Labdoo is a non-profit organization that provides, free of charge, refurbished

laptop A laptop computer or notebook computer, also known as a laptop or notebook, is a small, portable personal computer (PC). Laptops typically have a Clamshell design, clamshell form factor (design), form factor with a flat-panel computer scree ...

s loaded with child-friendly educational software in local languages to schools, orphanages, and refugee projects in low-income countries around the world. The organization is dedicated to not incurring additional

economic cost Economic cost is the combination of losses of any goods that have a value attached to them by any one individual. Economic cost is used mainly by economists as means to compare the prudence of one course of action with that of another. The comparis ...

nor contributing to the generation of emissions.Dootrips: A CO2-neutral Global Transportation System based on Collaboration
” Jordi Ros-Giralt, Adrian Rosello, Jordi Garcia. Published by

Elsevier Elsevier ( ) is a Dutch academic publishing company specializing in scientific, technical, and medical content. Its products include journals such as ''The Lancet'', ''Cell (journal), Cell'', the ScienceDirect collection of electronic journals, ...

, Procedia Engineering Volume 78, 2014, Pages 124–133. Accessed 24 December 2016.Project Labdoo.org: Humanitarian Social Networks and Positive Sum Development
” Jordi Ros-Giralt. International Conference on Sustainable Development Practice—Earth Institute, Columbia University, New York, September 2013. Through its global network of grassroots volunteers connected through more than 400 operational hubs, it has provided its services to more than 700,000

student A student is a person enrolled in a school or other educational institution, or more generally, a person who takes a special interest in a subject. In the United Kingdom and most The Commonwealth, commonwealth countries, a "student" attends ...

Approach

Labdoo's approach is based on leveraging a global volunteer social network platform, which is divided into "hubs" to carry out the work required to achieve its goal of providing children in low-income countries with computers and the opportunity to improve their digital

literacy Literacy is the ability to read and write, while illiteracy refers to an inability to read and write. Some researchers suggest that the study of "literacy" as a concept can be divided into two periods: the period before 1950, when literacy was ...

skills. The Labdoo platform allows users to engage via four types of

resource ''Resource'' refers to all the materials available in our environment which are Technology, technologically accessible, Economics, economically feasible and Culture, culturally Sustainability, sustainable and help us to satisfy our needs and want ...

Dootronics

"Dootronics" is what the donated used laptops or tablets are called. These devices must meet two

requirement In engineering, a requirement is a condition that must be satisfied for the output of a work effort to be acceptable. It is an explicit, objective, clear and often quantitative description of a condition to be satisfied by a material, design, pro ...

s in order to be accepted for donation: 1) The device, after all the existing data is securely removed, can be repurposed and uploaded with child-friendly educational software in local languages. 2) The device can be transported via "Dootrips".

Dootrips

"Dootrips" (also called "Labdoo Trips") are contributions from individuals and organizations who, when embarking on travel,

donate A donation is a gift for charity, humanitarian aid, or to benefit a cause. A donation may take various forms, including money, alms, services, or goods such as clothing, toys, food, or vehicles. A donation may satisfy medical needs such as blo ...

space in their luggage or shipments to carry the computers and laptops from the hubs to the recipient schools located in their travel destination. They claim that the Dootrips system would make it possible for these devices to be sustainably transported and delivered to the schools without incurring any additional economic cost and also without adding to emissions.

Edoovillages

"Edoovillages" (or "Educational Villages") are the Dootronics schools and educational spaces registered in the Labdoo platform and approved to receive the donated laptops and tablets.

Hubs

Hubs are composed of volunteers who are active in the various tasks involved in refurbishing these devices and delivering them to their destinations. This includes computer donating, collecting, sanitizing, Dootrip donations, and transportation of devices to an Edoovillage. Given that this effort is taking place globally, the Hub network model is adapted as needed to its particular location, but as part of a global collaborative community, all tasks are required to be managed in a transparent way, sharing the same volunteering principles.

History

In 2004, while enrolled as a

graduate student Postgraduate education, graduate education, or graduate school consists of Academic degree, academic or professional degrees, certificates, diplomas, or other qualifications usually pursued by higher education, post-secondary students who have ...

at the

University of California Los Angeles The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Its academic roots were established in 1881 as a normal school then known as the southern branch of the Cal ...

(UCLA), Jordi Ros-Giralt joined the UCLA

Engineers Without Borders The term Engineers Without Borders (EWB; , ISF) is used by a number of non-governmental organizations in various countries to describe their activity based on engineering and oriented to international development work. All of these groups work wor ...

(EWB) Chapter. His plan was to gather discarded computers from fellow students, fix it up, and then give it to a local school that needed them.. Three other classmates, Christine Lee, Michael Bruce and Charlie Fan,"A Portable and Sustainable Computer Education Project for Developing Countries-Phase I", Jordi Ros-Giralt, Christine Lee, Michael Bruce, Charlie Fan, Regina Quan, Henry Pai. International Journal for Service Learning in Engineering Vol. 1, No. 1, pp. 27-47, Spring 2006. joined Ros-Giralt in organizing this effort. They spent the rest of the school year gathering computer donations, cleaning them, and then installing educational software. During the summer of 2005, these four traveled to the village of Antigua, Guatemala, where they set up a computer lab with 12 laptops at a local school and connected them to the Internet using a 250 kbit/s DSL connection. Following this trip to Guatemala, the four wanted to find a way to expand this effort. They developed an online

collaborative Collaboration (from Latin ''com-'' "with" + ''laborare'' "to labor", "to work") is the process of two or more people, entities or organizations working together to complete a task or achieve a goal. Collaboration is similar to cooperation. The f ...

tool that would allow anyone to participate in the cause of bringing educational laptops to schools. As a result, the non-profit social network Labdoo was born. The model created and strategy proposed allowed Labdoo to unlock a large pool of small

volunteering Volunteering is an elective and freely chosen act of an individual or group giving their time and labor, often for community service. Many volunteers are specifically trained in the areas they work, such as medicine, education, or emergenc ...

resources anywhere in the world, making the project scalable and sustainable. In 2010, Labdoo.org was registered as a 501(c)(3)

charity organization A charitable organization or charity is an organization whose primary objectives are philanthropy and social well-being (e.g. educational, Religion, religious or other activities serving the public interest or common good). The legal definitio ...

in Irvine, California with a board of directors composed of Jordi Ros-Giralt, Wendy Lu, and Calvin Shen.

Funding

According to its charter, the Labdoo Project is operated as a zero-funding organization. A zero-funding organization is simultaneously a non-profit organization and a social business, and as such, it is self-sustainable, without any major source of monetary funding, including philanthropic donations, external investment funding, or even internal profits.

Awards and publications

* In 2017, the Labdoo Project is awarded the Alan Turing Award by the Catalan Association of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Engineers. * In 2017, Labdoo is one of the three nominated projects in the area of

sustainable development Sustainable development is an approach to growth and Human development (economics), human development that aims to meet the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.United Nations General ...

of the GreenTec Awards in 2017. * In 2016, the German Chancellor

Angela Merkel Angela Dorothea Merkel (; ; born 17 July 1954) is a German retired politician who served as Chancellor of Germany from 2005 to 2021. She is the only woman to have held the office. She was Leader of the Opposition from 2002 to 2005 and Leade ...

awarded the Labdoo project for its social commitment. * In 2016, Labdoo was one of the 100 winners of the Google Impact Challenge Award in Germany. * In 2016, Labdoo was one of the three nominated projects in the area of recycling and resources of the GreenTec Awards in 2016.{{Cite web, url=http://www.greentec-awards.com/downloads/161207_GTA_Gewinner_Nominierte.pdf, title=Winners and Nominations 2006-2016 {{! GreenTec Awards, access-date=2017-02-13, archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170123125921/http://www.greentec-awards.com/downloads/161207_GTA_Gewinner_Nominierte.pdf, archive-date=23 January 2017, url-status=dead * In July 2014, an article about the Labdoo Project was published during the Humanitarian Technology Conference in Boston, United States. * In September 2013, an article about the Labdoo Project was published during the

Earth Institute {{Infobox organization , name = The Earth Institute , image = Ei blue1.gif , map_size = , map_alt = , map_caption = , map2 = , type = , tax_id ...

International Conference on Sustainable Development Practice, in New York. * In 2012, a chapter of the book

IEEE The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) is an American 501(c)(3) organization, 501(c)(3) public charity professional organization for electrical engineering, electronics engineering, and other related disciplines. The IEEE ...

Service-Learning in the Computer and Information Sciences was dedicated to the Labdoo Project.

References

Educational projects International charities