1. Name of organization
AfricaOSH (Africa Open Science and Hardware Summit)
2. Email address (or preferred and reliable way of official contact)
team@africaosh.com
3. Tell us about your organization
The Africa Open Science and Hardware (OSH) Summit is a grassroots effort to bring together researchers, technologists, hacker hobbyists, educators, government officials, and start-up innovators around the world. Our goal is to create a conversation and set of actions on OSH, among African actors, and between them and the international community, in order to adopt OSH principles and practices appropriate to our context. Our Core Values are : Openness, Collaboration, Humanity, Respect, inclusion.
The first Africa OSH summit took place in Kumasi, Ghana in April 2018, hosted by Kumasi Hive and brought together 46 participants from across Africa, Europe and the USA. Topics discussed during the summit include STEM education in Africa, harmonizing technical skills for educational research across the continent, Open Educatinal Resources, Open Science for impactful education and innovation in Africa. Also the three panel discussions and thematic workshops engaged participants in vivid discussions and resulted in new partnerships between participants and initiatives such as the launch of the pan-African preprint repository AfricarXiv.org, designing learning kits for primarx school kids, concepts for STEM/STEAM practical trainings for all educational levels and new members for the global MakerNet Alliance.
The second Africa OSH took place in Dar es Salam, Tanzania, in April 2019 and hosted by STICLab on the theme ‘Nurturing Sustainable Innovations through Open Science and Hardware’. Key deliverables for this summit were to continue conversations from the previous summit, invite new members into the AfricaOSH community, strengthen existing collaborations and build new ones. A total number 58 participants were in attendance with 42 out of the total being new members of the community.
4. Does your organization have representation for a marginalized demographic due to factors such as, but not limited to, race, ability, place of birth, gender, sexual orientation, socioeconomic class situation or other identification? If so, how?
AfricaOSH is building a multidisciplinary and inclusive ‘Family’ to deliver its mission and advance research, education and innovation in Africa and abroad. We strive to make our community welcoming and open to everybody, regardless of scholarly or professional background, gender identity and expression, ability, physical appearance, body size, race, age, economic background, country of origin or employment, religion, and other characteristics. As we come from different backgrounds, it is important to be intentional about providing respectful, equitable spaces — both online and in-person — for our community to come together and engage in constructive, respectful discourse.
We particularly strive for equity. We are intentional about actively reducing the inequitable barriers that stand between science and those who create, use, and learn from it.
5. What is the event about, and what do you want to achieve with it?
The third edition of AfricaOSH was supposed to take place in Yaounde, Cameroon from 14-16th May 2020. But do to COVID19, we were not able to organise it. After two years (2020 and 2021) without summit any gathering, we are confident that the time is come to gather again. The Summit’s theme is ‘Growing the Do-It-Yourself & Do-It-Together (DIY/DIT) Culture for Community Transformation’ and will be hosted by the MboaLab, in Yaoundé, Cameroon.
The summit will bring together, researchers, technologists, hacker hobbyists, educators, government officials, and start-up innovators from around the world. Open Science & Hardware (OSH) opens an alternative path to education, research, scholarly communication and manufacturing to create an ecosystem for innovation that is locally adapted, culturally relevant, technologically feasible, economically viable, and environmentally sustainable.
Due the Covid19 restrictions, the format of the event will be hybrid, running from 27th - 29th May, 2022. During the summit, we will bring together around 100 participants (for the in person meeting) from across Africa, Latin America, Asia, Europe and North America. The rest, will attend online. The three-day program is a platform to continue conversations that were initiated in the previous summits and will include:
• Presentations and working group discussions on challenges, opportunities and recommendations to contextualize Open Science and Hardware1 ;
• Workshops on making, hacking and DIYBio for a wide range of stakeholders to experience the process of design, co-creation, problem solving and to contribute ideas to OSH development ;
• Conference sessions by networks, startups, and innovators from Africa and the Global South.
6. Which of the three levels of funding would you like to apply for? (in round 1 only USD $9910 is avaiable for applications, in further rounds $3000, $6000, or USD $9910 will be available)
USD $9910
7. What is the funding for? Describe your budget. List what you are going to spend it on and how.
For the 3rd edition of Africaosh summit, we need a total amount of 50200 USD. But we request a support of 9900 USD from GOSH, the rest of the budget will be provided by Make, an European Union Grant.
The budget we are requesting from GOSH is mostly to support the participation of for 05 African Women. Like that will contribute to strenghten the gender balance in OSH.
| Items | Total Amount (USD) | What we request from GOSH | Provided by MAKE (European Union Grant) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Venue | 1000 | 0 | 1000 |
| Accomodation | 10000 | 1000 | 9000 |
| Catering | 7200 | 1200 | 6000 |
| Communication and documentation | 5000 | 1700 | 3300 |
| Travel | 25000 | 6000 | 19000 |
| Unexpected, Transactions, overhead fees | 2000 | 0 | 2000 |
| Total | 50200 | 9900 | 40300 |
8. How will you share the outcomes of this event. What documentation will result that will this project benefit the community as a whole? (videos? photos? a how-to? innovative hardware designs?)
As per usual, we will provide :
- A report
- Share Video and photos
- Openly share Share protocol and designs used in workshops.
9. How would your event address GOSH’s values of diversity and inclusion?
In terms of diversity, in AfricaOSH, our definition of Africans is not related to the color of your skin or your geographical location. It is mostly a way to be. Moreover, Ubuntu is our community value. That is why we are accepting participants from Africa and others parts of the world.
In terms of inclusion, our event is targeting the participation of at least 35% of women and 15% of LGBTQ+
10. Are there any conflicts of interest that you wish to declare?
None