A short summary of our achievements in 2014 and future plans regarding Sote ICT Hub and working also with graduate students to support them in launching their own startup companies.

1. Bringing Startups to Rural Schools in Kenya
Our achievements in 2014
In year 2014 we helped to educate 417 members of ICT Clubs at 10 secondary schools
from Taita Taveta County in practical computer and business skills. Since 2013, students
established and manage together 24 training companies that are registered in Practice
Enterprise Network and do business among themselves and students abroad. During the
school year, students create brochures, video adverts, blogs, business plans and accounting
documents and share them through facebook.com/SoteICT and slideshare.net/soteICT.
Why Sote ICT?
The youth unemployment is a global challenge. In Kenya, 81 percent of workers are employed
in the informal sector and jobs for young people are scarce and fragile. The core purpose of
Sote ICT is to nurture practical ICT and business skills in young people that will enable them to
become qualified and responsible future employees and business owners who support
sustainable development of their country. The Swahili word “sote” means everybody and
describes our philosophy of inclusion and search for high social returns. We focus on rural
schools with no or limited ICT exposure. Our biggest added value is the ability to combine the
concepts of student ICT Clubs, practice companies and international student cooperation. And
provide continuous support to both educators and students. We don’t believe in magic when it
comes to ICT integration and building practical student skills. Therefore we seek to provide
continuous mentorship and financial support for ICT Clubs and practice companies. In early
2015 we aim to establish a Sote ICT Hub in Voi for graduates and the wider public.
Our holistic approach combines ICT integration and training with business skills
1. ICT Integration in education: Sote ICT program first helps secondary schools to
integrate ICT in their teaching and administration. We donate computers, laptops, projectors,
smart boards, cameras among other equipment. We connect schools to internet and install
Education management information system (EMIS) and eLearning software. We were the first
and repeated customer of a young Kenyan startup JBS, the creators of EMIS that our 10
partner secondary schools use currently. JBS has currently more than 70 schools among
customers. We provide trainings on ICT integration in teaching and the use of EMIS. Some
trained teachers mentor their colleagues in three neighboring primary schools that received
equipment through our smaller ICT projects. So far we integrated ICT in ten secondary and
three primary schools in Taita Taveta County.

2. 2. Project-based learning and ICT Clubs: We train secondary teachers in project-based
learning and establish ICT Clubs in the second step. Students meet here weekly to work on
practical assignments and own projects. Students elect their officials and communicate through
video chats with other Kenyan and Slovak schools. Each year we organize joint school
competitions; for example in writing CVs and cover letters, essays and promotional videos. Our
manual, regular communication and meetings guide teachers in their weekly ICT Club
activities. But teachers don’t follow a strictly defined curriculum and are free to be creative and
experiment. We support the clubs with mini-grants during the school year and expect teachers
to deliver and share quality outputs of students. ICT Club members learn how to create
business cards, brochures, videos, blogs and presentations of their practice companies.
3. Certified student practice companies: In the third step, we introduce the concept of
training companies as the main activity of ICT Clubs. We encourage schools to create up to
three training companies and focus more on quality than quantity. After students agree on the
structure of their training companies and create basic documents, we register them in Practice
Enterprise Network (PEN). The next goal is to help Kenyan students communicate and trade
with other training companies and with their peers abroad. PEN International is based in
Germany and currently has 42 member countries. In mentoring practice companies and
training teachers, we cooperate with Slovak State Vocational Education Institute and strive
together to gain full membership of Kenya in PEN International. The practice
companies that prove constant high quality of outputs are referred for PEN certification. Also
individual students are able to receive internationally accepted certificate of their
“employment” in the practice company as a proof of certain basic skills needed for future
employment.
4. Sote ICT Hub to mentor graduates and support startups: Our next big goal is to
create a startup hub in Voi town from January 2015 to support our graduate students. We are
partnering with iHub Outreach program for the next school year. Since January 2015 we plan
to organize two day boot camps for our student members. And in our Sote ICT Hub, we also
plan to introduce more advanced technical competences, such as digital fabrication, robotics,
coding and incorporation of real startups.
Five years of growth and our future plans
Sote ICT is based on three consecutive projects of Slovak-Kenyan Cooperation for Modern
Schools that SlovakAid funded since 2010. The program expanded to five schools in 2012 and
ten schools in 2013. In the same year we introduced the concept of practice companies. Pontis
Foundation and our partners Kasigau Wildlife Trust have managed the program for five years
and we are in the process of registering the Sote ICT as a spin-off NGO.