The Turing Trust were lucky enough to host BIPB (now Keyrus UK) for a week long training session in Greater Accra. BIPB are our corporate sponsor, and have been behind us since early in the year. They sent two members of their team from London, and one from New York. This first of a kind training brought together 50 students and 10 teachers, from every region across Ghana.
The week kicked off with two days of Data visualisation training, where teams of students were given the task of compiling Data about Ghana, researching and using RACHEL, the offline content distribution system devised by World Possible. The trainees were given training in using Microsoft Word, PowerPoint and Excel, and all gained training in soft skills of the three day event. On the final day students presented their data in some of the most fantastic presentations we’ve seen to date. Staff and trainers were blown away by the quality of the presentations, their diversity and the level of delivery.
The event closed with certificates for all those involved, who have returned home to teach the skills they learnt to others in their schools. The Turing Trust seized the opportunity to give out high performance laptops to coordinators from every region across Ghana. All laptops came loaded with pre installed educational content, including the fantastic RACHEL content devised by world possible. This, along with our own custom pack of content, applications and distribution software will be invaluable to all the schools which we work with.
This content will be loaded into every computer lab the Turing Trust has helped resource to date. In fact as part of the training week our guests joined us at one of out lab installations days. We were welcomed by the catering department, who had prepared us pastries and cakes, and then got to work on setting up the lab. Ten identical machines were installed, the staff chipped in, and as a result yet another school will have access to the facilities they need to improve their education. This school puts the total labs we’ve helped build at 32, and will be accessible to over 120 pupils.
The week closed at IPMC, where BIPB did training in using Qlik View, the powerful data visualisation software. This was a first of its kind in Ghana, and Qlik generously donated a handful of licenses for use in database visualisation and BI training. We are hoping to see a new class of data analysts come out of this rare opportunity, and IPMC will be opening a selection of its courses to our students.
The trip was a resounding success, and The Turing Trust want to express their gratitude to BIPB, who made this trip entirely possible. These thanks are echoed by the students we support who said the opportunity to have been a once in a lifetime experience.