University provides computer lessons for refugees
Computer skills are essential if you want to become part of Dutch society. Leiden University and Stichting Bestaanskracht, an organisation that helps the vulnerable, are therefore providing computer lessons for refugees who can use some extra digital help.
Leiden University and Stichting Bestaanskracht are offering the lessons within the scope of 444 Neighbourhood University. In the computer lessons, six groups of five refugees are being given the opportunity to master the basics in a quick and easy way. Leiden student Liam Zwitser gave the lessons.
In the first lesson, the refugees learnt the basics: creating an account, using the start menu and creating directories. The second lesson was devoted to Microsoft Office, with the participants writing a story in Word and creating a PowerPoint presentation. The third lesson covered Google and email.
The course was a success, if you ask Angesom, a 23-year-old Eritrean who came to the Netherlands three years ago. He is training to be a carpenter, but has realised that his classmates are much more computer literate than he is. He is very pleased with the lessons. ‘I am grateful to have been able to follow the course,’ he says in Dutch. ‘I feel much more self-confident at school.’ He hopes to become a carpenter and is currently doing his training.
There will soon be another 444 Neighbourhood University, this time with an intercultural quiz for people from a non-Western background. It is being organised by the University and Libertas Leiden.