Pilot program brings handhelds to Kenyan students

Efforts to bring more computing power to the developing world have mostly been about developing
$100 PCs and similar low-end devices. However, at least one project is testing out smaller computers designed for smaller people. In an attempt to reduce the costs of providing textbooks to primary-school students, one school in Kenya is experimenting with WiFi-enabled Pocket PCs,
which are updated via a school-based satellite dish that retrieves data from a central operations center. The system was developed by EduVision, a private company that includes Unesco and the Kenyan Ministry of Education among its backers. While EduVision claims that the costs of connecting every school in Kenya via a wireless network could be as little as $2,000 per month, detractors point to limited electricity in Kenya's schools — where the units need to be charged — and to the fragility of Pocket PCs. While we like the idea of bridging the digital divide by helping kids learn, we think the resources spent on this could better be used to get them Freeplay radios and cellphones, and to provide textbooks, which will work without electricity, and can still be used if they're dropped in a field.