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– worldwide and in most, or even all, individual countries – but
only if we break with business as usual.
“We cannot win overnight. Success will require sustained action
across the entire decade between now and the deadline. It takes
time to train the teachers, nurses and engineers; to build the
roads, schools and hospitals; to grow the small and large busi-
nesses able to create the jobs and income needed. So we must
start now. And we must more than double global development
assistance over the next few years. Nothing less will help to
achieve the goals.”
To achieve universal education for all children, it is imperative
to educate enough teachers and train them according to real
needs. This is a formidable task, especially when bearing in mind
that many teachers in Sub-Saharan Africa have died from AIDS.
Most teachers also need regular updating on their subjects as well
as in new pedagogical approaches to effective learning.
There is an increasing demand to acquire not only subject-
specific skills but also generic communication skills, ICT skills and
collaborative skills. To meet “the needs of mass education cost-
effectively, provide learning experiences of percieved quality for a
disparate student group, develop generic skills as well as subject-
specific knowledge and foster a culture of life-long learning” there
are basically two major strategies.
4
The first is to increase access to
education. This can be done by making education offers more flex-
ible and open, modularize it and increasingly offer it as distance
online learning. Developing efficient ICT infrastructure with satel-
lite communication and broadband capacity in urban as well as
rural areas in developing countries is crucial to increase access to
cost-effective mass education. The second strategy is to help
students take more responsibility for their own learning. Students
must learn to be more self-reliant and self-directed. Learning how
to learn is the main concern for independent learners.
A third strategy is cooperation between educational institutions
in sharing educational material and other educational resources.
An increasing number of educational institutions now cooperate
in joint study programmes, student and staff exchange and on
the pedagogiocal use of ICT. The EU has worked intensely on
developing a system for making mutual accreditation easier and
course development and implementation more transparent and
standardised through their European Credit Transfer and
Accumulation System (ECTS). Several African educational insti-
tutions have adopted the system in order to harmonise their
education systems to global demands. This development paves
the way for networks of international collaborating educational
networks, such as the GVU.
Strategy for the information age: individual education
for many
To meet the challenges of the dynamic knowledge society of the
21st century, we must understand how people learn and how
ICT can assist in the learning process. In the last 200 years our
society has been transformed from a relatively static one to a
society where the only constant is change. The knowledge base
in some areas is said to double every 16 months. There is an
abundance of perspectives on everything, even on basic science.
The globalized world asks for creative, critical thinkers with
collaborative skills, the ability to communicate cross-culturally,
using ICT and with an intrinsic motivation for dynamic, lifelong
learning. The future graduate will be characterized as having:
• The ability to convert theory into practice
• The ability to define her/his own problems
• The skill to collaborate cross-culturally
• The skill to systematically seek solutions to new problems
• The skill of efficient dialogue and communication
• The ability to efficiently search for, find, assess and use
relevant and reliable information
• The ability to manage his/her own time efficiently
• The dynamic attitude of a learner with systematic reflections
on own learning.
To achieve this, the students of tomorrow must be given oppor-
tunities to study in collaboration with others. To keep costs down,
he or she should be able to combine studies with a job. The studies
must be flexible enough to accomodate the individual needs of
the student and his or her employer as well. This cannot be
achieved in a mass scale without using the appropriate technology.
When choosing among electronic media, the choice should be
based on the technology that most efficiently facilitates ‘deeper
learning’ which makes learning more effective, i.e. the students
gain deeper insight and understanding in less time. What is more,
the learning process should be pleasurable, thereby motivating
the student to go for more and becoming a lifelong learner.
Joint development of courses and study programmes between
the south and the north must be part of the solution. Network
partners in the south must feel ownership and that they are equal
partners, contributing subject content in course development.
Preparing courses in the US or Europe and imposing these on
students in Africa for example, will only enhance the perception
of globalization and development as a continuation of colonial
relations. In contrast, joint development and delivery to a global
audience of students, perceiving courses from Africa and Europe
as being of equal value because of agreed harmonization and
standardisation procedures, will enhance the global cooperation.
International, easy-to-follow quality assurance systems will make
mutual recognition of competence possible.
The present situation with regard to connectivity is often char-
acterized by a situation where in some cases an entire African
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Judith Irene Nagasha from Uganda and Kristin Hvideberg Tobiassen
from Norway collaborating on problem-solving together with the rest of
their group in the virtual classroom
Photo: Åke Bjørke