Kigali Day Thirteen
by aidanh@gmail.com on July 21, 2016
Today we got to go on a field trip! We began the morning with an early departure from the hotel so we could visit a secondary school about 45 minutes outside of Kigali. This was to be our first chance to meet one of the key user groups the InventEd platform is designed for. On our journey to the school, Coco and I discussed what type of questions we’d like to ask but were not so sure what to expect. Would the students be interested in the topic? Would they provide feedback? How many would we get to meet during our visit? These thoughts were bouncing around our heads as we continued to drive away from the city.
Upon our arrival, we entered through a set of red gates which lead us to the administration building. The all girls secondary school was built eight years ago and is made up of several one story and two story red brick buildings with a large green space in the middle. The school is operated by nuns and we were quickly introduced to the head mistress. We were warmly welcomed, which has been very consistent wherever we go here in Rwanda. As we walked to the classroom that would host our meeting, students enrolled in the school’s ICT program were called to attend. Since we are in the dry season here in Rwanda, the students graciously removed some of the dust that commonly gathers on the chairs within the classroom and we got settled in a large circle.
We kicked off with some introductions about our background, what SAP does and the main goals of the InventEd platform. Coco and I were really interested in getting some market research so we began asking the group some questions on how they interact with technology. We discovered that Facebook is still very popular within this age group and most of the students already have a smartphone. We then opened up the floor for any questions …hoping that I would not hear only silence. Thankfully, the group, which numbered 43 students, were very interested in understanding more about InventEd. We received questions on many different aspects of the platform and also received some really great ideas on how we can make the launch of the platform a success (Coco, the organized team member, had brought paper and pen and was writing feverishly). At the end I asked who would be interested in using InventEd once we go live and everyone put up their hand, what I great ending to a very enlightening session.
