About Me

About Ousia A. Foli-Bebe¶

Hi! I am Ousia A. Foli-Bebe. I am a Maker, STEAM Educator & Design Thinking Consultant In Togo.

I am passionate about tinkering, local innovation, and digital fabrication. I started EcoTecLab Makerspace in 2016 and have been empowering the local maker community through training and DIT Workshops. I have also co-designed and built the MoLab a mobile STEAM Laboratory (https://www.molab-project.org/). With the Molab I have been spreading STEAM and empowering youth in schools from towns to villages in Togo. Ousia is also involved in the Maker’s response to the Covid 19 pandemic through his involvement in the design and local production of FaceShields and a ventilator for covid patients.

Previous work¶

EcoTecLab¶

EcoTecLab is a Maker Space, a third place and a community of makers who, starting from already available resources, teach young people what is possible for them to do that is functional and useful for their community.

Started in September 2016, EcoTecLab organizes every last Saturday of the month Making Workshops (co-creation) where participants learn and share various topics ranging from the recycling of pallets into furniture, to the manufacture of dryers and solar ovens and making a 3D printer by recycling electronic waste.

MoLab¶

the MoLab is a joint project with Mobile Labo SARL, the USA Embassy And EcoTecLab Makerspace. it is Designed by Ousia, and founded by the US-Embassy in Togo.

the MoLab (Mobile Laboratory) is a palliative to the crying lack of laboratories in our schools and aims to awaken the scientific spirit and audacity among students and young people and support practical education.

MoLab is a Bus connected and equipped with STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Maths) materials. In this case, scientific experiment kits, computers, E-waste made 3D printers, puzzles, books… The molab power its computer and devices with solar panels on the roof of the van.

With the Molab we tour the country going from town to village to spark genius in kids. In the MoLab team, I’m focused on Technology and Maker related workshops.

Ousia in the Molab — Ousia Talking About How the Molab was made during a workshop

Trainings and Design Thinking consultancy¶

I also do Design thinking training and consultancy. This is how I make money to contribute to equipping the maker space.

So I get paid to help people and organizations in their innovation process. It’s mostly helping them design our redesign project based on their targets reel wants and needs. It’s a human center design approach to insure project success. Because most of the time and mostly in our local communities what people need is not tech but to eat and; pay their charges…(very basic needs). So my role is regarding that is how to make a raspberry pi network meaningful and useful for them and ensure they are engaged after the donator departure.

That is what I did on the Miadé net project during the covid with the DrLabs in Germany.