In the blink of an eye, we are already in June. Many beautiful opportunities have brought a lot of activities this year to our Camasca offices. Equipment preparations for the grant in Northern Intibucá with the Inter-American Development Bank are nearing deployment. Our Embassy grant tablets have been distributed to teachers. All of this has helped bring some normalcy back into our programs because teachers are once again becoming excited to hear about Kolibri, even with the pandemic still very present in our region. Vaccines are very slowly reaching our area, with the elderly just beginning to receive their first dose and having to wait until the end of July for the second dose. Everyone has felt an urge to bring the teaching environment closer to normalcy as we continue hearing students leave school at an alarming rate, often to migrate. Even with the risk, some schools are meeting in person at least once a month to assign homework. One small rural community is so determined to use Kolibri that when needed, they turn on their server and router. Students live right around the school, so they just turn on their tablet, pick up the signal at home, and punch in those Kolibri minutes. The community found a unique solution to using Kolibri during these moments.
Tablets at home, with Kolibri Android, have really helped to bridge this pandemic gap. The United States Embassy has supported Shoulder to Shoulder with this initiative since last year and in 2021 they awarded us an additional grant toward at-home tablets. This year and last we were limited in resources to do a big scale deployment to homes and this year we are blessed with multiple efforts. As always we continue thanking all our donors and grantors because without them we would not be able to continue our programs and grow them.
Second graders receiving tablets
Father signing for student tablet
Student displaying Kolibri Android
In many ways our pre-pandemic, technology assisted learning, ideology was fit to thrive into the unforeseen circumstances that COVID-19 brought to our lives. Additionally, with the limitations of our team working at home last year our focus on content development alongside the Honduran Ministry of Education is the main reason that we have been able to accommodate teacher needs. While the pandemic brought many losses to our communities, we are remembering to focus on the positives that emerged and are fortifying our current functions. We are excited to enter students’ homes virtually through the delivery of a tablet with Kolibri. We are excited to begin hearing teachers’ feedback on everything we have developed, with every passing month. We are excited to slowly hear the student’s stories and we hope to share some of those with you. We are thankful for such a great team on the ground and in the US that allows us to have so much reach and impact on education in Honduras.
Students being trained on Kolibri Android
Prof. Lidio, the sole teacher at his school, distributing tablets to his students
