CDI

Company Background
The Committee for Democracy in Information Technology (CDI) is a non-governmental, non-profit organization with the mission of fostering the social inclusion of less-privileged social groups by using Information and Communication Technologies as tools to encourage active citizenship. CDI works in low-income communities and with institutions assisting individuals with special needs including, among others, the physically and mentally disabled, the visually impaired, homeless children, prisoners, and indigenous populations.
Learning new technologies not only creates job opportunities, but also expands access to knowledge and encourages social interchange. At CDI, they believe this initiative contributes to changing the lives of individuals and has a profound impact in the community development.

Presently, there are 946 autonomous and self-sustaining Information Technology and Citizens Rights Schools using CDI´s methodology and model concept. In a recent evaluation, carried by an external consultant group, 86% of the students answered that CDI Schools had a positive impact in their lives, such as going back to regular schools, making new friends or staying away from drugs.

Visit Summary
CDI is the only organization we visited which gave us an understanding of how impoverished many of the Brazilian people. We visited one of the 946 schools using CDI's concepts and we were very impressed with the positive energy of the students and the staff. CDI has attracted many sponsors, in fact our class was so impressed with CDI's contributions we made a small donation of our own. This visit, for many of us, was the highlight of our Brazil visit.