Bill Gate Good Intentions

Summary:

Bill Gates published his concern about education in Forbes.com at the beginning of this year. He began his reflections mentioned article 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. He underlined how the education has progressed during the last 60 years; more children attend school, literacy rates increase, and thousand of students attend at universities. Nevertheless, he said, millions of young people don’t receive an education adequately for life beyond school, and the scale of this situation could be worse if we do not act quickly to solve the problem now. For Bill Gate, the combination of some software, internet networks, and some other technological tools could create a high-quality educational environment to help students and teachers. He used some examples to illustrate his thought. First, he mentioned MIT’s Open Courseware as a example of how technology is used to created educational materials that could be used for millions of people by free. He also mentioned Microsoft’s online portal called Innovative Teachers Networks. Today, more of half a million teachers shared lesson plans and ideas of how to use technology in their classrooms at that online portal. He also recognized that technology by itself is not the answer to all the educational issues. He proposes a holistic approach that includes teacher training, relevant curricula, technology, and the participation of parent, nongovernmental organization. From his point of view as parent, philanthropic and businessmen, his approach could guarantee access to high-quality educational experiences.

Personal Responses:
I agree with Bill Gate’s analysis about educational present problems and their future solutions. I also accept that technology could be use to create better educational opportunities. In addition, I agree that we have to act now to avoid more complex educational problems. Nevertheless, I do not trust Bill Gate’s good intention and philanthropic spirit. For instance, He did not mentioned open free source software as a part of the solution; on the contrary he only mentioned his company’s product. He also said that “…more than 1 million people visit the MIT’s Open Courseware website,” but it is a half of the true. According to 2005 Program Evaluation Findings Report, MIT Open Course Ware, published in June 5, 2006, p. 17 -19, they use the word “visitor” instead “people.” Mr. Gates probably played with those words to exaggerate the real instructional impact of this service. I know that 1,4 millions of “visitors’ from Latin America/Caribbean have used this webpage. That number of visitor represent only 8.4 percentage of the total population of that area, 601 millions of inhabitan.Fianally, I rememeber another Bill Gate’s interview is which he talk about his love for money and his political ambitions. After all ideas, I conclude that Bill Gate is promoting a novel, and I aggre with him. However, I also think that he is trying to add more millons to his personal saving account.