ANN ARBOR—The next time you need to get to Haiti from Ann Arbor with 6,000 books, 3,200 pounds of pinto beans, 92 computers and assorted peripherals, consider the comforts of an old Ford Motor Co. school bus. Just hours before leaving for Haiti, Sara Naab loaded the last of the books, computers, and food onto the bus, which was stuffed from front to back and top to bottom. Three School of Information graduate students eschewed any semblance of luxury for practicality when they set out June 7 for Miami in their bus, which they had repainted a light green. In Miami, the bus crept onto a freighter for the nautical portion of its trip to the L’Institut de Formation et Development en Informatique (IFDI) in Les Cayes. Master’s students Sara Naab, Sadanori Horiguchi and Junko Sagawa took turns driving to Florida, making the bus trip in about 30 hours in their 5-mile-per-gallon workhorse. “We’re doing this to help a community in Haiti utilize technology,” Naab said. Naab, who organized the trip, and fellow students will set up a library and technology center and create an intranet for 20 local schools. Part of their mission includes developing a long-term strategic plan to help Haitians improve their educational and economic standards
At the end of June, three more students from the School of Information—Elizabeth Keith, Ben Robinson and Sharon Smith—will fly to Haiti, along with Luis Castro of the Business School. Another seven SI students in Ann Arbor will assist with distance-learning technologies: Henry Chou, Caroline Crouse, Erin Doumboulaki, Rachel Hu, Cory Knobel, Jim Ungar and Sara Ulius. In Haiti, the students will research the role that information and community technologies can play in the Haitian economy. The U-M contingent plans to collaborate with university and business leaders. “This project has allowed me to apply my interest in equitable access to information and technology to benefit a country with enormous needs in those areas,” Keith said. “I’m especially excited about our close collaboration with Les Cayes community members. Our joint goal is to create a local gateway for knowledge, lifelong learning and community development. I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to be a part of achieving that.” The project came together as a result of Naab’s devotion to making an impact on society. Through her church work, Naab had visited Port-au-Prince, Haiti, in 2001 and set up a computer training center. A Haitian student helped open the IFDI in 2002. Naab assisted his effort by writing operating procedures and personally delivering 30 computers to get the IFDI under way. Back in Ann Arbor last fall, Naab gave a presentation about her work to a Community Information Corps class at SI. Other students quickly expressed an interest in helping and soon the project expanded. Faculty support and the work of student Adrienne Janney, who volunteered as a coordinator, smoothed the way. Naab received financial support for the project from the Alliance for Community Technology, a W.K. Kellogg Foundation-supported initiative at the School of Information; the U-M International Institute; her Ann Arbor church, St. Luke Lutheran; and from the project’s Web site (haiti.si.umich.edu), which accepts online contributions. The Chelsea, Michigan school district sold the bus to Naab. Once some seats were removed and makeshift beds were added, supplies were loaded. Over Memorial Day weekend, Naab and Horiguchi drove to Montreal, Canada to pick up most of the 6,000 books, written in French, from an organization that promotes literacy. They also drove to Grand Rapids to pick up donated computers and monitors. Then there were the beans—32 100-pound bags for an orphanage.
For students who wanted to have a hand in changing the world, the mission was quietly accomplished.