Infrastructure

Text by SJ Wilkinson, Sketches by Design Collaborative (Barbados)

Introduction

The major financial output of the Guyana Education Access Project is for Infrastructure - both building new schools and extending or refurbishing current ones. By the finish of the project all secondary schools in the project areas will have modern, well equipped teaching/learning facilities, including:

Individual Classrooms for all subjects, with lockable storage space for teaching materials
Library
Information Technology Laboratory
Science Laboratories
Industrial Arts areas for Woods, Metals, Technical Drawing and Home Economics
Washrooms and Showers
Offices, interview rooms and staffroom
Multi-purpose Hall
Outdoor sports areas

Information Technology Laboratory Specification

Every project school will be equipped with an air-conditioned computer lab with 14 workstations, each with two seats, giving a total class capacity of 28. All labs are designed for necessary future expansion.

All workstations are networked so as to enable the sharing of resources. One computer (the fileserver) stores users’ work and other information.

Workstation Specification

Intel Celeron processor, 64Mb RAM, 6Gb Hard Disc Drive.
Microsoft Windows 98.
Microsoft Office 2000 Professional (includes a word processor, spreadsheet, desktop publisher and database).

Fileserver

Intel Pentium III processor, 128Mb RAM, 9Gb Hard Disc Drive.
Microsoft Windows NT 4.0.
Network Management Software (simplifies management of the network security settings).

Shared Network Resources

All network users have access to:

1 HP black and white laser printer.
1 HP colour inkjet printer.
1 HP flat-bed scanner.
Computer Aided Learning (CAL) packages.
Intranet – a small number of education web sites stored on the information server.

Internet

Internet access controlled by school IT supervisors.
All network users can browse the World Wide Web and download files using the same ‘phone line at the same time.
Email facilities are available via the World Wide Web.

Region 6

In Region 6, Tagore Memorial, Skeldon High and Skeldon Line Path schools have been refurbished and extended.

The IT Lab was installed at Tagore Memorial and inaugurated by HRH The Prince of Wales and His Excellency The President of Guyana in February 2000.

The Computer Lab at Tagore Memorial Secondary School.

Region 10

Linden Foundation, previously housed in unused Linmine buildings at Noitgedacht, moved to completely new school buildings in Amelia's Ward once in early 2003 (originally planned for September 2002).

Christianburg Wismar has been extensively refurbished. An IT lab was installed in March 2000.

New Silvercity is also being refurbished, and a new extension added.