José Santana
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72.79.76.168 02:14, 11 February 2007 (UTC)--72.79.76.168 02:14, 11 February 2007 (UTC)--72.79.76.168 02:14, 11 February 2007 (UTC)--72.79.76.168 02:14, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
José Manuel Santana Silvestre (February 25, 1962), is the Executive Director of the Dominican Republic Presidential Commission of Science and Technology and Research Associate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Santana was born in Santo Domingo capital of the Dominican Republic, and is an economist specialist in technology and development.
Following Ex-President & Professor Juan Bosch's recommendations, Santana moved to Costa Rica at the age of thirteen where he finished high school. In early 1979, he enrolled in the Social Science school at the University of Costa Rica. He majored in Economics with a minor in Psychology and Philosophy, learning from Chilean philosopher Professor Helio Gallardo and Oscar Arias Sánchez, who is the current President of Costa Rica and the first Nobel Laureate from his nation. Oscar Arias served as President from 1986 to 1990, and was elected for a second term in a close election in 2006. In 1987 he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to end the civil unrest then raging in several Central American countries. Santana's political views were greatly influenced by both teachers. Already at a young age he identified completely with the Central American human rights movement. Beginning in 1980 he became a humanitarian volunteer to help in the postwar reconstruction of Nicaragua and in the nationwide literacy campaign.
In 1984, he moved back to the Dominican Republic and in 1987, he completed his Bachelor of Arts in Economics at the Instituto Tecnológico de Santo Domingo (INTEC) with a degree in economics. In 1997 he received a certification at the University of Ilmenau (Erfurt, Germany) for his active participation in the ISWI program Building Our Future. This program was created by the University of Ilmenau in pursuit of answers to five fundamental thematic questions centered on globalization: world inequality, administration for peace, human rights, technology and protection of the environment.
José Santana joined the staff of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology at the end of 2003, he became a research affiliate of the MIT Auto-ID Laboratory where he specialized on Radio Frequency Identification - RFID and Supply Chain Management with the former Executive Director of the Lab, Daniel Engels. Since 2003, he has been involved with the design and development of scientific and technological research of radio frequency identification in Latin America. In 2001 he completed a graduate program at Columbia University in New York on Executive Information Technology Management.
In September of 2004, he was appointed by the President of the Dominican Republic, Leonel Fernández, to take on the role of Executive Director of the International Advisory Commission of Science and Technology with the rank of Ambassador and Special Advisor to the President. José Santana is an activist and visionary in the development of science and technology in developing countries.
In 2005 he joined the One Laptop Per Child initiative launched by Nicholas Negroponte, together with Seymour Papert, Alan Kay, Walter Bender, Mary Lou Jepsen, Jim Gettys and a high level group of scientists at the MIT Media Lab. This education-technology project will put constructionist learning into practice. The aim of the OLPC initiative is to provide low cost laptops to every child in developing countries. OLPC is a non-profit organization set up to oversee the $100 laptop project. Both the project and the organization were announced at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland in January 2005. One Laptop per Child is being funded by a number of sponsor organizations including Google, Red Hat, AMD, Brightstar Corporation, News Corporation and Nortel Networks. Each company has donated two million dollars.
At MIT, José Santana met with Noam Chomsky, which raised awareness of Social Science topics, particularly world peace, human rights, environmental issues, political history and technology innovation for peace. They are currently devoting time to work on a Latin America Political History. In early 2006 Santana established in the state of New Jersey the International Foundation of Science & Technology to promote knowledge transfer to developing countries.
