Technology a key to empowering the youth for the future

In this world that we inhabit, the 21st century has brought an overdrive of “time change”. It’s a reality that we have to wholly accept the fact of constant changes in the way our society operates as a community. If you live in developed countries, you have the full throttle of experiencing every bit of it. The key word that can present as an example is “technology”. It is estimated that more than 300 technological improvements are created each year throughout the world. More than three quarter of these are done by people living in developed and emerging economies. I agree that they have the facilities that promote research and development. However, this doesn’t mean the less developed countries have the luxury of relaxing in the aim of waiting for them to create appropriate technology to assist our needs. People are different in each country and have different needs. We need to be creative to supply our own needs. Rwanda’s future lies in the hands of today’s youth. The biggest proportion of our population is the youth; therefore, the biggest investment by the government should be in our youth. The government through the Ministry of Education is making it a reality since it receives one of the biggest budget allocations of our revenues and foreign aid. The initiatives made by Mineduc, featuring some NGO’s, are undoubtedly pro-education. Take for example the one laptop per child initiative. Individually, I feel it’s wonderful in the sense that 21st century is all about technology and robust dynamic changes in activities. As a youth, I feel that that is the competitive advantage we Rwandese have against the rest of Africa. The dotcom era is a reality as we find e-commerce, E-learning, E-news etc taking centre stage globally and MINEDUC is making it their responsibility for us the youth to have this advantage of integrating into the global E-buzz. How are we, youth, making use of this gift? We cannot only focus the communication with our friends as purposeful since it’s not the aim or vision we want. We should focus more on using this resource for research and development to have a better eligibility of integrating and competing globally. I hereby request MINEDUC to train teachers in research especially through E-tools for it will enrich our curriculum and also instil in us a habit of using the Internet as a research and development tool. When we have integrating this resource into our economy, we will find resourceful opportunities such as job opportunities, cheaper business costs and countless customer bases. This will lead to the achievement of some of our government’s goals such as lower unemployment and economic growth. The E-buzz is taking centre stage and since we have been given access to it, we have the responsibility of using it to sustain ourselves instead of continuing to have a begging hand. The opportunity is upon us and we should grab it rather than letting it slip; we need to profit from the E-buzz it rather than it profiting from us. akagenza@yahoo.co.uk