Microsoft is expanding partnerships throughout Latin America and helping to establish programs to provide technology education.The partnerships are focused on providing technology education to at-risk youth as well as people with disabilities.

Microsoft will be partnering with or expanding partnerships in Brazil, Ecuador, El Salvador, Mexico, Peru and international Latin American organizations.

The Dominican Today article goes through all the partnerships, and there are quite a few. The article doesn’t say how much money Microsoft plans to commit to all the partnerships, but it does say a $4 million dollar fund has been setup for Partnership in Opportunities for Employment through Technology in the Americas, which is an IT skills and job training program.

A North Carolina school district partnered with Qualcomm’s Wireless Reach Initiative and Arlington, Virg., based Digital Millennial Consulting to provide some 9th graders smart-phones with internet access in a pilot program. The K-Nect Program, as it’s called, is an attempt to address three issues at once: Getting at risk kids access to the Internet, educating them on technology use and improving thier math scores.

How to cell phones improve math scores?

Well it looks like the consulting group associated with the project developed some custom software that allows teachers to send the kids math questions, which they can solve by themselves or with help from other classmates through peer-to-peer technology.

However it looks like the program is in trouble. According to an article on an NBC affiliate’s website, NBC17 in Raleigh, the funding is set to run out in June. The director of the project and of the Digital Millenial Consulting group, Shawn Gross, ‘pleaded’ with the state board of education for more funding, which will be matched 100 percent by private sources, according to the article.

And from the article, it looks like the smart phones are popular among the students and might actually be teaching them math.

Now if only I could get my smart phone to stop crashing…

Cnet has an post up about the city of Miami’s efforts to provide technology education to residents and small business owners. Elevate Miami is a city-wide program that provides classes and computer access centers for residents. The city works with technology partners like Microsoft Corp. to recycle old PCs, and with telecom providers to provide Internet access in the city parks.

The era of global communication is upon us, and the Internet is changing the way people work, find information about their world and talk to friends and family. But many people are left behind because they can’t afford a computer, have no Internet access where they live, or are just plain scared of taking the plunge for the first time.

In the United States, availability of high-speed internet is a big problem. It’s difficult to get a broadband connection in many places. Urban as well as rural areas of the country are lacking the infrastructure. Despite President Bush’s promise to improve access to broadband, about half of americans have broadband in the home. Part of the problem is the lack of data thats collected to monitor the progress of wiring the nation.

Cities across the United States, like Chicago, Philadelphia and Houston, have contemplated or implemented city-wide wireless Internet access as a way to address problems residents have getting or affording it on their own. Often these municipal wireless projects do not work out.

Other advanced nations typically have much better and much cheaper broadband access for their citizens. In Japan, consumers can get connections that are much faster than consumer connections in the United States. Less developed countries are a much different story. Lacking in communication infrastructure and the resources to build them, many residents of poorer countries have no way to get online. Experts are looking to mobile phones to pick up the slack and provide Internet access to people in developing nations.

Organizations like the not-for-profit One Laptop per Child (OLPC) are working on developing low-cost hardware and software for people – and in OLPC’s case, children – in the Third World. Other electronics companies like Intel and mobile phone giant Nokia are working on low cost computers and devices to get people online.

By far the biggest digital divide issue that has to be addressed is access to education. Many people lack the skills to use computers and the Internet, especially those without physical access to computers but also the elderly and many who are afraid or aprehensive of technology. Some money available to help communities provide computer education, but the demand for affordable training is greater than its availability. Training will just become more important as more employers look for computer skills in all of thier employees.