DATA Train-the-Trainers Workshop 2026

About the DATA Project

The DATA Project (Decolonial Approaches to Technological Agency) is a groundbreaking two-year international research initiative that’s reshaping how computing education spaces share knowledge, value, and technological agency across Southern and Eastern Africa and China. Rather than extracting knowledge from communities, the DATA project operates on a principle of exchange—building sustainable, non-extractive models of collaboration.

At its core, DATA challenges the traditional top-down approach to technology development. Instead of imposing solutions, the project works with community partners to co-design meaningful technological innovations. This research brings together six partner institutions across six countries, including the University of Witwatersrand and University of Leeds, to create what they call a “quintuple-helix” model that puts community and environment alongside academia, industry, and government.

The Innovation Systems Lab (ISL)

The DATA project’s flagship initiative is the Innovation Systems Lab (ISL) programme, a 10-week, hands-on curriculum focused on sensors and LoRaWAN (Long Range Wide Area Network) technology. Co-designed with the Wits Innovation Centre, this programme is specifically tailored to the needs and contexts of partner communities.

What makes this approach truly unique is its commitment to attribution, not appropriation. The ISL programme design is informed by twelve different computational traditions from partner communities, and every single one is credited and celebrated, none are extracted or appropriated. This is technological exchange done right.

Train-the-Trainers Workshop

Setting the Stage

Bringing together educators and technologists from partner institutions across the DATA network, this workshop served a crucial mission: equipping trainers who would lead the ISL programme in their home communities. As educators ourselves, we needed deep, hands-on understanding—not just of what these technologies could do, but how they worked and why they mattered for the communities we serve.

Hosted at the University of Witwatersrand’s Wits Innovation Centre, this week-long workshop was designed as an immersive experience. Rather than a typical tech training, we were positioned as learners ourselves—walking in the shoes of the students we’d eventually teach. By building and deploying real IoT solutions, we’d gain the embodied knowledge needed to authentically guide others through the same journey.

Building with Purpose: Hands-On IoT

Over the course of the workshop, we engaged in a series of intensive, practical sessions where theory met hardware. The centerpiece of our work was constructing sensor nodes from the ground up, not just assembling pre-made kits, but understanding the underlying principles of how sensors collect data, how microcontrollers process information, and how LoRaWAN technology enables long-range, low-power wireless communication.

We didn’t just build sensors; we built a complete environmental monitoring system. Each sensor node we created was configured to collect readings, temperature, humidity, air quality, or other environmental metrics, and transmit them over LoRaWAN’s impressive range. LoRaWAN’s low power consumption and ability to connect devices across kilometers made it ideal for monitoring applications in community settings where infrastructure is limited.

The Real Learning

What made this experience truly valuable was the iterative problem-solving. Things didn’t always work on the first try, and that’s exactly the point. We encountered real challenges—configuring gateway connectivity, debugging firmware, troubleshooting sensor calibration, that taught us far more than any lecture could. These are the same obstacles our learners will face, and now we have genuine experience navigating them.

By the end of the workshop, our team of trainers had transformed from theoretical knowledge-holders into practitioners who could authentically guide communities through deploying their own environmental monitoring solutions. We were ready to teach not from textbooks, but from experience.

Snapshots