Question 3: How to make grassroots telecentre operators more active member of global telecentre movement?

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Permalink Reply by Cuchie Echeverria on November 24, 2009 at 3:59am

I agree with you Nune and all the rest who said that we should look into the needs of these grassroots telecentre operators and then craft our projects based on those identified needs. That is the best way to get them involved, by helping them find value in the telecentre.org program as a whole.

Permalink Reply by Anuradha.K.T. on November 18, 2009 at 12:43am

By creating and providing access to knowledge base in local language especially in agriculture, environmental science and medicine. Access means has to be both Online (through the Net) and offline (CDROM, bulletin boards, community radio...)

Permalink Reply by Sandra Nassali on November 18, 2009 at 3:55am

I think one-on-one events between TC Foundation and grassroot operators can be paramount in making this happen and these of course should not aim at creating knowledge about the existence of telecentre as grassroot telecentre operators already know but should aim at building the self-efficacy of the grassroots hence portraying their significance to this cause. Grassroots need to know that they are important to this concept and once this is achieved, i guess sharing their knowledge and experiences would not be much of a problem once they also come to understand that they are of tantamount interest or concern.

EGs of such one-on-one events can include local, national and regional workshops, Award/ Recognition events, etc. During such, training tool-kits about how they can be of great impact to their communities can also be introduced.

Permalink Reply by Niranjan Meegammana on November 18, 2009 at 12:47pm

Dear Sandra
As I have experienced smaller gatherings enable more active participation bt grass roots rather than large gatherings. The old way we could do it bringing people together to one location, although half the day gone for their traveling, they will at least pickup their workshop KIT and share a friendly lunch time.

People will realize that the way we got to move is 'E' but it needs transformation of our thinking of workshops and meetings. It's something we badly want to take forward from industrial age,

in a knowledge society we all need knowledge to be the thread.

Thank You
Niranjan Meegammana
Shilpa Sayura Foundation
http://www.shilpasayura.org

Permalink Reply by Ananya Raihan on November 18, 2009 at 1:23pm

The first step towards it is to connect the telecentre workers within a national boundary and arrange sharing of ideas and thoughts among themselves. Ning sites are getting more popular among the telecentre workers. It is found that telecentre workers shy to write, they feel comfortable to speak. Probably technology will us opportunity to have voice and video blogs.

Exchange of telcentre workers at a global level probably will make new leaders.

Permalink Reply by Elizabeth Yumul-Manugue on November 18, 2009 at 10:25pm

1. First buid awareness that there is a global collaboration in the telecentre movement and what it is about.
2. Provide easy and reliable access to the services of the telecentre collaboration.
3. Demonstrate benefit from involvement.
4. Sustain interest in the movement.

I would like to point out that some of strategies for these may be done on the global level but a lot of these are actually network-based. Motivational activities should be particularly carried out on the regional local levels as these are closer to the ground.

A concern that is beyond the direct control of tc.org is connectivity. This is an area where tc.orginfluence is needed in the formulation of policies that will push for greater and wider scope of infrastructure.

Permalink Reply by Francis Mwathi on November 19, 2009 at 2:44am

The content availablility is also another key factor. Nothing would have more effect to grassroots telecentre operators than does the creation of relevant content. It’s time consuming, expensive and usually ignored at the price of things that are more fun. The reason is quite plain and simple; when you have a presence (e.g. on the web), Content is the thing that attracts the target audience and retains their attention. So allocating of resources to ensure building of a content stream especially in a language they can digest easily is vital.

Permalink Reply by Jimmy L. Calata on November 19, 2009 at 7:51pm

1. Let the TCF Logo appear on every telecentre signage, poster, website.

2. Worldwide dissemination of telecentre impact on society and environment, best practices and success stories of telecentres.

3. Links to websites of telecentres/telecentre networks across the world in the telecentre.org portal

Permalink Reply by Polly Gaster on November 20, 2009 at 8:56am

I agree with most of the contributions so far that the main reasons for lack of involvement of grassroots telecentre operators in the global telecentre movement can be summed up as:
a) lack of connectivity, language difficulties, funds for phone/Internet bills...
b) lack of motivation, perhaps caused by a mixture of not feeling that they are getting much out of it and lack of confidence about contributing.
Of course a) and b) are also interlinked.

This is why we too are very much in favour of strengthening the national communications network, both technically in terms of providing user-friendly tools, website, mailing list, etc; and practically by working with the operators, giving training and encouraging confidence, promoting horizontal mutual aid and exchange of experience relationships between centres in the same province or region, and so on.

I wd say that the grassroots operators are the most active of all members of the global movement - they are doing the work while I am sitting in a university, for example - and it wd be a mistake to think of them as invisible or passive just because they are hard to find on this discussion. Hopefully people like me are in some way representing the views of members of our national networks, that we have learned about over time, as well as invididual opinions.

of course it wd be good for the grassroots operators to have more direct contact and involvement with the global movement, and that is one of the great advantages of the Internet (if you have it) - cutting out the need for hierarchical structures to move things upwards and downwards. But I think we have to be practical and go step by step, and democratic communication at national level in our own languages is an important starting point.

Permalink Reply by Jimmy L. Calata on November 23, 2009 at 8:06pm

For item Number 2: "Worldwide dissemination of telecentre impact on society and environment, best practices and success stories of telecentres."

Local and international telecentre Research and Development Centers may be established. These centers could be independent entities or integrated with the extant telecentre academies. These centers should work collaboratively in coming up with a database of telecentre impact, best practices, and success stories direct from the ground. Part of the database could be the pitfalls or failures experienced by telecentre operators or knowledge workers, so these won't be repeated. Outputs should be disseminated to all concerned and target sectors or populace.

Permalink Reply by tareq ahmed on November 20, 2009 at 12:04pm

1.Promoting local and multilingual content will be the key agenda for making the grassroots telecenter operators play a proactive role.

2.Connectivity and Access will be another challenge for creating greater opportunities 4 grassroots telecenters.

3.Energy issue is very important for spreading the telecenter movement in countries which r at the developing stage.

4.Capacity building is another key factor.

Permalink Reply by Kiringai Kamau on November 20, 2009 at 10:37pm

This may not sound very nice I know but the telecentre.org is not very grassroots focused, it is still a club of the ICT savvy and the networked. At the country level the network should have activities that are seen to be focused on local telecentres. I like the Sudanese model where every activity is linked to the telecentre and Ahmed has done a lot. I am not sure I have learned of others that promote knowledge acquisition from diverse actors as I have gathered through m,ail and other interactions with the Sudanese people. We need to promote that focus by addressing real needs for the people at the grassroots. Starting with education, health programmes and now environment will help promote that focus. We can try supporting national level competitions.

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