From Sept - Dec 2012, following a 'real life project training model', 30 African coders will create 5 mobile and web solutions that will impact their communities

Unlike traditional software training practices which focus just on specific technologies and development patterns, ours keeps the African context in mind with an approach that treats every trainee as a potential employee and/or entrepreneur.

The coders will be taught solid Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) principles, practices and processes as well as how to understand/translate technical writings in order to effectively communicate with other developers, engineers and most importantly clients for each project.

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Simply put, trainees work on real projects while receiving the fundamental training. The thirty developers will be broken into teams of 6, with each team owning one project.  

By the end of December 2012, 30 coders will be certified and trained, having completed 5 unique, real life projects in different sectors: agriculture, healthcare, business, education and social needs. These apps will be delivered at the completion of the project. 

Elimu (Education) (School Management System): with both Mobile and Web interfaces allows students, teachers and admins to manage their stuff online and on their phones.

CoopNet (Agriculture): a coffee crop management system that assists employees, farmers and stakeholders to solve issues with Human Resource management, coffee crop inventories, pricing & weight calibration (including currency and weight conversion tools.

Open Data (Social Need and Governments) the entities that hold the most public and infrastructure data are always government institutions. Getting information from them, no matter where you are in the world can be difficult. In Africa it can be very hard indeed. The Open Data initiative is established to bring together parties who desire to see African Societies governed openly, by creating and promoting Open Data and Open Government ecosystems in Africa.

Database Management & Repository System (Business, Government), with this product small and medium sized enterprises and especially government institutions will have records and paper workflows digitized which will in turn allow citizens to get services in a timely manner and more efficiently. The end goal is bring eService online as soon as possible.

Symptom Health Checker (Healthcare): Self-improvement and disease management tools to empower people to manage their health via mobile phones. By choosing a few symptoms, the app may suggest what you may be suffering from and suggest you go see the doctor right away. The App may also identify a doctor that handles the disease in your zone.

These 5 products will be ready to use by their respective clients. As matter of fact stakeholders will be involved in every step of the training program, following an Agile SCRUM methodology. Trainees will approach stakeholders for requirements (User Stories), acceptance criteria and will keep them updated throughout the process.

The success of these 30 African software developers and 5 ICT solutions will depend on how much support we receive from YOU. If we meet our fundraising goal, half of their battle has been won! The more we surpass our goal, the stronger the message we send them - "There are a lot of good people rooting for you!"

Your donation will go towards:

-2 vetted professional trainers that are going to conduct the training for three months

-Venues where the training will take place. Each venue must have uninterrupted power supply, good Internet bandwidth, video conference capability and be computer lab ready

-Software development tools and licenses

-Hardware: Laptops, mobile devices and servers

-Training Material: Mainly books- hard copy and digital format

With the success of this initiative, we hope to inspire others to give back to their respective communities. The best way to predict the future is to invent it. We are inventing a community of innovators that will help Africans conquer this last digital frontier. We can't do this project without all of you.

We can't do this project without all of you, it takes a village to raise a child - if we fall short of our goal, the 30 developers will not be able to achieve their dreams because we won't receive any of the pledged money (everyone gets refunds).

Please send this page along to anyone and everyone who is a dreamer, and who has ever created something out of nothing. Such is software development, very similar to alchemy. You invent something tangible out of letters and numbers. That's magical! Thank you so much for your time and help!