Organizing Conferences For Learners: How we did it in Namibia

Speaker 1: Good morning, everyone Um so my name is Jessica, and today I would like to talk to you about organizing conferences for learners and share my experience with you on how we did it back in Namibia. So, first of all, thank you very much for your presence here and for joining me for this talk. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank the sponsors because they made it possible for me to come here and share some African awesomeness with you guys So let's thank them with a round of applause, please. Okay, so I'm from the southwestern part of Africa, from Namibia, from a small town village called Okakarara.

Speaker 1: My first encounter with Python was at Python Namibia 2015. Now, as you can see in this picture, I'm one of the people in the front line. holding the banner or supporting the banner, but I had no business whatsoever being there because my reasons for going for that conference was not to learn Python or I wasn't curious about Python or anything like that I went to the conference because it was at the beginning of the year and I was coming from holiday. I was bored and I had the time. And also because the conference was free. So I thought there would be free food anyway. So let me just go But at the end of the conference, the experience that I got after attending the conference and meeting the community was one that I'd never experienced before. So I would like to take this opportunity again to um

Speaker 1: thank my dear friend Daniele Prosida for putting aside his fears and bringing a conference to Africa to a land he had never been. And as you may know, there's a lot of stories about how one can die in Africa. So thank you very much to you and to the Cardiff team and to the Phoenix Project from bring for bringing this uh conference back in Africa. It brought um a lot of opportunities for Africans, it opened a lot of our eyes as well. Um this uh talk that I'm going to talk about about the the conference for learners it couldn't have been because um if it wasn't for you. So thanks a lot for your efforts. Now, over the past three years, the Python community in Namibia grew from this group of people.

Speaker 1: To this group of people in 2018. So again, thank you very much for your efforts. Now, let's talk about Computer Day 2017. Now, Computer Day 2017 was a conference Uh that we organize for just one day. Now my idea was I don't know what I'm getting myself into, I don't know what I'm doing. So let me just make this conference a one-day conference. If it's going to be the worst day of my life, then let it just be that one day and no more. So I made it a one-day conference where we had a lineup of talks um throughout the whole day and then we also had a break for uh software uh application presentation and poster presentations during that day. Now, our main focus for Computer Day is having talks and panel discussions.

Speaker 1: So at Computer Day 2017, we had two panel discussions, one with the Dean of Faculty of Computer Science and two of our most uh highly recognized universities in Namibia and also another talk okay they shared for example, the career opportunities that are there and how the learners could prepare for the uh university and things like that, like how m how many points they needed to have, what um courses they could take and the way forward. So we also had another panel discussion and this one was with um former students who were now in the industry and also with university students who are still in the university. So here we wanted to um give the children an opportunity to learn.

Speaker 1: uh for example what what attitude they needed to have in order for them to be successful in the industry and things like that. So um the students were sharing their um mistakes and um some tips on how the children could be better students when they get to university. We also had poster presentations. Now these ones were just posters on theoretical um concepts in computer science. So children made poster posters about that, did research and then they presented on the day. We also had software project presentations. Now kids uh created small software applications and then they showed to the others also at the conference. Now for Computer Day 2017 we only had the first three, the talks, the posters and the software presentations and not the workshops.

Speaker 1: Now workshops came at Computer Day twenty eighteen and they came about because of the key because of what the kids um requested in the after the first conference. Okay, so this is a picture, is one of the pictures of um one of the presentations during Computer Day 2017 where the kids were now showing their software applications to the others. And then that is a poster presentation for one of my grade uh for three of my grade eight learners. As you can see, they are very, very shy. They know what they are talking about but they are very very shy and I was uh grateful for their courage to show up on the day and share their experience with the others Okay, so um those are the two deans that we had for the day that shared their experience with us.

Speaker 1: And then at Computer Day 2018, we had a panel discussion, one of my most interesting panel discussions with the learners themselves. So here we are talking about how we as teachers or how we as software developers can assist them in building great computer scientists. So here they shared some of the mistakes I was making as a teacher. I didn't mention that I was a school teacher, did I? Um so I learned a lot as well on this day And then uh Computer Day 2018. Now Computer Day 2018, as I mentioned, uh it had workshops. So now instead of making it a one-day conference, I made it two-day conference. The first day was called workshops. And um sorry we had

Speaker 1: two uh all day workshops. So one was Introduction to Python that ran for the entire day and the other one was a Django girls workshop that also ran for the entire day Now the interesting thing about the Django Girls workshop is that we had our I had I didn't have to do much. I just needed to direct them. So they organized themselves, they they organized the con the the workshop themselves, the the scholars, and they also coached the workshop themselves. So what we did was I took some of the learners who were comfortable with programming. So a few weeks before the conference, I took them and we went through the Django Girls tutorial So we practiced it until they were confident enough to coach the others and then I didn't have to worry about finding coaches for them during the conference. So um

Speaker 1: And then the following day was just a series of talks where we had the same um the same scenario as we did in 2017. Now, I would like to share a couple of differences between organizing a conference for learners and organizing a conference for adults because I've been in both worlds and Uh I would like to share this experience with you in case you are um looking into organizing this in your community. Okay. Now when you are organizing a conference for adults, they have the money So all they do all you do is just open the tickets and ticket ticket sales and then they buy the tickets, isn't it? Now with kids, they don't have money and they depend on their parents And not all parents know the necessity of having events like conferences for the learners.

Speaker 1: So personally, I have to write letters to each and every child's parent and tell them the importance of the conference, why the kids should attend the conference and also somehow put in there that it's compulsory for the kids to buy the tickets because otherwise they won't buy it So and then you have to answer some calls to some parents if they call and say, you know, why should we pay that much money or why should we pay anything at all for the conference and all of that And then there's also behavior. Now this point is very important because if you are thinking of organizing a conference for learners you need to be prepared for the behavior of the learners. You see like for adults the environment is uh matured, it's chilled and everyone is listening and focused and all of that, right?

Speaker 1: With kids, they will get bored very fast. They will start playing games, they will start having chit-shirts in the in in in while they are seated, and they will move around and tinker around anywhere. So if you are organizing a conference for learners, you need to have a team of coaches to control every movement of the learners. Otherwise, anything can go wrong anytime and you don't want that. Now um the thing is w what I've noticed is that as a teacher the way I treat the children and the way anyone else will treat the children who is not a teacher is different. So with kids they will Do stuff and they will look for attention, right? So with uh anyone who's not a teacher they would be polite with the kids But I'm telling you you have to be hard on them

Speaker 1: because they are just looking for attention and you need to be strong. Otherwise you can lose control during the whole conference and you don't want that Okay, different expectations. So with the adult conference, you see everyone basically most people know why they are at the conference. They are most of you, for example, are software developers and you know why you are here. You know the format of the conference and so forth. We school kids there most of them have never been to a conference. And for them they want to have fun and games and then For me, for example, the first time I organized the conference it was just a series of talks and no breaks. Not a lot like not I didn't have a lot of breaks and I didn't have a a lot of fun things to do in between So the kids came in and they wanted to work with computers.

Speaker 1: They thought they were going to work on computers and then they come, they are sitting the whole day and listening to talks non-stop So they have different expectations. Perhaps maybe you can explain to them beforehand before the conference so that they know exactly what to expect instead of them coming and them getting bored because they had expected something different. Fun and games. So if you are organizing a conference it would be nice to include one or two things that are fun. Um I don't know what uh children would enjoy in your area, maybe poets or maybe um a band singing for maybe five, ten minutes. or dancing or whatever it is or maybe playing games outside or virtual reality some type of something just for them to have a break where they are distracted and they um don't get bored during the call during the conference or during the day.

Speaker 1: And also speakers. Now with speakers, I had to choose the type of topics that I would or that I wanted the kids to uh To learn about and I also had to select the speakers. I had to headhand the speakers because I wanted to have a conference where the the the topics that were going to be discussed were um Uh the kids could comprehend what the speakers were saying because you could have great talks, but the kids are not familiar with most of the concepts that are used in computer science, so they would not even comprehend what the speakers would be speaking about. So I had to head hand the speakers. I had to also look at the talks beforehand to see that you know this is easy enough for the kids to understand and so forth So if you are organizing a conference, you cannot just um

Speaker 1: open to uh open um um uh what do you say? Um open what Call for proposals. You can't just do that. You have to head hand the the people. Let's say for example you want to we want to talk on career opportunities, then you would want you would find someone for that You want a talk on uh networking, you'd want to find someone for that and also sort of like go through the talk and make sure that it's not too technical for the kids to comprehend and things like that. Uh and then funding. Um when I organized Computer Day, it was something that no one knew about, so no one was really interested in supporting the event.

Speaker 1: And also the and the audience of the learners. So they are not interested in in investing in in a in a audience like that. So fund funding for me was very, very difficult. Um I did not find any local sponsors until today Um but maybe in your community it will be a different scenario, but funding is one thing that we struggled with with computer day. And then decorations. I cannot emphasize this enough because You see, as beautiful as this venue is to us, to the kids, it's not that beautiful. It needs to have color, it needs to have balloons, it needs to have all sorts of decoration. So when you are organizing yours Don't be shy to put as many balloons and as many colorful stuff around your room as you can

Speaker 1: because this to them is boring Okay, now what are what is the importance of organizing a conference or how do the kids benefit from computer day? Now they get to apply the knowledge that they have learnt into the classroom. For example, if you teach, for example, about robotics or something like that. When kids do some research and they have some live presentations or whatever that they are presenting at Computer Day, then the others get to actually say, uh -this is what Ms. Upani was saying in the classroom and so forth. And then also they get to learn more than what they learned in the classroom. If a grade 12, for example, is uh presenting on a concept um that a grade eight had never learned before

Speaker 1: then uh the great aid learner is going to learn something even before they get to grade twelve. Um Inspire computing career choices. Now, for example, if one learner um is passionate uh enough about computing or about programming and then they create a game and so forth And then they show this game at Computer Day. Then the other learner is going to be like, uh, this is also doable by a learner like me. Then maybe I can also take this patient or they take this path and learn co uh gaming and stuff. So it does motivate or bring out like actual career um opportunities that are existing in the community instead of just hearing about them Passion and knowledge.

Speaker 1: Okay. Now um if if a learner is for example pre preparing for a poster or for Whatever it is that they want to present at the conference, they have to do deep research. They have to do um research more than what they have learnt in the classroom. Or sometimes they are researching on a new concept and they want to be confident enough to present to the others. They have to do deep research and in in in um In this sense, they are going to learn or get deeper knowledge on that. And then challenge themselves as well. So, like basically, I have a programming team at the school Now when you are learning programming just um at a smaller scale, it's different from when you are actually creating an application that will impress someone else, for example. Right. So for Computer Day, Computer Day is an opportunity for learners to create applications that are going to be impressive to others because you can't just create anything floppy because you want to show off, right

Speaker 1: So they w this forces them to create applications that are really running and that are lively and that are impressive to the others. So in in in that sense they get to challenge themselves. Okay, now the big question is why? Why did we start organizing Computer Day in the first place? Now, when I started teaching, I started teaching computer studies in 2016 So I come to the school, I'm supposed to teach kids about computer science, I'm supposed to give them practical work and all of that, but I'm teaching more than 250 learners and there's no single computer at the school. Now, what do I do? How do I give these children practice? How do I show them that there's a world of computing, of programming, when they have nothing to see that on

Speaker 1: or to practice that on? Okay, so this was the problem that I first ch uh faced when I started working. Now we uh went through several solutions that were able to help me move forward during the time. So what I would do is for example the first thing was that I knew about a programming competition that was coming up And I wanted the kids to participate. I didn't expect them to win or anything like that. I just wanted them to participate and get in that environment So, but I needed computers again for them to practice for me to teach them on and so forth, right? Now the fortunate thing is At uh Python Namibia 2016, Pinam Society, which is the Python Namibia Society, received eight Raspberry

Speaker 1: Pis. So I was able to get some screens and some keyboards and mouse And we're able to practice on these uh little devices. We also um uh wrote letters to the universities locally and they were able to give us their labs during like weekends, for example. So we could go to um the university and and do some practice at the the university. Or like eit either during the weekend or sometimes also during the time when they are on holiday. Okay. But You see, this is this is not something that is going to solve a problem in the long in the long in the in the long run, right? And not every teacher is willing to make these efforts to help the learners get access to computers or to to even programming or anything like that.

Speaker 1: What these kids need is more than what I can offer. I can only offer this bit. I can only keep them together, I can only introduce them to computing at this smaller scale. But if they can't practice on a continuous basis or if only the kids at my school are able to go to a university and start programming and no other teacher is willing to do that, then it's going to be a problem. What the children need is a team of people who are going to make efforts to even at least sponsor a school or at least one school per year, even with just fifteen to twenty computers Because this is not a problem that I'm experiencing alone as a teacher at my school. This is a problem that is being experienced within all government schools in my country. And I don't have the resources to help them

Speaker 1: And of course what I'm doing now is not going to sustain a good or build a good computer science um based in in my country or in my school or whatever. So what we need is a team of people who are or partners who are willing to help at least one school per year with fifteen to twenty computers. Um sponsorship so that the kids uh or more than my kids have an opportunity to to have access to computers So the main reason why we organized Computer Day was because we wanted to do fundraising for the lack of computers at my school. We are still doing fundraising after two years because we don't really have A lot of support. And then after how many years is it going to be until we get to actually buy computers for this one school?

Speaker 1: And then how are we going to solve this problem for all the other schools that are coming up? Because I I I cannot do anything. I don't have the resources to do anything. So I would I would I would wish for someone to to to help me You know, in coming up with solutions or talking to someone somewhere to to assist even more than one school or at least one school per year With just 15 computers or 20 computers or whatever the case may be, a little bit of help will go a long way. Okay Now this is our social media platform names. So when you go on Twitter you can find us at Pynam

Speaker 1: Scholars Or Python Namibia or PyCon Namibia, they will you will see like what we do on a day-to-day basis or see pictures of the things that we do on a day-to-day basis And I would like to thank the Python Software Foundation and Django project for sponsoring Computer Day 2017. These were our only two sponsors, and they were the only people who could make us have that day possible anyway. So I would like to thank them a lot for believing in us, even though they know nothing about us. We had nothing to prove to them, you know, to say that this is really going to happen or this is really going to be beneficial. But then again they trusted us and they gave us some funding to make the whole thing possible

Speaker 1: In 2018, we got sponsorship again from PSF. We got sponsorship from Python Anyway and Investec. Investec is a company in South Africa I don't know what got over their hearts to trust us with anything, but then at least they gave us something and I was very grateful for that. Sticker Mule also sponsored us with batches and also Wildfish. I think uh not I think Wildfish is a UK-based company and again um we are very grateful for the help that they gave us. I'm done. Any questions?

Speaker 2: We have time for uh one or two questions I think. So if you have some questions please step up. We have two microphone three microphones in in the middle of the room.

Speaker 3: Hello?

Speaker 1: Yep.

Speaker 3: Hi Jessica. Thanks so much for for this wonderful talk and for for sharing. Perhaps I'm a bit of a primary target for for for your uh experiences. Um but I think there's also um a lot of people who aren't here um today who could really benefit and I hope they're uh going to see the video. Um And uh I hope maybe a guy called Rubin from Msuzu University in Malawi is watching this right now. Um I want to ask you, what can someone do um for instance at a university in Africa to get started with a with a conference like this. Where where can they go? Who who should they talk to? Thank you.

Speaker 1: Um okay so you're asking what a university could do to organize a conference like this The best thing is to speak to school authorities, um speak to a a school teacher who teaches computer studies so that they relay the message to the learners in your absence. Um you could also approach the schools directly because those are the people that you are targeting, right? You want the students. So you want to go to them And talk to the principal, talk to the computer studies teacher, talk to the learners, even for an hour or so and explain what your goal is and what you want to do. And then You can start building a relationship and say, okay, fine, when is your holiday or when is the right time for us to organize something for the learners or what do your learners need? Then you can get them involved and say

Speaker 1: We want this, we want that, or we want workshops only, we want talks, or we want what then you can use that idea to um build your conference. I mean the format doesn't have to be like the one that we did It can be however you want to make it or however is suitable for your area. But I mean the best thing is to talk to the schools.

Speaker 2: Okay. Oh no, one more.

Speaker 4: Jessica, thanks a lot. What proportion of the school learners, but also of the people who are helping you run these events actually have access to computers of their own at home, for example?

Speaker 1: I would say like out of let's say out of let's say maybe twenty learners, right? You can have Four learners who have a computer. Either they borrowed from someone, from their sister or brother, or maybe sa their parents bought for them But then again this is a situation or even sometimes they can be six or so, right? But this is learners that are in the city There are lots of learners who are not even able to have a computer at all. So normally what we do in our in my instance is that Whoever brings, let's say we have we are 20 lenders and we have four computers, right? We we share. So however many we are, we are going to share those four computers within the groups and then we just switch, for example, we

Speaker 1: pay program So we just switch who's going to be in charge of the computer um over time but then we make it work for those four computers that we have at the time Um when we what we did with uh Computer Day 2018 is that I asked the learners to bring computers, those who could bring computers And at the venue where we're at I hired or I rented um the computer lab. So the Django Girls Workshop moved to the lab and then I took computers from all the girls who had uh laptops and I took them to the team uh to the group that was doing uh introduction to python. So they they could um share those computers there and then we would use the the lab computers at that time Yeah.

Speaker 2: Thank you very much Jessica. It was a really great talk. We're going to take