TMCnet News
70 free laptops recalledJun 16, 2009 (Asia Pulse Data Source via COMTEX) -- 70 laptops earmarked for outer island schools in Cook Islands have been recalled. The wait for a consultants report on information communications technology has stopped the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) project for Mitiaro from going ahead. The plan had been for Mitiaro school students to receive about 70 of the colourful laptops last year. Now the Ministry of Education is being asked by the Secretariat of the Pacific Community in New Caledonia to return the laptops after it failed to distribute them. Secretary John Herrmann is tight-lipped on what happened to the project, other than that the ministry was waiting for the recommendations of an ICT policy report before doing anything with the computers. Last December Herrmann told Cook Islands News the Mitiaro project had been put on hold pending a cost benefit analysis of the plan. The worldwide initiative for the special laptops which cost around US$100 each was developed by the American-based OLPC social welfare organisation. The computers were designed specially for distribution to children in developing countries around the world to provide them with access to knowledge. About 100,000 of them were purchased for the Pacific region by a financier and given to the SPC to distribute to poor communities in the region. Some went to Papua New Guinea and Kiribati. The rugged, low-power computers contain flash memory instead of a hard drive. They use only five watts of power, run for about four hours, take one-and-a-half hours to charge off power mains or by solar, and connect with other laptops through a wireless system which is set up in the classroom. |