The Afretech Aid Society and the ARES project
In briefAI summary — tap to read
The ARES project (African Ruggedized Education System) is a Rotary global grant initiative that delivers offline-capable computer labs to rural schools in Kenya and beyond, featuring rugged servers, solar-battery-powered devices, and free educational software including Khan Academy, Wikipedia, and thousands of books. Founded by Sean Hogan, Bonnie Sutherland, and Mark Knittel, the project has already installed systems in 47 schools, with dramatic results including schools rising from the bottom to top rankings and increased university placement rates among students.
Key takeaways
- ARES uses a ruggedized server with no moving parts, connecting up to 50 wireless devices with batteries that function during frequent power outages, costing approximately $5,500 per installation.
- The system provides free, licensable software including Khan Academy, TED Talks, Wikipedia, 45,000 downloadable books, and curriculum materials in multiple languages, transforming content-starved rural classrooms into information-rich learning environments.
- Schools installing ARES have shown measurable improvements in student outcomes, including one secondary school rising from the bottom 26,000 to the top 30 within three months with 100% student exam pass rates.
- Teacher training and local Kenyan partnerships are essential to project success, with ongoing support ensuring equipment maintenance, annual software updates, and adaptation to local educational needs.
- The flexible, adaptable platform can be customized for different countries and communities, including projects preserving indigenous languages and cultures through digital content.
About Sean Hogan, Mark Knittel and Bonnie SutherlandSean Hogan and Bonnie Sutherland are Rotarians with over 30 years of service experience; Bonnie, formerly a teacher in British Columbia, founded the Afretech Aid Society in 1992. Mark Knittel, a retired IBM engineer, designed the ARES server technology and leads its technical development.
AI-generated from the meeting recording — AI can make mistakes, so check the recording for anything important.
Meeting for the week of August 10 - August 16, 2020
This Meeting at a Glance:
Program: The Afretech Aid Society and the ARES project
Speaker: Sean Hogan, Mark Knittel and Bonnie Sutherland
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Website Committee Co-Chair Olu
Guests, we are happy to have you join us this week!
As we see it, our flexibility as an online, asynchronous club allows a special type of service to Rotarians around the world: we make it easier for anyone to strive for and maintain 100% attendance. That keeps you engaged with Rotary's events and ideas, and provides a moment of inspiration for devoting your creativity, talents, and resources to good causes.
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Is it the TRUTH?
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Weekly Funny with Shags
We believe laughter is an important part of life, and we should all make time to laugh a little. This segment of our meeting is meant to tickle you just enough. These funnies are curated by member Steve Shags Shagrin!
Greetings from Shags! I've always loved humor and had a joke column in a prior Club newsletter that I'm happy to revive here!
Last year, I replaced all the windows in my house with those expensive double pane energy efficient kind. But this week, I got a call from the contractor complaining that his work had been completed a whole year and I had yet to pay for them. So, I proceeded to tell him just what his fast-talking sales guy had told me last year. He said that within one year, the windows would pay for themselves. There was silence on the other end of the line, so I just hung up, and he hasn't called back. Guess he was embarrassed.
Weekly inspiration
Every week we start our meetings with a short video highlighting innovation, inspiration, entrepreneurship, or social change.
You may know someone who is detail-oriented. You may be such a person. If so, this story of Luke Towan via Art Insider will sing to your soul. Prepare to be charmed, impressed, and perhaps appreciative of a good magnifying glass.
World of Rotary
Jennifer E. Jones makes history, becomes first woman named Rotary president-nominee.
https://www.rotary.org/en/jennifer-e-jones-makes-history-becomes-first-woman-named-rotary-president-nominee
Through a Rotarian's Lens
Sometimes a photo can capture an amazing moment. In this section Member Keith Marsh shares his incredible photography!
If you'd like to submit a photo for this section please contact Keith.
The Saharan sand dunes of eastern Morocco at Erg Chebbi are the best I have seen. The sand is perfect, beautiful and easy to walk. I like this photo of our camel ride with the camel and guide off center.
Learn something new
This section is curated by members Shags Shagrin and aims to teach our members and guests something new, fun and useful! If you have any ideas on a fun trick or skill you'd like to share please contact Shags.
3 Amazing Self-Made Air Conditioners and Cooling Systems
Not everyone has air conditioning where they are, so here are some ideas to keep you a bit cooler! And the old "Heathkit" kid inside me loves this stuff!!! (Look it up -- they were before PCs!!)
Service report
Tell us about service you’ve done recently in your community.
Click here to fill out The Rotary eClub of Silicon Valley Service Survey
On the first meeting of every month, we feature service reports from club members for the previous month. Thanks for your service everyone!
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Our events & projects
We hold our meetings online, but we do regular service projects and social events in the Silicon Valley! This section is updated every week with our upcoming events. We welcome guests to all of the events and service projects listed here.
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Happy Dollars: do good by sharing something good
Each week we ask our members to share stories with the club and toss in a few dollars to support our efforts. The primary goal of this section is to provide a fun way of getting to know each fellow members and guests, while giving back to a good cause.
Happy dollars is an opportunity to share something positive that has happened in your life whether it is personal or business. Think of it as your opportunity to brag a little, but also put a little bit into a karma jar. The money donated through happy dollars is put to charitable use, and the message that you leave for happy dollars will be posted in our online meeting the following week for the entire week for folks to see! (Pending that it’s appropriate!)
Here are the happy dollars contributions from last week!
This section is usually updated on the early hours of Saturday, so contributions made over the weekend may not be listed here.
Rory Olsen made a $20 donation.
Jazzy is with me on my chair. All is well. Please apply my gift to Polio Plus.
Anonymous? made a $20 donation.
Thanks for sharing the story highlighting the advancements with prosthetic limbs.
Selected comments
Every week at the bottom of our meetings, there is a comments section for members and guests to tell us what they enjoyed about the meeting or to ask questions to the speaker. We select a few comments every week from last week’s meeting to be featured during this week’s meeting.
Here are the comments selected from last week’s meeting.
Tzviatko Chiderov said:
Thanks so much for the super fun presentation Caleb! Are you finding that these students are able to fly their drones freely in their communities to practice or are they mostly restricted to certain spaces and the simulators on their computers? It seems like we only started hearing more about drones less than 10 years ago and it's so cool to see the potential of programs like this to grow the interest in the technology as it seems the practical applications of it will only continue to grow.
Sandy Stabile said:
Caleb, such an interesting program. I wish we had something like this when I was in high school.
I think this would get more kids excited about STEM.
Fremont Fire Department has a drone and is often called to use it to assist the police department.
Nathan Gildart said:
Caleb, that was a lot of fun to watch. I've been dabbling with buying a cheap drone for a little bit of play (at home or with students). I'd like to see my school do more with drones. I think the kids would love it. Robotics is somewhat popular so I imagine we'd have some interest. I learned a few new thing so thank you!
Be sure to leave a comment at the end of this week’s meeting after you watch the program below, and perhaps you’ll see your comment featured next week!
Program: The Afretech Aid Society and the ARES project
Speaker: Sean Hogan, Mark Knittel and Bonnie Sutherland
Every week we bring to you a new program on innovation, entrepreneurship, and education, and how those contribute to service to others. Special thanks to member Roger Plested for leading our club's Programs Committee in finding us amazing speakers each week.
The Rotary eClub of Silicon Valley seeks to explore perspectives on service from across the world. The views of the speakers in our programs are their own, and unless stated otherwise, are not necessarily reflective of the views of our eClub nor Rotary International.
If you have an idea for a cool speaker, please feel free to reach out to them directly or submit THIS FORM so our Program Committee can contact them!
If you truly want to change the world, you begin by educating the children." That is the philosophy behind the ARES Project. ARES is an acronym for the African Ruggedized Education System and a solution for the problem of education in rural communities with minimal resources. Afretech is a small, effective organization that has been working in the Developing World since 1992 and a registered Canadian and US charity since January 2000. Their goal is to help people help themselves. They provide schools with libraries, computers, technology training, and even build schools where there is a great need.
Additional Resources
Learn more and donate at http://www.ares.education/
Upcoming program recording schedule
All of our guest speakers and programs are recorded live online over Zoom video conference. We welcome members and guests to join us in one of these upcoming recordings. Recordings are approximately 30 minutes long and are subject to change without notice.
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If you can’t join the live recording, please send your questions for an upcoming speaker to programs@siliconvalleyrotary.com.
