Technological Infrastructure and Use of ICT in Education in ... - ADEA

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Technological Infrastructure and Use of ICT in Education in Africa: an overview 65 Integration of ICT into education, together with the enhancement of educational opportunities, is essential for achieving real access to ICT for the African continent. Without appropriately educated and skilled people, the areas of capacity, relevant content, integration, and trust in technology are going to be difficult to achieve. Jensen (2002, p13) states that ‘perhaps [the greatest] problem is that the brain drain and generally low levels of education and literacy amongst the population has created a scarcity of skills and expertise at all levels, from policy making down to the end-user’. Further, there is also a need for careful economic and policy direction to incorporate beneficial use of ICTs. This requires well-educated people ready for the information society who will then be able to mobilize an African response (for African benefit) to the global knowledge economy (Opoku-Mensah, 1999; Maclean, et al., 2002). Therefore, one of the greatest challenges for developing countries lies in education and human resource development to service the knowledge economy. This is no easy task given the resource requirements needed, not only to ensure physical access to ICTs, but also to enable the people of Africa to afford to use the technology, to see its value, and to use it. Furthermore, long-standing gender disparities with respect to science and technology training and use, as well as more recent gender disparities in ICT access (in the widest sense), will need to be explicitly tackled when considering human resource challenges (Hafkin & Taggart, 2001; Rathgerber & Ofwona Adera, 2000). Several continental leaders are seriously considering the importance of ICT for development, and there has been increasing recognition among African policy makers of the role of ICT in this regard. Since the historic Information Society and Development (ISAD) conference in 1996, there has been a growing number of initiatives to bridge the digital divide, with many of them focusing on the education sector. The African Information Society Initiative (AISI), spearheaded by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) in 1996, provided a framework for Africa’s digital inclusion which involved governments from all over the continent, followed by: the historic African Development Forum in 1999; the Digitial Opportunities Taskforce of the Group of Eight Nations in 2000; the World Economic Forum’s focus on Bridging the Digital Divide; and the United Nations ICT Task Team in 2000. These all highlight the importance of bridging the educational divide through integration of ICTs in education. The formation of SchoolNet Africa was strongly influenced 6. Africa, ICT and Development
66 Working Group on Distance Education and Open Learning by these processes and more specifically, was a direct outcome of the first African Development Forum in 1999. The UNECA-driven processes after ADF 99 led to a strategy to consolidate the AISI framework which includes the call for an African Learning Network comprising three components: VarsityNet, Out of School Youth Network (OOSYNet), and SchoolNet Africa. Over the past three years however, parallel regional networks and programmes to promote ICTs in school education in Africa have also been formed. Here the World Links for Development Program (WORLD), the Department for International Development (DFID)’s Imfundo Project and to a lesser extent, Schools Online have consolidated their programmes in Africa over the past two years and have country projects in several African countries. To date, conscious attempts at collaboration between the various regional programs remain limited. More recently, the New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD) has also been introduced, spearheaded by a number of heads of state in a renewed attempt at African revival. 6. Africa, ICT and Development NEPAD 7 provides an African-owned and African-led effort to promote accelerated economic growth and sustainable development for Africa, based on partnerships between African countries themselves, but also between Africa and the developed world. NEPAD explicitly recognizes ICT as a key priority in development efforts for the continent (NEPAD, 2001). In the NEPAD document, several comparative advantages for the African continent from intensive ICT use are identified. These include: support of democratization and good governance, integration into the information society, provision of training, use in research, enhancement of trade opportunities, support of regional distance learning and health programmes, input to conflict management and the control of pandemic diseases through early warning systems. Five specific objectives with respect to ICT are noted. These are: • To double teledensity to two lines per 100 people by 2005, with an adequate level of access for households • To lower the costs and improve reliability of service 7. NEPAD is a comprehensive plan for the development of Africa, the details of which cannot be covered here. It is however important to note that this initiative has been criticized from several fronts. Notwithstanding, this document is currently a defining approach for development and change in Africa.
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Technological Infrastructure and Use of ICT in Education in ... - ADEA

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