Creativity Group Kumasi

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Description

Ron Eglash and Ellen Foster:

"The Creativity Group is based out of KNUST in Kumasi, co-founded by two KNUST alumni Jorge Appiah and Papa Kwadwo Wonkyie Mensah, but it is fully run by currently enrolled KNUST students who control the direction and flow of its projects. Creativity Group is focused on creating appropriate and sustainable technologies out of available parts, typically from e-waste. Often these technologies have educational merit, are open source, and focused on fostering knowledge sharing and hands-on learning. Members come from many different academic backgrounds and are invested in learning different skillsets from one another through the creation of innovative and value-creating technologies. Due to their varied disciplinary backgrounds, students would not typically mix at the University level. Thus, they created this group separate from the institution and as a grassroots endeavor to further guide their own educational interests.

Some of the Creativity Group’s projects include an educational student kit, High Altitude Balloon Testing, and raising awareness of problems involved in E-waste disposal practices (“Projects,” Creativity Group). They have also engaged local Kumasi communities beyond the University, and many members have partnered with fabricators working out of Suame Magazine. Suame Magazine is a market-place for acquiring second-hand parts and is home to many machine-technology fabricators and fixers who have acquired their skills through attachments beyond or instead of a formal engineering education. Other projects and studies are also being conducted to create more interaction between university engineer students and traditionally trained informal sector fabricators, with initiatives reaching as far back as the 1980s (Waldmann-Brown et al. 2013)." ([1])