easyLearning in Action: Kayunga, Uganda
"The answer is education"
Even in a country like Uganda that relies on agriculture, Internet cafes are common. In Kayunga - a town about 100 km from the country's capital, Kampala - cows and goats are "parked" in front of one such cafe. Oblivious to the intense midday heat, a man in a bright purple shirt tosses freshly-picked pineapples into the back of a truck.
A car stops on the dusty road opposite an Internet cafe. Ted Moorhouse, CEO of Serebra Learning Corporation, is touring Uganda after meeting President Museveni to talk about easyLearning, Serebra's Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) e-learning program.
Upon entering the Internet cafe, Moorhouse is confronted by a scene that has become very familiar to him. People young and old tap away at computers that in previous lives may well have sat in smart downtown offices in Europe or North America. In one corner sits a woman in a dress decorated with sequins that reflect the light from the screen in front of her. Books sit open on the table as she works on the computer while monitoring several children playing with toys scattered on the floor around her feet.
Moorhouse approaches the woman, introduces himself and asks her what she's doing. "I'm learning Microsoft Word," she replies. When asked why, she responds "you see the man in the purple shirt outside throwing pineapples into a lorry? That's my brother. All his life he has thrown pineapples into a lorry. Before him, my father threw pineapples into a lorry. And before him, my grandfather threw pineapples into a wagon."
The woman waves an arm over the children at her feet and continues... "these are my children. I don't want them to throw pineapples into a lorry. The answer is education."
