Closing the Digital Gap: Karamoja’s First Computer Club

The Door That Opens at 3PM.

In most parts of the world, children grow up tapping screens before they can spell their own names. Sometimes we hand them a phone just to keep them quiet. Sometimes it’s because we’re too tired. Sometimes it’s just what everyone else is doing. But wherever we stand on it — the tools we once saw as professional, adult, distant — are now entry points into a future that’s already arrived.

Here in Karamoja, that conversation barely exists. Access isn’t even on the table.

Entire schools in this region have never owned a computer. Not one. Children go through their entire education without touching a keyboard. And even the teachers — many of whom have worked in education for decades — have never created a lesson plan on a laptop.

So when we started talking about launching a computer club at SHANITA, the reaction was mostly confusion:

“Here? Computers?”

“Who will teach them?”

“Will it even work?”

It works.

It started with a handful of secondhand laptops, a dusty classroom, and one instructor — Prossy, whose belief in the children is stronger than any connection speed. Every Saturday at 3PM, something remarkable happens.

A group of children (P5 and up) gathers outside the classroom door. They don’t rush.They wait — patiently, quietly — with an energy that’s hard to put into words. They know what’s inside. And they know how rare it is. When Prossy arrives, they stand. They smile. She opens the door, and for the next two hours, Karamoja transforms.

Inside that room, children who once didn’t know how to spell their names are now typing full sentences. Formatting pages. Exploring games that build logic and language. Like Betty and Amodoi — two girls from the minority Tepech tribe, tucked deep in the mountains of Moroto. When they first joined Shanita, they didn’t own a shirt. They didn’t speak a word of English. For weeks, they sat in silence, heads down, unsure if they belonged in a classroom at all. But last week, they sat at a desk in Shanita’s computer lab and typed letters to their future selves.

Letters in English, Full paragraphs, Each with a date at the top.

A subject line in bold, Typed confidently in Microsoft Word.

They clicked Save As — and gave their dreams a file name.

It wasn’t just a lesson in typing but a moment of transformation.

And for the first time, they saw those things reflected back on a glowing screen. And they’re not alone. The entire school has started to shift.

Even the teachers peek through the windows now. Some laugh and say, “Our pupils are ahead of us.”But you can feel it — they’re not just amused. They’re envious.They’re inspired.

Because for the first time, they’re watching the digital gap begin to close — and it’s happening right in front of them. That’s what makes this moment so powerful.

In Karamoja, computers aren’t normal. They are almost unheard of.

And yet here we are, watching barefoot children navigate a digital world with curiosity and confidence. It’s not just about the computers. It’s about what they unlock.

A boy who once herded goats now knows how to open a Word document.

A girl who’s never left her district just found her village on Google Maps.

A community that was told it would never catch up is now quietly, steadily, catching on.

We are incredibly grateful to Anna Cheniuntai and the STEM Access Foundation for donating another round of laptops and helping us turn a dream into a movement. Because of you, a place long left behind is stepping into the light.

We called it a club. But now we know better, It’s a doorway.

And every Saturday at 3PM, that door opens —Not just to a room, But to the future.