Education Projects and Events (FOSS-Centric)

posted by Roy Schestowitz on May 01, 2026

• Raspberry Pi ☛ Why localisation matters for AI literacy: Lessons from Uzbekistan

  On the plane to Tashkent, Uzbekistan, I found myself wondering about the level of engagement with AI tools among teachers and educators in Uzbekistan: how interested are teachers and students in AI technologies? Are they more excited or hesitant about AI technologies?

  My questions were answered within minutes of the start of the training session in Tashkent. The teachers and trainers, who had travelled from cities and rural areas across the country, were enthusiastic, inquisitive, and already experimenting with AI technologies in their daily lives.

• 404 Media ☛ World’s Largest Digital Human Rights Conference Suddenly Canceled

  Update 4:30 PM EDT: On a popular listserv for academics, many of whom are attending RightsCon, a board member of Access Now wrote "I am told I can leak that RightsCon has been canceled. Message from [Access Now] following shortly" in a thread about what attendees were planning on doing. And in an email, AccessNow wrote: "It is with heavy hearts that we share: RightsCon will not proceed in Zambia or online. We understand this news is deeply upsetting for our community and while we know everyone has questions, our goal right now is to notify you of the event’s status because many of you have imminent travel plans. We do not recommend registered participants travel to Lusaka for RightsCon.

• The Record ☛ Zambia cancels global digital freedoms conference days before start

  The government only intends to postpone the event, Mutati said, but it is unclear whether the already financially strapped global human rights community or Access Now will be able or willing to travel to a rescheduled conference. RightsCon typically attracts more than 5,000 human rights advocates and academics from over 150 countries.

  Many global human rights organizations have been financially hobbled by the dismantling of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), making travel to Zambia a difficult undertaking.

• Tor ☛ Tor Project Statement on the Abrupt Cancellation of RightsCon 2026 | The Tor Project

  The Tor Project is deeply saddened by the last-minute cancellation of RightsCon 2026 in Lusaka, Zambia, and online. The right to assemble, associate, and speak freely must not be conditioned on political approval. Convenings like RightsCon are essential precisely because they create space for difficult, urgent, and necessary conversation about power, technology, rights, and accountability.

  Tor's work is rooted in the belief that everyone should be able to speak freely, safely, and privately. We build tools that help people connect, communicate, organize, and seek information; especially those facing censorship, surveillance, repression, discrimination, and other forms of vulnerability. The disruption of a space dedicated to advancing these shared goals represents a serious gutpunch to the global human rights community.

• Paolo Melchiorre ☛ PyCon US 2026

  PyCon US is the largest and longest-running annual gathering for the community using and developing the open-source Python programming language.

• James G ☛ IndieWebCamp Düsseldorf 2026

  Last weekend I attended the 10th IndieWebCamp held in the city of Düsseldorf. This is the second time I have attended the event, which was scheduled before the Beyond Tellerrand conference.

  After the two days of talking about and making web pages at IndieWebCamp followed by two days of all things creativity at Beyond Tellerrand, I left with reams of notes. Both events always reminded me how many people there are out there making fun things on and with the web. For this post, I am going to focus specifically on the IndieWebCamp.

• Rlang ☛ R programming book in Greek language

  For anyone interested, “Programming in R” (title translated) is a free book on R programming written in Greek.

  It presents a programmer’s point of view of R, for beginners (in fact for people with absolutely no programming experience) to advanced programmers.

• Rlang ☛ CougarStats: a free and open-source Statistics web app for Teaching and Learning

  I’d like to share CougarStats, a free and open-source R Shiny web app I developed to support the teaching and learning of Statistics. CougarStats runs entirely in a browser and is designed for accessibility and ease of use.