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Niue Issues Laptops to All Schoolchildren
Tue, 26 Aug 2008
The One Laptop Per Child foundation has reached a significant milestone following the decision by the Niue government to issue a laptop to all of its schoolchildren. The miniature South Pacific nation, which has a total population of less than 1,500, will receive 500 XO laptops, enabling the OLPC scheme to get closer to its target of distributing 5,000 laptops in the Pacific region. Although the laptops are usually distributed to children aged between 6 and 12, every primary and secondary school pupil will receive a laptop in Niue. The laptops will give all children in Niue access to the internet, whilst also enabling pupils to access study information and chat to each other within a radius of a kilometre through mesh networking.

The director general of the regional development agency, Jimmie Rodgers, welcomed the news, claiming that laptops ‘have the potential to revolutionise education in ways that are difficult to imagine’. With an order for a further 200,000 laptops expected in 2009, the OLPC are recovering from a shaky start which saw the price of the XO laptop nearly double, whilst software giants Microsoft and computer chip maker Intel refused to partake in the project.