The Java Users Group of the Federal District of Brazil in Brasilia – DFJUG (www.dfjug.org) was established in 1998 out of a need for qualified Java professionals. Today, with 46,983 members, DFJUG is considered one of the largest Java User groups in the world. It is DFJUG's educational focus which is the main driver that keeps this community together and growing --- Why?

Daniel deOliveira (currently working at the Brazilian Ministry of Planning) explains, that in Brazil, there is a shortage of IT professionals. There are currently 40,000 java-related jobs that are open and unfilled in Brazil. Furthermore, Brazil's formal educational sector (universities, colleges, technical and IT schools) has not been able to meet the demand. So, DFJUG began searching for answer(s) and asking questions like: Where does one find individuals that fit the IT developer profile? Where to find these “geniuses” that, without any formal or academical training, are capable of disassembling and reassembling a cell phone or even program these devices?

Recently, Sun's Scott McNeally was interviewed by businessweek.com “Next: An Internet Revolution in Higher Education”. There is a connection between this article and what groups like DFJUG have been doing with student developers. (i.e ...Web technology being used to shake-up education, the way it rocked newspapers and the music industry...). What was not mentioned in the article was Sun's contribution in founding/funding the Java Education and Development Initiative (JEDI) which is an open-source education curriculum at the University of the Philippines.

JEDI seemed like DFJUG's answer. So naturally, good community leaders tend to gravitate to each other, and the JEDI professors met Daniel as Java Champions at JavaOne in 2006, one thing led to another and JEDI-Brasil was created. Today, the program has (9) open source course modules focused on Java programming which is now serving over 39,000 students online. The initial training provides a foundation for future Java training and potential certification.

To see more about JEDI-Brasil check out DFJUG's online website, which serves as a online training platform for free video-based training modules (in Portuguese). Sun has donated a SunFire T2000 server in 2009 to help the JEDI-Brasil effort. Daniel can be reached via the website and will be coming to the U.S. in late 2009 to work on his doctoral thesis.