My WE Reflections

Although we did not have time to finish an action project, what would you think would have been something you could have done with an app to help students learn better or get to school when transportation is a problem?

• One potential idea for an app that would allow students to more easily get to school is to incorporate a GPS app that would find the best route to their school and calculate how long it would take to get there depending on weather conditions or other situations in which transportation may take longer or be more difficult. This app would hypothetically allow students to still be on time to school by taking measures against unexpected situations like bad weather.

Although our ability to influence a global issue is limited when we work alone, what do you think you could do with the help of an organization already in existence to make computer science education more accessible globally?

• With the assistance of a dedicated organization, the process of implementing and gathering resources that allow for computer science education would be much easier than if someone were to do it alone. A well-led organization can reach more people in need through their numbers and therefore will be able to make a larger impact on a greater number of people who are in need of it.

Lastly, reflect on what you have learned through this WE service learning project and how it has influenced your global view of education.

• This WE service learning project helped me to brainstorm possible solutions to help solve the crisis of lack of technology and access to education in poor and developing areas of the world. It has helped me understand the significance that proper access to education can have in a country or region and why it is important to secure the right to education for those who are most in need of it.

• From the information you have gathered watching these videos, what are some basic human rights? Is education a basic human right?
  • Some of the basic rights that I believe each human should have is access to food, clean water, clothes, shelter, education, and a good quality of life. I believe that it should be a basic human right, since having a proper education significantly influences the way you are able to live life for the better and greatly expands the opportunities you have as a person.
• If education is a basic human right does that mean that everyone has access to quality education? Explain.
  • Even though most consider education as a basic right, many people around the globe are not able to have it, for many different reasons. Some areas are in such poverty that they are not able to build or sustain schools, so the children there are not able to be educated. Children in other areas may be forced into work or labor at a young age and therefore are unable to pursue an education. Cultural factors may play a role in some areas as they prioritize other things more than education and so they don’t feel the need to get one.

• How would you summarize the video “The Right to Education”? What is the intended message of the video?
  • The video spoke about “The Universal Declaration of Human Rights”. It highlighted some of the basic human rights that they believe should be afforded to every human and applied on a global scale. Despite this, however, many countries do not honor the declaration as many people are still not given these basic rights. I believe that the intended message was to convince the viewer to fight for universal basic human rights. They wanted to put people in action to help those in need.

• What your future would look like if you never had a formal education, or your formal education had ended at the 2nd grade?
  • I think my opportunities in life would be severely limited if I hadn’t been able to get a formal education. Without having learned basic subjects and materials, I probably wouldn’t be able to get a comfortable job.
• When you consider the barriers to education we have learned about, are there barriers that have impacted your access to education? Whether yes or no, how do you feel about that?
  • Personally, I believe that I was lucky enough to not have many barriers to education, since I always had access to a school. I am glad that I was able to have that opportunity
• Have these lessons made you think differently about the value of your education?
  • They have made me think differently about the value of my education, because they gave me insight into the lives of those who weren’t fortunate enough to receive a proper education and made me rethink the way I view education
• What could you do to improve access to education at home or overseas?
  • We can help the effort to improve access to education at home or overseas by getting involved in programs and organized activities that seek to help these people. We can also help by spreading the word about issues of education in these areas.

What stood out to me the most about the issue of education is how significantly it affects poverty rates or quality of life in entire communities or regions of the world. I never thought about how access to education could help improve these impoverished areas before I had began this project. A few statistics that surprised me from the “Ask the Prof” video were the numbers on how education caused a large decline in fertility rates for women. It also decreased the mortality rate for children and how well they get nutrition by their educated mothers. This surprised me because I never thought that access to education and fertility rates had correlated so strongly.

To help improve access to education in regions of the world, we can develop programs and applications to help those people to have additional resources of which they may lack. Places that lack proper access to education services often don’t have the means to get the learning material that they need, so we could help provide them with it by developing software firsthand that fulfills that purpose and give it to those that need it.

I am Demetrius, a student who is creating this for the WE Service program project. The process of brainstorming and developing an application that can help many different people is exciting to me. By participating in this program, I hope to both further my understanding of Computer Science and also learn more of the world’s issues and try to make them better.