Slamm Foundation, the CSR arm of Slamm Technologies, an IT firm that offers IT Support, Career Services, and Corporate IT Training, has launched Nimde3, a free IT training mobile application that aims at providing on-demand IT lessons to individuals across the world but more specifically in Ghana and Africa via several local languages.
The launch of the app follows Slamm Foundation’s pledge some two years ago to train one million Ghanaians and Africans in a range of topics including: cybersecurity, IT fundamentals, social media, and PC repair to position them take advantage of the jobs of today and tomorrow.
Executive Director of Slamm Foundation, Francisca Boateng said the app will offer a wide variety of lessons to users.
“The app is available to everyone and can be downloaded both on the IOS and the Play store. We have classes from basic, intermediate and advanced levels and these classes can be taken in different languages ranging from, Akan, Dagbani, Ewe, Hausa, English, Spanish, French, Igbo and Yoruba. Anyone that falls under these categories and languages can access it or even in any language they prefer and learn basic IT training,” she said.
She revealed that more languages will be introduced to increase participation adding that an audio version will also be introduced to serve the purpose of people who would prefer to listen to these courses in their preferred languages.
“As time goes on, we seek to introduce more languages in order to increase the reach of people that can have access to the app. We are also coming up with an audio version whereby users would not need to go through the normal activity but just listen and can also share across with their friends and family,” she said.
Speaking as the Special Guest for the launch, Technical Advisor at the Ministry of Education, Sheila Naah Boamah commended the management of Slamm Technologies and the foundation for their continuous effort in promoting digital inclusiveness stressing that such an initiative is important as it will help to reduce the gap that there is in digital literacy.
“This is a very good start, to have lessons in various local languages and I must commend management for this initiative. It is a corporate social responsibility, and the ministry can never do it all by itself, so when other collaborators and other partners come on board, it helps to bridge the gap in digital and IT literacy.
The Ministry is always interested in such initiatives because it helps in driving the overall goal of digital inclusiveness. What they are doing is different as you can see, they are attempting to use the local language to reach out to everybody both the young and old, and to everyone within the formal and informal sectors. This will try to reduce the gap because people will go there to pick up information that would help to empower themselves,” she said.
The App’s developer, Elikplim Baani, said the application is created in a user-friendly manner with easy access allowing users to navigate to learn their registered courses without hesitation.
“The app is easier to use and navigate. Once the app is downloaded, you can easily access it by selecting whatever language you prefer and then you log in your details then you can start with the classes, and that is from the basic to the intermediate then to the advanced level,” he said.
He said users can also choose to change the languages in which they prefer to learn even after registering with an initial language. “So the app is also designed in a way that even if you register in Ewe and you take a basic course or class, it is easier to change your language to maybe Daagbani or Spanish to continue with your class or course, it is that easy and accessible,” he added.
He added that the app has also been created to give users the opportunity to recommend and make suggestions to the app developer for further addition.
“There is a section that also gives users the opportunity to write down their suggestions and what they think can be done to improve the apps, so more like a review of the app but this gives you the opportunity to suggest and recommend on how easy you are able to access the app and what can be done to improve it and I must say that these suggestions and recommendations would be used,” he said.
The event was also attended by Gunner Hamlyn, the American Embassy’s Economic Advisor, tech industry players, and the media.
