ICT Management workshop in Sengerema, Mwanza

Since the launching of the Tanzania Telecentre Network, things have been moving at a promising speed. TTN is organising an ICTs Management Skills Workshop between 6-8 July, 2008 at Sengerema telecentre in Mwanza. About 30 participants from telecentres, government levels, ICTs service providers, wireless network experts and civil societies took part. The workshop objectives are rotating on building capacity for telecentre leadership on management issues to make telecentres evolve into effective ICT to realize the ICT4D initiatives. The expected output is to develop skills on network connectivity and management issues.

The workshop provided an opportunity for Tanzanian telecentre practioners to share knowledge and practically see what Sengerema telecentre is offering to the community. It is a good experience for telecentres that are in the initial stages and that would like to expand activities, like implementing radio programmes etc.

During the second day of the workshop, there was a discussion on the development of the Tanzania Telecentre Network website. Marteen, a consultant from IICD, had been working on the website and hosted on a FREE server (www.freehostia.com) due to lack of funds. The www.ttn.or.tz domain selected will be registered free of charge, according to TTN chairman. UgaBYTES has committed to fund the hosting of the website for the first two years.

Wireless Networking:

On the last day, it's all about wireless technology. The day has started with a site survey of the main backborne tower for the line of site to nine centres that are anticipated to be connected to the internet using a single bandwidth at Sengerema telecentre. Three centres; sengerema secondary school, district education offices and sengerema district council have so far been connected to the internet.