The Summer School week at the IUT of Douala (Douala Institute of Technology) in Cameroon was organized by the Mapubi NGO in partnership with the IUT of Douala and sponsored by the CIM (Centre of International Migration). The summer school was held from Monday 05 September 2016 to Friday 09 September 2016 and fifty-five students registered and attended the program.

The Summer School was held under the theme ‘My Future Now: The Android Generation’ with the goal to inspire IT students at the University of Douala by raising awareness of the opportunities available to them in the field of IT. During the summer school students were also involved in a community project and tasked to conceive and develop a mobile application to warn authorities in case of an emergency or disaster: The SOSAPP.

The students received a series of presentations and practical exercises on the following topics:

• Fundamentals of the JAVA and the Android platform
• Fundamentals of relational databases
• Definition of the functional design of an application
• Setting up a development environment (JAVA, ANDROID, MYSQL)
• Development of a MYSQL database
• Development of an ANDROID application
• Publishing your application and making it visible
• Effective CV writing and marketing your skills

The presentations were held by Mrs Olivia DAVIS-MBOU, Mr Paul Emmanuel NDJENG, Mr Yannick NANA and Mr Christian NDJENG-NYOP in collaboration with Mr Armand YOMBI.

Students had the opportunity to work in groups during the practical exercises. Three groups were formed to give each student the opportunity to participate during the project: the Developer group, the Database group and the Functional design group. Each group focused on a specific element to develop the app and eventually contributed to the creation of the SOSAPP. At the end of the week a Demo version of the App was completed and presented during the mentor’s networking meeting.

Parallel to the presentations and practical exercises’, the students also had the opportunity to interact with their mentors through daily interviews via Skype coordinated by Mrs Lydie YABEKO. During these eMentoring sessions, the mentors spoke about their educational background, career path and gave students practical advice on how to navigate potential challenges they might face when they transition from university to the work place.

Other mentors personally attended the summer school and met with the students. The following mentors interacted with the students during the summer school at the IUT in Douala: Dr. Mojisola ERDT, Mr Paul Emmanuel NDJENG, Mrs Olivia DAVIS-MBOU, Mr Martin MADIBA EBONGUE, Mr Achille EBOULE, Mrs Consuelo DOUGAN CHAFFER, Mr Biodun OLAORE, Mr Yannick NANA, Mr Christian NDJENG, Mrs Lydie YABEKO and Mrs Laetitia GNASSINGBE. Mentors are still available for mentoring and advising the students via our online forum ( www.mapubi.com ).

On the last day of the summer school week, two field trips were organized for the students. The purpose was to give students an overview of a work environment. The field trips were held at Brasseries du Cameroun (plant of Koumassi) and DHL (Headquarters at Bonanjo). Both companies gave access to their working processes and how they use technology to implement their business processes.

A mentor’s networking event was held at the Pullman Hotel in Douala to officially close the summer school week. The aim of the event was to offer a networking platform to all mentor’s and project facilitators. The proceedings of the event included an overall presentation of the summer school week and the SOSAPP. In addition, Mr Paul Emmanuel NDJENG, a marketing expert, made a presentation on ‘The advantages of Inbound Marketing.’

The event ended with a podium discussion about the challenges of numeric economy in the African context. The panellists were Mr Alphonse BEA (Commercial Director DHL Central Africa), Mr Serge ESSO (General Manager Corporate Services at MTN Cameroon), Mr Amede ASSOMO (General Manager DHL Guinea), Mr Jacques NDJAMBA (CEO CAC), Mr Armand YOMBI (Lecturer IUT Douala), Mrs Laetitia GNASSINGBE (General Manager Ibis Malabo) and Mrs Olivia DAVIS-MBOU (founder MAPUBI NGO). The panellists outlined the importance of digitalization for their business and how they used technology to succeed. They also outlined the importance of education, and how work positions are being redefined due to the digitalization. Mr BEA pointed out that Africa is at a very important time in history and should make sure that it benefits from the advantages of the trend in all areas. Mrs DAVIS-MBOU outlined the importance of the networking platform offered by the Mapubi NGO to ensure a bridge exists between the industry and the faculty and that students could receive training tailored to the needs of the industry and their community.

We would love to use this opportunity to thank all project helpers, facilitators and sponsors. We would love to thank the CIM for financing this project. We would love to thank our local partner the IUT of Douala and in particular:

• Prof ETAME, Director of IUT Douala, for making sure the project takes place and receives the best environment for its completion.
• Prof MOUKENGUE, Doyen University of Douala, for supporting us all through the years and opening the right doors for us.
• Mr YOMBI and the lecturers of IUT Douala, for supporting with the teaching materials and all activities with the students.

We would love to thank “Brasseries du Cameroun” and Mr. Jacques ELIMBI for his overall support of the project and allowing us to visit the company’s plant at Kumassi. The students who visited the plant were very inspired and enthusiastic about the visit. The students also expressed their interest in receiving information on open positions and internships.

We would love to thank all mentors for their dedication and the difference they made in the lives of the students.

We would love to thank the panellists of the mentor’s workshop debate: Mr Alphonse BEA (Commercial Director DHL Central Africa), Mr Serge ESSO (General Manager Corporate Services at MTN Cameroun), Mr Amede ASSOMO (General Manager DHL Guinea), Mr Jacques NDJAMBA (CEO CAC), Mr Armand YOMBI (Lecturer IUT Douala), Mrs Laetitia GNASSINGBE (General Manager Ibis Malabo) and Mrs Olivia DAVIS-MBOU (founder MAPUBI NGO).

We would love to thank all mentors who accompanied the students during the project onsite and online. Special thanks to Dr. Mojisola ERDT, Mr Paul Emmanuel NDJENG, Mrs Olivia DAVIS-MBOU, Mr Martin MADIBA EBONGUE, Mr Achille EBOULE, Mrs Consuelo DOUGAN CHAFFER, Mr Biodun OLAORE, Mr Yannick NANA, Mr Christian NDJENG, Mrs Lydie YABEKO and Mrs Laetitia GNASSINGBE.

We would also love to thank all those who worked behind the scenes: Mrs Lydie YABEKO for moderating all eMentoring sessions and the networkig event, Mr Patrick EYOUM for realizing and developing the media material, Mr Patrice MBOU for providing the infrastructure for the eMentoring sessions, Ms Tanya WHANDE for the QA of all written materials and Mrs Princesse PRISO (Founder SAWA.COM) for organizing all events in Douala.