SPO Training Lab in Uganda

A facility that offers hands-on and practical education for students, tech professionals and individuals seeking to change careers.

The educational material will include lessons based on the Cardano Stake Pool course https://developers.cardano.org/docs/stake-pool-course/ and prerequisite lessons on skills stake pool operators require. These practical classes will be held in a computer lab setup with at most 2 bare metal servers running VM'S, 10 Raspberry Pi's and a Cardano Testnet. 

Learners current skillsets will be considered before admission. For example an individual working in IT will go straight to the stake pool operator program unlike a high school student who will have to first learn Linux (if i could turn back time to my high school i would attend this class :))

The educational material will be both documented, video recorded and translated as well to suit different languages (English and Luganda to start).

-----Team-----

Percy: A Cardano Community member, works full time as an IT System Administrator at a Construction & timber retailer in Victoria BC, Canada with experience in a variety of IT Areas like System Administration, Technical Support & Day to day IT Operations Management and entrepreneurial ventures in Uganda like Retail (Beauty Cave Ug - instagram page @beautycaveug - the ultimate hub for authentic beauty cosmetic products).
https://www.linkedin.com/in/percy-a-muhirwa-a5aba7149/

Jerry: Currently the Open Source Community Africa, Kampala Lead.  He has a substantial amount of programming experience within Software Engineering and Artificial Intelligence.  He also has experience facilitating technical sessions at Code-Hub UG.
https://ug.linkedin.com/in/kakoozajerry

-----Impact----

Stake pools are a key part of the Cardano network. This facility will provide much needed access to practical training and resources for aspiring stake pool operators, existing stake pool operators & related businesses around the world.

We will also be giving back to the Cardano Community of stake pool operators by addressing the issues our students have encountered, suggesting edits to the official documentation and answering queries in Cardano forums (Cardano stack).

Once successful with this model of training we hope to do something similar for aspiring Dapp and DAO Developers.

This will help grow the Cardano ecosystem with the technical talent needed by businesses that will be built on the Cardano blockchain.

We see some potential SPO Business opportunities as we grow.

1. Paid Study courses on Introduction to Linux, Server Administration, Introduction to Cardano and Blockchain, and Stake Pool Operations

2. Affordable monthly subscriptions for access to the computer lab to test & practice concepts taught or work on personal projects and tutors for learners to practice their new found skills in partnership with.

This business model can also be replicated to other parts of the world where the cost of getting computing equipment is expensive.

----- KPIs / Objectives ------

1. A fully functional computer lab
2. A group of skilled tech professionals to teach and support users of this Lab
3. Engaging high schools and university student associations. This will serve as a good ground to promote the Lab to students.
4. Fifty Learners signed up for the two cohorts in the year. 

------Roadmap-----

 On Going

1. Creating a landing page for interested people to sign up for the lab
2. Going through the Cardano Stake Pool course step by step

0 - 3 Months

1. Recruit technical expertise to teach prerequisite skills needed to become a stake pool operator for instance Linux basics & server administration
2. Personalizing and translating the existing Stake Pool Operator course, teaching Linux fundamentals and server administration lessons.
3. Create a mission driven stake pool. 
4. Put together investor educational material for Ugandan crypto traders to teach them about ADA as a crypto currency option (since many don't trade in ADA compared to Ethereum and Bitcoin) and stake part of their ADA to help fund a worthy cause such as this lab.  We will definitely need all the help we can get on this :)
5. Purchase computer equipment & furniture
6.  Work out pricing of courses, lab use, daily/monthly passes

Expected  Lab launch  date: April 2022

3 - 6 months

1. Acquire lab space and set it up
2. Open for business. Business hours 8:30 am to 9:00pm
3. Receive the first cohort of students for the 3 programs of study.
4. Posting of our educational material on both our YouTube channel and git book for notes (translated to at least one local language i.e Luganda)

6 - 12 months

1. Open lab sessions - for learners to practice skills learnt, ask questions and research more without being capped by expensive data plans.
2. Educational material translated into two other local languages.
3. Increased stake delegator outreach to ADA holders around the world to reach our goal of a self funding lab operation.
4. Inviting Senior Cardano community members to give lectures about the blockchain industry as a whole.
5. Partnerships with other African & East African Cardano communities
6. Begin research into adding Plutus & Haskell programming courses - Cardano community input needed 

2+ years

1. Providing businesses in other industries like Agriculture & Health care a place to educate their leaders on how the blockchain can transform their operations. 
2. To promote learners to prospective blockchain employers. 
3. A stake pool is generating rewards, these rewards will 100% be used to fund the lab's activities since we aim to be eventually self-sufficient. In addition to this we hope rewards can also help subsidize costs for lower income students.
4. Onboarding educational institutions to use IOHK's Atala Prism for credential verification.
5. Provide incubation space to foster the creation of Dapp start up companies solving local problems.

-----Budget breakdown-----

1. Rent (3 months) - $500/month - $1500
2. ISP - Speed - Roke Telecom 40Mbps - $350/month
3. Furniture - 2 long tables - $140 & chairs - $210 
4. Whiteboard - possibility to borrow/receive donation
5. Projector - $500
6. Extension cords - possibility to borrow/receive donation
7. Raspberry Pi 4(10) - $1200 
   https://www.okdo.com/p/raspberry-pi-400-all-in-one-personal-computer-kit-uk-keyboard-layout/
8. Monitors(10) - $1260
9. hire 3-4 staff = $1500 for 3 month(s)
10. Advertising(printing flyers, social media, school visits) - $1500 
11. Servers(2) - $1500
12. Miscellaneous (unexpected costs) - $340

-----Feasibility-----

How feasible is the execution of your proposal, are needed tools for the implementation of your proposal available, does your team have the required capacity to build your solution ?

Leveraging our previous experiences and personal connections in the Technology, education and business space in Uganda, we will be able to find interested tech savvy people, students and stake pool delegators.

Jerry has experience starting up and running a successful boot camp for Girls in STEM named Code Hub Ug a registered NGO in Uganda. https://www.codehubug.com/

------Adjustability-----

Risk/Mitigation

1. Internet interruptions- we will eventually have to get a secondary ISP if the interruptions are beyond reasonable doubt
2. More than expected interest or vice versa - In the event our lab generates more interest than expected we will add a third table for users to bring their own laptops.
3. Reach out and partner with Ugandan Cryptocurrency Traders with to stake sell their current crypto holdings and buy ADA and Stake it.

-----Auditability-----

What success looks like ?

1. 5 out of 10 learners can start their own stake pools
2. A YouTube channel with all our technical lessons, stake pool delegation and general blockchain explainers educational material in all four languages we will translate in.
3. An open source Gitbook with documentation(in all four languages as well)
4. New startup ideas solving local problems born from the lab.
5. Posting new insights , participating in answering technical issues to various stake pool operators forums and discord servers
6. Identifying other business verticals for the lab for instance getting at least one school interested in using IOHK ALTA Prism
7. A block producing stake pool earning rewards & rewards being used to fund the lab's operations & expansion