Computer Centre in Kindu

Even though the city of Kindu has a university, the infrastructure is poor, especially with respect to computer and internet access. For instance, the entire city offers only two public Internet cafés (see photo).

This situation hinders our fellows – as well as all other students in Kindu – in acquiring good general education. Furthermore, it makes communication with scholarship students difficult. A core part of our concept is, however, to establish personal contacts and professional exchange. Such can, realistically, only be carried out via internet.

In addition to our scholarship program, we therefore construct a computer center with internet access. We cooperate with an established local non-profit organization.

Goals

With the establishment of a computer center we intend to

• provide to our scholarship students the opportunity to work at a computer and use the internet
• impart essential computer and internet skills to young people in Congo
• to contribute to development in disadvantaged Eastern Congo
• qualify students for promising development projects of their own
• provide access to worldwide information and education resources for a hitherto largely isolated region
• create a project for sustainable development that will pay for itself in the long run

Concept

The computer center will provide 16 workstations with half of them having connection to the internet. Prior goal is to provide to our fellows the opportunity to work with computers independently and use the internet. Furthermore our fellows as well as the general public will be offered training courses.

The computer center is to be connected to the internet via satellite. To ensure stable and independent power supply, we will employ diesel engines. But, we are additionally working on ecologically and economically sustainable power supply by photovoltaics.