Intersol Kenya on Wednesday morning donated three interactive whiteboards to Nairobi's Starehe Boys Centre and School. Intersol is an authorised reseller of the SMART Board interactive whiteboard.
Starehe Boys' Centre director Mathew Kiyaka, said that the school would share the three whiteboards with other schools in the country. Schools would be allowed about two hours to try out the whiteboards. The whiteboard were already being used in teaching.

Angus Sawers, Intersol General Manager in Kenya said that the three white boards had been donated in partnership with the Starehe Future Appeal, a United Kingdom Charity. Each board costs KSh 350,000 together with a projector and KSh 250,000 without a projector . The firm said it would support and train teachers in the school till they were self-dependent.

Isaac Kinyanjui, a biology and agriculture teacher at the school says that the whiteboards were particularly helpful aids in the teaching of science based subjects. Kinyanjui demonstrated how the whiteboard can be used to teach various subjects. Teaching is done with the aid of a laptop and includes video, audio and writing and illustrations on an electronic board.

Some of the students at the school had been surprised by the use of the medium in teaching. "Students are used to thinking that technology is ICT used for entertainment, it is up to the teachers to show that it can be used for learning too," he said.

Angus says that the boards have been available in the country since 2006 through Intersol. He says the firm sells approximately 100 boards each year. Adoption however has mostly being by international and private schools such as Brookhouse schools. Makini and Riara schools were some of schools running the 8.4.4. system of education that had deployed the whiteboards.

"We are engaging with the Ministry of Education and public schools to find ways in which they can acquire the whiteboards," said Angus. Other than Starehe Boys' Centre, a few other public schools have acquired Whiteboards , mostly through donor support. St Peter's in Mumias were supported by the KCB Foundation in acquisition of the whiteboard. He says that the schools would have a significant return of interest from investing in the whiteboards compared to cost.

Each SMART Board comes with a five year warranty and can receive software updates through the Internet or via manual installation by Intersol .