Humza Yousaf, the Minister for Europe and International Development, visited the Turing Trust in Edinburgh on March 9th to announce the awards under the latest round of the Scottish Government’s Small Grants Programme for 2016/17. The Turing Trust was delighted to have been awarded £60,000 for a project “Improving ICT skills in rural Malawi, powered by renewable energy”.
This project will build on the work we have done in Ghana and Edinburgh to deliver 4000 PCs to Malawian schools, all equipped with an e-library of resources customised to the Malawian syllabi. We will also work to engage the local communities to maximise the use and maintenance of the equipment provided and will be developing and piloting an off-grid computer laboratory powered by solar energy (the Solar Berry ).
During his visit, Humza Yousaf met our Director, James Turing, and some of our dedicated volunteers and was given a tour of our Edinburgh hub, where your donations are collected, wiped securely and then loaded with educational software before being shipped to Africa. You can read more about his visit and the Scottish Government’s awards here. The Network of International Development Organisation of Scotland (NIDOS) has also welcomed the awards and featured the Turing Trust on its website.
Work has already started on this exciting project and we will keep you posted on our progress through our newsletter. So, please sign up for this if you haven’t already.