ICT for Education
Across a range of educational applications, ICT is being harnessed to improve the efficiency, accessibility and quality of the learning process in developing countries. One of the most clearly demonstrated applications is distance education. Distance education has been a particularly successful model in developing countries where affordability and geography have been real barriers to access.
In the case of primary and secondary education, ICT has been found to significantly enhance the learning process by enabling increased access to knowledge and more collaborative and interactive learning techniques, but is not an effective substitute for close personal supervision from teachers or parents.
The development of scientific research networks on a worldwide basis, usually over the Internet, is also helping to empower indigenous research and development programs in developing countries. Virtual research groups—composed of interconnected specialists in different parts of the world—allow databases to be shared, conferences to be organized, papers to be circulated and discussed, and collaborative research and reporting to be undertaken.
Another rapidly growing area of ICT-mediated learning is in the delivery of technical and vocational training. Because ICT can facilitate sophisticated and customized performance simulation at low marginal cost, many organizations and vocational training facilities are employing ICT to train workers in an array of functional areas—from healthcare to IT services—even to train teachers themselves.
ICT-enabled solutions also present significant opportunities for enhancing the efficiency and effectiveness of education administration. Through the use of ICT data repositories and networks, curricula can be developed collaboratively, educational materials can be procured more cost effectively, staff and student time can be scheduled more efficiently, and individual student performance can be monitored more closely.
Challenges
While UNISA has a key strength in the quality and relevance of its educational content, a number of key challenges must be overcome before it can achieve critical scale with its online offering. Chief among these is securing the skills and capabilities required to develop and maintain a rich and broad program of educational content. The development of applications to deliver content to a broader and more diverse audience is also a priority.