Oliver Talking to Bruce Garrity in Africa on Skype via Wifi

My friend Bruce Garrity is in Africa right now, volunteering at a school near Meru, Kenya.

You can read all about his work on his blog and, if you know Bruce at all, you’ll recognize the same practical, no-bullshit attitude toward solving problems that is so much a part of Bruce.

Except that in a school in the middle of Kenya Bruce doesn’t need to convince anyone to solve problems, he just solves them himself, combining money donated by his vast network of friends and family with an “okay, let’s go buy some underwear and trousers” attitude. It is, in many ways, a project Bruce has been working up to all his life.

In advance of our TeacherNet open house at Prince Street School last week I made contact with Bruce to see if we could connect him and his students with students at Prince Street.  Prince Street is twinned with a primary school 2 hours away from Bruce, and the now-we-can-use-Skype situation afforded by the new wireless network in the school seemed like a good opportunity to make a virtual connection.

Bruce got to work on his end, and the teachers at Prince Street took over once initial connections were made.  And so, this morning I got this photo from Oliver’s teacher:

That’s Oliver in the bottom-left (with Philip Brown, French teacher and a former city council colleague of Bruce’s, to his left) and Bruce looming large on the right.

I love it when a plan comes together.