The Centre for Information Technology and Development (CITAD) has on Tueday, 10^th February 2009 handed over computer and other computer teaching aid to two secondary schools in Kano State. The schools are Government Secondary School, Sharada and Government Arabic Girls Senior Secondary School, Tudun Wada. The donations were part of the effort of the organizations to assist schools to teach computer to their students.

Government Secondary School, Sharada was given a set of computer by Alhaji Abdullahi Nashe which Tudun Wada was given six monitors, system units and keyboards. In a brief ceremony that held at the conference hall of CITAD, the two schools were presented by their principals and staff and accompanied by some students. Presenting the computer to GSS Sharada Alhaji Abdullahi Nashe who was represented by Usman Abdullahi of Mediwat School of Computer Sciences said that the donation was in fulfillment of the promise he made during the school at the school of the 2008 Annual IT Quiz.

Receiving the computers on behalf of GSS Sharada, the Vice Principal of the School Mal. Mohammed Surajo Abdullahi thanked both CITAD and Abdullahi Nahe for available the schools with the gift. He said that the schools would make good use of the facilities. The IT Coordinator of the School Malam Nuhu Aminu who spoke at the brief handling over ceremony appealed to CITAD to assist the school train more teachers in the use of the computer.

Earlier the Principal of GAGSS Tundun Wada, Hajiya Khadija Ibrahim Gambo had also expressed her appreciation for the kind gesture CITAD had demonstrated to her schools. She said that the school at the moment has no computers and would use these facilities to start training them on computer appreciation.

In his brief remark at the occasion the Executive Director of CITAD, Y. Z. Ya’u said that the decision to support these schools was based on the efforts their respective principals have been showing. He said that GSS Sharada had never failed to participate in the annual ICT Quiz of CITAD and that in spite of the fact that it lacked computers; its performance in the competition had always been very good. As or GAGSS Tudun Wada, the ED said that the principal was the only principal who graced the CITAD/CAI scheme beneficiaries’ interactive forum and therefore deserved the gift arising from the CITAD/CSI scheme.

CITAD is an ICT-focused non-governmental organization which has offices in Kano and Dutse, and an outreach unit in Bauchi State. For more on CITAD, visit www.citad.org.

Y. Z. Ya’u

Executive Director

The Centre for Information Technology and Development (CITAD) has on Monday 2^nd February, 2009 begun its ICT Business Incubators Programme with a pioneer set of 16 youth people. The sixteen were selected from the best of the 300 people who participated last year in the Microsoft/USA Government supported Employability Programme that CITAD and LEAP Africa are implementing in Kano. The ICT Business Incubator Programme as conceived by CITAD is aimed at nurturing the young people to become ICT businesses entrepreneurs. The Incubator programme consists of three components. The first is a training programme on ICT Entrepreneurship. This lasts for three month. During the period the participations are in addition to deepening their ICT skills, given training in such ICT skills as website design, video/film editing, ICT equipment maintenance among others. They are also to be couched in Small Scale Business Management and Marketing as well as in communication and negotiation skills. During this time participants are also encouraged to sit for relevant professional examinations such as those organized by the Computer Professionals Registration Council of Nigeria (CPN).

At the end of the three months, they will undergo a 3-month business internship during which they are expected to produce business plans. These business plans would be discussed with a team of CITAD business advisers and once agreed upon, CITAD would then provide the needed business support on grantorship. The beneficiaries will then at the end of the business internship set up his or her business. At this stage CITAD would provide business mentoring support, networking, professional upgrading and virtual office space for the participants. Six months following the establishment of own businesses would be used to incubate and it is expected that at the end of the year the participants would graduate to full business Entrepreneurs.

At the core of the programme is the team work and participants are encouraged to work towards setting up partnerships or cooperatives rather individual businesses. The pioneer group of 16 consists of nine (9) male and seven (7) females.

CITAD is an ICT-focused non-governmental organization which has offices in Kano and Dutse, and an outreach unit in Bauchi State. For more on CITAD, visit www.citad.org.

Y. Z. Ya’u

Executive Director