I am Allan Kakinda, currently a 3rd year student of Makerere University offering Bachelor of Statistics (Computing option). This is the second series of my testimony of how the SchoolNet Uganda activities have impacted on my life. This actually shows you that my life is continuously being impacted on by SchoolNet Uganda. Feel free to first read the first one and then continue with this one.

Anyway, over the past few years I have been involved in a number of SchoolNet Uganda activities such as training workshops, youth camps, competitions, evaluation surveys etc. and I believe these have impacted a lot on my life as a young person because in most cases when I share with my friends what I can do, they find it hard to believe I have all the capabilities I tell them. Allow me to kindly share some of them with you with the hope that they will inspire you in one way or another.

The World Starts with Me Evaluation survey

I happened to be among the team of 12 Bachelor of Statistics students which were chosen as research assistants to help SchoolNet Uganda administer questionnaires to secondary school going students in the school where they are implementing the World Starts with Me (WSWM) sexuality education program.
We first had a 3 day training workshop at Bativa Hotel in Kampala where we were trained in data collections, designing of data collection materials i.e. we had a session in which we were taken through the questionnaire and we were to give in our input in order to improve the questionnaire, carried out a pre- test survey and were finally sent into the field to collect the data (well facilitated). Being a statistics student, this training help me actually realize, practice and have a clear picture of how surveys are planned and carried out unlike most of my classmates.

 I for one (along with Simon Katongole) was sent to Soroti and Tororo districts to administer the questionnaires to the schools there. Having been well facilitated the challenges I was bound to face were minimal. Simon and I were excited to get such an opportunity and we administered the questionnaires to 6 six schools in these districts and are happy to report that SchoolNet Uganda did not have any complaints with the data we collected.

Besides the data collection, we had a lot of fun in these districts especially in the evenings e.g. there were days when each of us ate two whole fish, a whole chicken and even the day when both of us ate half a goat in Tororo (believe me all these are true), we also visited the Tororo rock and saw Mt. Elgon and the Inselburgs  in Kachumbala.

Personally I gained a number of things from this exercise and these include:

• Had practice in the designing of data collection tools.
• Got practical experience in data collection (especially questionnaire administration).
• Got a chance of interacting with practicing statisticians (Billie) who happened to give me a clear picture of the kind of work they do.
• It improved my public speaking and communication skills as we always first had to brief the students on how to answer the questionnaires, kind of responses expected on each questions etc.
• I interacted with a number of important people especially the teachers and the head teachers at the schools. This excited me a lot because we would go to the staff rooms and interact freely with the teachers and we also went to the head teachers offices, signed in the visitors book and even interacted with them freely unlike in the actual school setting where you only go the head teachers office when you had committed an offence.
• I also got a chance of traveling to those other districts unlike before when the furthest I had been from Kampala is Jinja.
• I also received some payment for conducting this exercise which I used to boast up my pocket money.

This exercise actually got me more interested in the course I am pursuing at the university since I was able to see what I was heading for.
After this I actually thought the fruits of this exercise were almost exhausted, little did I know that this was just the beginning of what is in for me for having participated in this exercise. During my period of internship at Mildmay Uganda, because of this experience I was shifted to the research department where I managed to practice a lot of statistical work e.g. designing of data collection tools, data collection, data entry, data analysis and interpretation and statistical report writing unlike my other friends on internship who only did data collection and data entry.

Training workshops

I have attended and facilitated in a number of training and sensitization workshops which have been conducted by SchoolNet Uganda. These were mainly under the projects Inspiring Science Education for Girls Using ICT, World Starts With Me, and Adobe Youth Voices (AYV). At these workshops, I mainly make presentations; did video recording and documentation of the workshop report. These have helped me improve my communication and presentation skills, acquire skills and experience in video recording and also meet and interact with people whom without these workshops may be I would not have been able to meet.

One specific workshop that I really like most was Adobe Youth Voices training workshop that took place in January 2009 where I was directing involved in the training. I made presentations and trained people in Adobe Software like Adobe Photoshop where I was teaching the participants how to create a photo story and Adobe Premier where I was training the participants how to edit a movie clip. I also trained the participants on how to use a digital and video camera for photo and video shooting respectively. This was a huge achievement to me since I was sharing what I can do with other people and I was very happy when the participants were able to do what I was training them and even modify them to look better. This workshop also helped me learn better how to use the software myself.

I have also been involved in the AYV school visits and trainings where a team from the SchoolNet secretariat is sent to an AYV participating school to help kick start the project in the various schools, share experiences in the project or to help out with the school to carry out activities which the project is trying to carry out at the school e.g. I have been asked to go to schools like Kings College Buddo, Gayaza High School, Duhaga S.S where I have been able to share my experiences in AYV and also train them on how they can use some of the equipment e.g. the video camera i.e. sharing with them good video capturing tips. This has always improved my knowledge on the project and about what I share with the students. It has also always been an opportunity for me to travel to the various part of the country where I had not been before.

 Participating in Adobe Youth Voices (AYV)

AYV is a very special project to me because of the numerous skills, experiences and I see may arise out of it. I have been participating in the first AYV project cycle in which my team was producing a documentary on the Gender Disparity in Science. During the production of the documentary I was heading the group of students and we were about to come up with a complete media piece. The production involved a number of activities e.g. meetings and discussions of what media piece we are supposed to produce, discussion of the story board, designing questionnaires to be used for the interviews, visiting schools and interviewing the students, getting in touch with female scientists and interviewing them, video editing and coming up with a final product and then sharing our product with the target audience. All these have been very interesting and challenging to me at the same time.

Through participating in AYV I have gained a number of things including:

• I have developed more concern on issues affecting my community and am more active in such issues.
• I have gained a number of skills like team building and team working skills, media making skills including video/photo shooting and editing, communication and interpersonal skills, innovativeness and creativity, recapping and critiquing skills etc.
• I have also managed to meet and network with a number of big people whom without AYV, I would not have been able to.
• I have also managed to share my experiences with the other people within the AYV project.

All these are skills and experiences that I did not get a chance of having while at school.

International conferences and competitions

During our participation in the AYV project, through the AYV mailing list; an opportunity was sent out to all those taking part in the project to apply through a competition for the first ever AYV summit to take place in Palo Alto, California, USA.
In order to compete one had to produce a media piece for social change and also complete an application form. My team produced a documentary on Gender Disparity in Science and also completed the application forms. The competition involved schools from 30 countries. I am humbled to say that my team was among the two teams which were selected from Uganda to attend the summit. The summit is due this month form July 29th – August 2nd. At the summit, we are going to be trained how to produce youth media for social change in addition to interacting with professional film makers. I have already received my USA visa and Adobe Foundation is covering all the costs of air travel (US$ 2819), accommodation and feeding. I am really excited with this opportunity because traveling to the USA is a dream come true more so due to the fact that the first time I go there I am going to be interacting with professionals in film making; a field which I am very much interested in and I hope to have my future in.

I also managed to participate in the Mtandao Afrika website design competition (another project coordinated by SchoolNet Uganda) once again and this time round. My team created a website called Africa for All http://maflib.mtandao-afrika.net/MAF080026/ in which our main aim was to help clear the bad image people have of Africa as a suffering and poor continent by providing appropriate, timely and relevant information about the continent. My team won the platinum award in the Interdisciplinary category http://www.mtandao-afrika.org/English/Winners/Winners2008.aspx . I am really also excited about this victory and again without SchoolNet Uganda conducting it, I would not have been able to be part of the winning team.

Finally, I would like to thank SchoolNet Uganda for having provided me with all these opportunity. To them it might be that they are inspiring young people like me as they carry out their activities but to me, they provide me with opportunity to challenge myself and see what I can achieve and also it a chance for me to learn skills that I may not have gotten a chance of learning while at school. I would like to say thank you, SchoolNet Uganda for reaching out to young people like me because slowly but steadily you are modeling  the ideal future generation that our country needs. And to the reader thank you for reading my testimony, hope I have some how inspired you and if you get the chance of participating in any SchoolNet Uganda activity, please make maximum use of it.