Challenges

From UgaBYTES Collaboration wikipedia

Challenges anticipated from the collaborative meetings

1. Commitment to meet as people will be busy elsewhere. Most people working for other telecentre networks in the region have other jobs elsewhere as the networks are still in the inception stage

2. Connectivity may be a problem if we are to facilitate online meetings

3. A number of initiatives are coming up and might be serving the same purpose as the national networks eg ICT action network in Kenya and focus on different issues of policy but there are a number of other organisations. The issue of how to interact with all these institutions should be looked at. How do we include them in our activities? Solution: How to include people may be difficult but there is need to involve them and then they will be included directly

4. Availability and time for people involved Solution: Is to involve a member of the board so that if one is not available, they can delegate. Also for commitment purposes, the meeting will continue with the available people

5. Staffing is yet another problem. The available staff in the networks have a work overload. Can networks utilize the services of volunteers?

SOLUTION: We need to push for funding support for volunteers on specific issues eg research or content facilitation since most staff are work tied. UgaBYTES can consolidate a proposal for funding. Once the proposal is done, money is remitted to networks but the accountability is done at UgaBYTES. But it is the work of the network to monitor the staff /volunteers

6. We need a clear division of issues at network level so people know what to handle eg Kentel has different people working in UCRC. People may say they are not available yet they are