Fostering Egypt’s development through The Make and Innovation perspective

Fostering Egypt’s development through The Make and Innovation perspective

By Ricardo Ruiz Comment Closed
San3a Tech is a social enterprise established by young Egyptians to democratize technical innovation and build an impactful community of makers. It is also one of the Global Innovation Gathering hub members since 2022. Egypt faces a critical problem of missing the importance of research and development in the community and its effect on the industry and the Egyptian economy. Therefore, there needs to be an environment to bring together people interested in making, innovation and technology. The main challenges faced by Egypt today include the following: Lack of hands-on learning techniques in schools and universities in Egypt, although Education and training are crucial to national's industry development, economic growth and political stability. The Egyptian vocational schools need to provide the industry with qualified and skilled technicians. Craftsmanship produces low-quality creations due to different reasons. Co-innovating in MENA region These were the main drivers for San3a Tech founders to start the grass-root initiative in March 2012 through Fab Lab Egypt at first, followed by several projects and...
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Sailing on Knowledge Waves

Sailing on Knowledge Waves

By Ricardo Ruiz Comment Closed
In 2014, Nave à Vela - a start-up co-founded by GIG member Miguel Chaves in Brazil - has the purpose of, in partnership with schools, building a more meaningful education, promoting increasingly innovative teaching, and respecting the particularities and reality of each school. The mission is to transform schools into places where students' creativity and curiosity awake. They develop activities encouraging them to build knowledge through practices, projects and even life purposes. The Curricular Base for Innovation Culture: a methodology fostering student's development. Nave à Vela (NAV) respects the needs of each school and its particularities. For this reason, it developed an adaptable methodology to fit each school's needs: the Curricular Base for a Culture of Innovation. Designed for kindergarten, elementary school and high school students, it promotes maker learning, in which the student learns by building toys and prototypes and authoring projects. In this process, he starts to have a more exploratory relationship with knowledge and, thus, develops his autonomy. By becoming...
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Learning with Head, Heart and Hand – A Plea for Maker Education

Learning with Head, Heart and Hand – A Plea for Maker Education

By Mugethi Gitau Comment Closed
Global Innovation Gathering is proud to have Junge Tüfler*innen among our members. During workshops, they observe how children are fascinated by plants that make music, plasticine that glows because it can conduct electricity, or a talking poster. When they understand how these things are made, they quickly arrive at the point: "Maybe I can do that, too. I'll try that myself!" Doing things yourself to develop and experience your effectiveness is an essential part of maker education and, accordingly, at the heart of all learning formats. Through project- and problem-based learning, maker education strengthens key future competencies such as communication, collaboration, creativity and critical thinking. A diagram shows the overlap of the 4K model (Communication Collaboration, Creativity, Critical Thinking) with Digital Competencies (Reception, Reflection, Production). Maker spaces offer a near-limitless number of possibilities for exploration: also, digital skills can be taught here. Fascinating: the area for production, i.e. being able to design digital content and systems yourself. Illustration: Carlotta Klee. "Maker Spaces in der Schule: So...
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H-Fablab – Fuelling sustainable innovative solutions in Côte d’Ivoire;  starting with young makers

H-Fablab – Fuelling sustainable innovative solutions in Côte d’Ivoire;  starting with young makers

By Mugethi Gitau Comment Closed
Dodji Honou conducting a practical training for kids at H-Fablab (all photos courtesy of H-Fablab) In the neighborhood of Bingerville about 45 minutes -1 hour from Abidjan, in the district of Angré,  stands H-FABLAB.  A digital manufacturing laboratory whose primary objective is to promote learning by doing among young people, whether or not in school, literate or not in French. The space was opened formally  in Sep 2021, but had been running informally for 2 years before that. They enjoy good internet access via a fiber connection, though electricity can be sometimes unstable Dodji Honou is  the founder of H-Fablab. His story begins in Togo, where he was born. And where his story with makerspaces  and innovation hubs began. He was a member of  Woelab now expanded into Hubcity in Togo, and in 2013 while there, his story with GIG also began. He met GIGers, Geraldine and Max , who introduced him to GIG.  He later moved on to Senegal to work with a...
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The r0g_ way or the hard way

The r0g_ way or the hard way

By Fadia Elgharib Comment Closed
  On a sunny Monday afternoon, wandering through the streets of Charlottenburg, quietly tucked away on Knobelsdorffstrasse directly near Schloss Char  lottenburg lies r0g_agency, co-directed by longtime friends of GIG, Stephen Kovats and Susanne Bellinghausen.  “open culture” is plastered on the window in bold yellow lettering that if the sun hits it directly, it reflects perfectly over the white arched walls inside, further echoing core values of r0g_: accessibility, innovation, and peacebuilding. r0g_agency works with local grassroots organizations in the Global South to support openness within a developmental context.  As we walk through the front doors, we are warmly welcomed by our hospitable host, Stephen, and their summer intern from the University of Alberta, Lisa. Looking around, the walls are decorated with various educational materials, including a mock game board highlighting the dangers of irregular migration and the struggles migrants often face.  Currently, the list of ongoing projects is somehow interconnected and related to one another. From counteracting online incitement to violence with #defyhatenow...
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Join the HerMeNow Accelerator program

Join the HerMeNow Accelerator program

By Mugethi Gitau Comment Closed
Are you a women led social enterprise in MENA or Africa? Join the HerMeNow Accelerator program to grow your social enterprise and increase your impact.  Designed for women-led social enterprises focusing on building impactful solutions in culture, mindset, and education, this 5 month program is almost entirely remote and online and so accessible to companies across MENA + Africa (including Armenia). The Accelerator will support 10 women-led social enterprises. The accelerator is hosted by Bloom, an organization co-founded by 2 of our members, Bilal Ghalib and David Munir Nabti, that helps entrepreneurs grow and build skills for thriving people, communities and planet, in collaboration with the Stardust Concept ESG and Impact Division. Eligibility Social Enterprises that are past the product/market fit stage and that: Already generate revenues or have considerable user and/or product tractionAre planning to expand their teamsAre economically viable in the long termAre responsible, inclusive, and social enterprisesAre based in MENA + Africa (including Armenia) Selected Teams Get: Funding to support an essential aspect of...
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Gosanitize! Go Girls ICT (South Sudan)’s response to Covid 19

Gosanitize! Go Girls ICT (South Sudan)’s response to Covid 19

By Mugethi Gitau Comment Closed
South Sudan is a country that depends entirely on imports from its neighboring countries and during the pandemic, products such as hand sanitizers became more expensive as their demand was high and not affordable to the common person in the community. GoGirls inspiration to research and come up with a hand sanitizer called Gosanitize from locally sourced resources within South Sudan was because of the above challenges. Ten female local brewers were trained to make highly concentrated alcohol (Ethanol) for use in the hand sanitizer. To achieve this, GoGirls ICT Initiative team together with chemistry experts, had a peer-to-peer virtual mentorship exchange with Bibliothèque-MboaLab, Cameroon. But alas! A hurdle. To enable this project to succeed, they needed to overcome a major hurdle: religious beliefs and the extent to which women who make alcohol are viewed as contributors to the prevalence of hooliganism in the society. Not to be associated with a bad name in their society that taints their religious beliefs, some...
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Olabi innovation hub promotes a toolkit to encourage diversity in companies.

Olabi innovation hub promotes a toolkit to encourage diversity in companies.

By Ricardo Ruiz Comment Closed
The digital toolkit consists of an ebook, a podcast series, and a video manifesto aiming to clarify concepts and encourage companies to create environments of diversity in the workplace, supporting more women, LGBTQIAP+, black, indigenous and people with disability in their frames.It contains tips and guidelines on creating policies for welcoming and retaining people in the teams and the experiences and challenges of companies that experienced transformations in the workplace. Diversity is a theme that occupies more space in publicity, politicians and corporate addresses, classrooms, and journalistic guidelines each time. But how do you take real action? How do we convert themes to working policies? Include, insert and accept the broad and diverse range of people who coexist in the society, with respect and opening to welcome ideas, perspectives, and many different cultures can not be a desire but a requirement. However, it presupposes paradigms overturns not always straightforward incorporated. Olabi has extensive experience in consulting and actions to create more inclusive environments in...
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MboaLab inaugurates its “Bio Innovation Hub”

MboaLab inaugurates its “Bio Innovation Hub”

By Ricardo Ruiz Comment Closed
MboaLab committed to educating, transforming and positively impacting the lives of the Cameroonian people through its DIY lab. Last February, Mboalab, in partnership with the University of Cambridge, inaugurated its "Bio-Innovation Hub". This Hub is a shared biotechnology laboratory made available to researchers and students and is already undoubtedly contributing to the democratisation of biotechnology in Africa.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AD5m_UQrw8A Founded in 2018, with the aim to tackle the lack of biology laboratory equipment and reagents; MboaLab started bridging the gap in access to scientific equipment, particularly in Cameroon. This is the seed of what became the DIY biotechnology lab, MboaLab, in 2018 Biomakers at Mboa Bio Innovation Hub DIY biotechnology labs believe that science shouldn't be reserved for those who are formally qualified scientists and that anyone and everyone should be able to dabble in science. Therefore, in partnership with local universities, MboaLab organises and runs internship and training programs to equip growing talents in molecular biology, synthetic biology, engineering, and biotechnology. As a result, about 50...
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Climate Lab in Science Camp Iraq

Climate Lab in Science Camp Iraq

By Ricardo Ruiz Comment Closed
Science Camp is a well-known on-field player on job-oriented technological education for social innovation in the city of Basra, at the banks of Shatt al-Arab in southern Iraq. Moreover, Science Camp plays a significant role in the region by proposing methods and products intrinsically connected to the SDGs.  The ever-greater effect of climate change in the region pressures water availability & quality to the population. And it challenges the 4 million inhabitants of the 3rd most extensive petrol reservoir globally. As part of the "Climate Lab in Science Camp" project, a partnership with German Corporation for International Cooperation GmbH (GIZ) ICT for Youth in Iraq, Science Camp practitioners created the "water from Air". It is a scalable & replicable design and can be duplicated by makers and Fab Lab global networks. The solution needs no extra energy despite the amount already used in air-conditioning systems. It provides clean water, with increased efficiency in high temperature & hot weather. And, as simple as it looks, it depends on...
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