[Geo4All] Interacting With Students/Professionals in Uganda

[Dan Bwanika]

Prof. Suchith Anand

Many thanks for yours.

Right, I'll post the link the students walls tommorow.

It is crucially important for African students to interact with
European professors. Books, journal articles etc., all come from
Europe. Uganda for example has no single degree holding cartographer!

Such interaction enhances students academic prospects since most of
the students have limited number of professors to interact with here
in Uganda.

The internet is still very expensive that is when I consider French
Orange (Africell) the best operator on the market.  Internet speeds
are limited (depending on how deep the pockets are) which implies if
one is doing cartography for example, where one has to download and
upload huge data sets, the internet will just slow down. Higher speeds
imply higher cost.

The solution is to have small groups of students working at intervals.

Uganda telecom has a project with another organisation to link up
Universities but the university has to meet infrastructure costs and
Uganda Telecom meet the last mile costs - which is in thousands of
dollars. They do also donate servers and switches yet still most
Universities have to find sources of funding (hike fees) to purchase
addition equipment.

This is pushing academic institutions away from what they term as "
expensive courses"!

The National Information and Technology Authority (NITA - Uganda) is
expanding the fiber optical network and other telecoms are expanding
their communication network. Hopefully competition can bring down
monthly charges.


Anyhow government has to priorities education and they have to find the funding.

Best

Dan

On 11/12/17, Suchith Anand <Suchith.Anand at nottingham.ac.uk> wrote:
> Hi Daniel,
>
> Thank you for your mail. May I suggest that you and your students join in
> one of the GeoForAll webinar series to start planning ideas for this. Rafael
> Moreno is leading our webinar series, and  I will request him to consider an
> interactive webinar  on OpenCitySmart [1] and NASA Europa Challenge [2] and
> use the opportunity to plan ideas . It will be great to have  student teams
> from Africa for next years Europa Challenge.
>
> I fully understand the issues on low internet access in many parts of the
> developing world. But  things are changing and will change. From my
> experience in India, things have changed a lot in the last ten years in
> getting low cost internet access (though still lot of work need to be done
> esp. in rural areas ). Especially,  in university campuses there is high
> speed internet at low cost.   I am optimistic that costs for high speed
> internet access  will keep coming down in the future.
>
> What is the situation for low cost internet access in University campuses in
> Uganda? Are you based from a university there?
>
> Please feel free to connect with colleagues in the network and discuss ideas
> .
>
> Best wishes,
>
> Suchith
>
> [1] https://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Opencitysmart
> [2] http://eurochallenge.como.polimi.it
>
>
>
> ________________________________________
> From: GeoForAll <geoforall-bounces at lists.osgeo.org> on behalf of Dan Bwanika
> <bulemezi at gmail.com>
> Sent: 12 November 2017 3:32 AM
> To: GeoForAll at lists.osgeo.org
> Subject: [Geo4All] Interacting With Students/Professionals in Uganda
>
> Forum
>
> I am trying to find a way of how Professors, Scholars and Researchers
> in the Global North can interact with prospective students here in
> Uganda for short courses in any field specifically related to; Urban
> Geographies, Regional planning, Infrastructure Planning and Design and
> New Urban Technologies (Big Data, Urban Architecture & Design,
> Cartography, Infrastructure Engineering/Planning etc.,)
>
> Of course there’s need for a high speed internet connection (skype) to
> make this possible. French Orange (Africell) has such facilities but
> theirs are rather expensive.
>
> If you’re an interested Professor, Scholar and Urban Researcher and
> you might find this proposal interestng and has the means of
> interacting with students here in Uganda please let me know or we can
> talk about it.
>
> Best Wishes,
>
> Daniel Bwanika
>
>
> --
> _____________________________
> Bwanika Nakyesawa Luwero
>
> Daniel Bwanika
> Box 12413 Kampala
> Uganda
>
> t: +256-752-972-960
> f: facebook.com/uidc.uganda
> www.uidc-ea.org
> e: uidcug at gmail.com
> t: @uidc_ug
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-- 
_____________________________
Bwanika Nakyesawa Luwero

Daniel Bwanika
Box 12413 Kampala
Uganda

t: +256-752-972-960
f: facebook.com/uidc.uganda
www.uidc-ea.org
e: uidcug at gmail.com
t: @uidc_ug