘MARCUS GARVEY, KWAME NKRUMAH, MALCOM X LIBRARY’ ALL OVER AFRICA/GHANA. AFRICA/ALL PEOPL ...
read full comment
No. This is what TODAY'S Africa needs:
Africa now needs more than patriotic fervor and emotional outbursts. We need to replace revolutionary rhetoric with passion about TECHNOLOGY. The time has come to put on an innovative ...
read full comment
Thank you, Nyansasem for throwing more light on my article.
I appreciate your compliments at the beginning of your comment. I sincerely thank God for making my part of His tools to influence the lives of others, especially i ...
read full comment
Hello teacher Eyiah we welcome your community involvement. Your articles are also educative and thought-provoking, among the best on Ghanaweb
JgTFIi Wow, great blog post. Really Cool.
oB4BLT Im thankful for the article. Will read on...