The devil’s dictionary defines Education as that ‘which discloses to the wise and disguises from the foolish their lack of understanding‘. I guess that is why they say that it is possible to go through school and end up uneducated.
It is a common characteristic to find Kenyans grossly involved in boardroom conversations with regard to happenings on Social Media but hardly ever are pertinent issues given the gravity and attention they deserve.
For instance, just recently, arguments spewed as to why our government made a huge purchase of software programs from a large international organization for the “one child one laptop project” with little regard to the local developers who are just as equally able to develop high-end customized systems for our local use. However, as soon as that discussion started, the buzz was forgotten in a pile of social issues such as taxes on basic commodities and keeping up with our ever entertaining politics.
But still the real issue remains: Is it that our local programmers and Kenyan techies are not good enough? Or are they not ready?
Well, I believe the answer to be quite simple – The real reason is because we as a society are large consumers of education, but are hardly ready to share and grow together. I mean, how many of us ever posted anything educative, after the many years of using Google and Wikipedia to research? Whatever happens to all the projects and term papers students write? One of my earlier lecturers put it, “they just end up as fuel for his home jiko”
There was never a more right time for the IT experts in Kenya to come together and form an active, dependable professional body, that can be a channel to cater for our people’s needs. While at it, maybe it’s time we also had a code of ethics for programmers and IT support consultants, else opportunities will always be passed over to the willing hands of the more prepared, while we are left behind in our little talks, crying foul.
