ICT, Education & Emerging Economies

Reflections from WSIS/ ICT4D, Geneva, December 2003

- Prashant Sarin[a] & K.S.R. Anjaneyulu[b]

“Lighting the fire of learning in the hearts of the students, providing role models, and building student-teacher bonds are the most critical factors for successful learning…So even when the jury concludes, as I suspect it will, that the Information Marketplace can radically improve learning, teachers’ dedication and ability will still be the most important educational tool.”

Michael Dertouzos, What Will be. (1997)[1]

The connection between ICT, education and emerging economies has remained amorphous at best – with a number of computer-based pilot projects claiming significant success, yet failing to replicate their pedagogical claims on a wider basis. While the recently concluded WSIS ’03 at Geneva was valuable in bringing together thoughts, ideas and current practices of professionals worldwide, it underscored the fact that education in emerging nations has been largely untouched by the advent of new technologies. Researchers have been attempting to utilize the computer’s strengths to revolutionize the field of education ever since their deployment in the early ’60s but have received only limited success till date. However, relatively recent initiatives such as MIT’s OpenCourseWare may still lead to significant advances – especially with the Wired[2] magazine including Brazil, China and India among the top 10 nations whose citizens access the MIT website. In this context, the authors argue in favor of the educational community stepping back to consider the issues holistically ahead of proposing a template for the future. The authors, after attending several talks in Geneva – list five proposals that, in their opinion, should be deliberated in the considerations leading to WSIS ’05, Tunis.

Proposal 1. Re-examine the role of ICT with respect to the eEducational context

Given the zero-sum nature of finances that resource poor countries such as India and China often struggle with, the introduction of new technology at the classroom level often comes at the cost of time-tested but non-ICT solutions such as new blackboards, additional teachers or more classrooms. In India, for instance, visits to rural schools indicate that while personal computers have aided student retention, there is no noticeable wide-spread impact on grades or other indicators that test conceptual and analytical skills. While a number of speakers at WSIS delved into the possible benefits that ICT could offer, the benefits of using other solutions or merging traditional and technological models did not play a significant role in the discussions.

Proposal 2. Understand the needs of emerging economies

There exists a dire necessity to take important steps forward to address the requirements of ICT in education, particularly in emerging nations. Firstly, given the diversity of needs in education, it is essential to promote context-specific ideas with a sustainable model that can be adopted and replicated. This will be possible only after a thorough user needs assessment has been carried out for the particular education segment. Significant investments in education against competing priorities can only be allocated after this step is complete. Secondly, practitioners using IT in education were under-represented at most fora in WSIS. It is the review and debate of their experiences at the grass-roots level that will bring standards and future areas of research to the fore-front.

Proposal 3. Dissect education under a microscope

While the generic domain of education signifies a life-long learning process, it is too vast to be discussed in a manner that will lead to meaningful insights or action items. Hence the authors propose that it should instead be dissected along several axes – including student’s age, type of education (formal, informal, non-formal, alternate), technology application (television, radio, PC), pedagogical model etc. This distinction is necessary as educational solutions can only be a reflection of ground realities. For instance, university students geographically removed from premier institutes of higher learning could benefit from technological advancements such as video-conferencing or web-based telephony. On the other hand, the traditional “chalk and talk” method employed in primary school education in rural areas of developing countries remains far more effective than the deployment of ICT-based education.

Proposal 4. Identify appropriate technology from user needs and constraints

Often technology is viewed from the narrow constraints of a PC and a solution signifies only a piece of software. However, it is vital to look at non-PC solutions such as audio-books and electronic pens when designing for user communities. Furthermore, we need to consider the needs of emerging countries and devise low-cost IT-based devices that are rugged, incorporate appropriate energy sources, are easily accessible and so forth.

HP Labs India, for instance, worked in collaboration with HP’s Emerging Market Solutions to create an adult literacy testing solution. Initially, focus group discussions identified education as a key priority within HP’s i-Community in Kuppam, Andhra Pradesh. Meanwhile, the State Government of Andhra Pradesh had expressed an interest in adult literacy owing to their vision of achieving total literacy by 2005. Together, the teams identified areas within literacy wherein technology intervention would be cost-effective and hence, chose literacy testing. Based on the characteristics of the user population and the evaluation of appropriate interfaces for interaction, a touch screen was chosen as the primary form for input and speech for output. Pilot studies carried out with 221 learners over a period of 1 month have thrown up positive results in terms of the educational effectiveness as well as the usability of the system.

Proposal 5. Do not use technology as the only key

A clear understanding of the needs of the target student and teacher population must be followed with a truly inter-disciplinary approach that encompasses all the stakeholders. It is crucial to address design needs, socio-economic context, sustainability issues and business eco-systems related to the proposed solution. However, while this probably has been done in some cases, we believe that it has not taken place nearly as often as required. A measure of success is when best practices and replicable guidelines are widely disseminated and used.

(These are the personal opinions of the authors that should not be attributed either to HP or HP Labs.)