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ICT Integration in African Universities
The document discusses challenges and opportunities for integrating ICT into African universities. It notes that while limited infrastructure and resources pose challenges, partnerships and strategic planning can help overcome barriers. Specifically, the document recommends identifying the roles of ICT in research and learning, conducting sound financial and pedagogical planning, enhancing ICT through inter-institutional collaboration, and developing skills adaptable to change. A case study highlights the Partnership for Higher Education in Africa project, which promotes open educational resources, capacity building, and collaboration between universities.
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ICT Integration in African Universities
- 1. ICT Integration inAfrican Universities: Challenges and Opportunities Greig Krull Saide ODL Summit - 31 August 2012
- 2. Agenda • Context– Motivators and Constraints • ICT Integration in the areas of Higher Education – Research, Teaching, Administration • Challenges and Opportunities – Environment, Institution, People, Technology, Learning • Case Study: Partnership for Higher Education in Africa • Discussion
- 3. Key Trends inHigher Education People expect to be able to work, learn, and study whenever and wherever they want to Technologies used are increasingly cloud-based, and notions of IT support are decentralised World of work is increasingly collaborative, driving changes in the way student projects are structured Abundance of resources / relationships via the Internet is increasingly challenging us to revisit our roles as educators Shifting education paradigms to include online learning, hybrid learning and collaborative models New emphasis on more challenge-based and active learning The NMC Horizon Report: 2012 Higher Education Edition
- 4. Significant Challenges Economicpressures and new models of education are bringing greater competition to higher education Appropriate metrics of evaluation lag the emergence of new scholarly forms of authoring, publishing, and researching Digital media literacy continues its rise in importance as a key skill in every discipline Institutional barriers present formidable challenges to moving forward with emerging technologies Challenges for libraries and university collections: how scholarship is documented, and the business models to support these activities The NMC Horizon Report: 2012 Higher Education Edition
- 5. Context 1. What isyour biggest motivator to integrate ICT into your teaching and learning? 2. What is your biggest constraint to integrate ICT into your teaching and learning?
- 6.
- 8. ICTs in HigherEducation Areas Research Teaching Administration
- 9. Top tools for…? 1. Research 2. Teaching 3. Administration
- 10. Top 100 Toolsfor Learning in 2011 © 2012 Centre for Learning & Performance Technologies
- 11. Types of Challenges Environment Institutions People Technology Learning
- 12. Environment Challenges Opportunities Limited Regional Infrastructure Partnerships between institutions, governments - Electricity and businesses - Access to resources Sustainability Articulate a vision and a strategic framework for harnessing the potential of ICTs to address a country's development challenges Policy Implementation Overarching and guiding national telecommunications and ICT policies, particularly as they relate to ICTs in education
- 13. People Challenges Opportunities ICT Literacy of Teachers Provide prior training for faculty when introducing ICTs Extra effort and time involved Implement incentive systems that promote the in using technologies use of ICTs Lack of readiness of students Provide support and training for students to use technologies Shortage of people with Develop internal capacity in the use of ICT technical skills to maintain ICT systems
- 14. Institutions Challenges Opportunities Major financial investment • Vision and commitment of the leadership to needed deploying ICTs • Require strong institutional policy (resource allocation) High cost of acquiring and • Regional approach for joint negotiations on maintaining ICTs the cost of bandwidth • Identify ways in which the application of ICTs will significantly enhance the research and teaching capabilities High cost of content (e- Look for freely available resources e.g. e- journals, digital libraries) journals Consistency across Centralised units departments
- 15. Technology Challenges Opportunities Reliability and Security • Create a technology plan (includes long term budget) • Funds and staff available to sustain investments in ICT infrastructure and support systems System / Data Integration • Piloting (test the efficacy of a technology) • Possible sharing or coordination of ICT usage with other institutions Inexperience in procuring Understand total ownership cost (acquisition, appropriate ICT installation, power supply, maintenance, replacement, training etc) Limited bandwidth Enhance bandwidth/connectivity through the acquisition of suitable infrastructure
- 16. Learning Challenges Opportunities Delivery methods – online, • Review student needs, technology and blended etc content availability • Learn from experience “Dumping” content Produce high quality content with sound instructional design Content not adapted to the Customise learning content appropriately technology and context Limited interaction between Effective interaction of students with content, students and fellow students and teachers/tutors during the teachers/tutors learning process
- 17. Summary • Lookto integrate emerging technologies into policies and programmes • Identify the specific roles of ICT in enhancing research and learning capabilities • Requires sound financial and pedagogical planning • Provide for adequate infrastructure - backed by capacity building • Enhance ICT though inter-institutional collaboration • Wide adoption of ICTs calls for mindsets and skill sets that are adaptive to change
- 18. Case Study Partnership for Higher Education in Africa (PHEA) Educational Technology Initiative (ETI)
- 19. Project Objective “To support interventions in universities to make increasingly effective use of educational technology to address some of the underlying educational challenges facing the higher educational sector in Africa” The strategic objectives of the PHEA ETI are to: • Support teaching and learning initiatives that integrate educational technology • Promote collaborative knowledge creation and dissemination • Refine institutional systems so that they support teaching and learning more directly • Research and report on educational technology activity in African universities
- 20. Universities Involved University of Education Winneba (Ghana) Kenyatta University University of Jos Makerere (Kenya) (Nigeria) University University of Dar es University of (Uganda) Salaam (Tanzania) Ibadan (Nigeria) Catholic University of Mozambique
- 21.
- 22. OER Challenges Licensing and Finding relevant / Copyright quality resources Clearance Policy implications Adapting or for ICT and remixing resources Intellectual Property
- 23. Achievements Growing Deployment Research Commitment to • Moodle • Case Studies ICT • Other • Evaluation • Policies technologies • Leadership • Online Courses designed • Online Courses taken
- 24. Lessons Learnt • Workingthrough rigid hierarchies creates problems in communication and implementation • Often Educational Technology units are marginalised • Capacity development is a key need, including ability to design projects • Lack of institutionalised incentives for academic staff to engage with educational technology • Limited ICT infrastructure remains a major barrier
- 25. Conclusions • Basic problems such as limited bandwidth and intermittent electricity place significant limitations on the potential for growth • However… • Telecommunications capacity is growing rapidly • Expanding range of devices at reducing costs • Explosion of available quality content online that educators and students can link to • Need governments and institutions to continue investment and focus on ICT use in higher education See the results: www.oerafrica.org (follow links to the PHEA Educational Technology Initiative)
- 26. Summary Open Adequate Education Infrastructure Principles Capacity Adaptive Building to Change Look to Collaboration add Value
- 27. Discussion http://www.slideshare.net/greigk/ict-integration-in-higher-education-in-africa Thank you greigk@saide.org.za greigk_za Greig Krull www.saide.org.za www.oerafrica.org This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.
- 28. References • Johnson,L, Adams, S, and Cummins, M (2012). The NMC Horizon Report: 2012 Higher Education Edition. Austin, Texas: The New Media Consortium. • Isaacs, S and Hollow, D, (eds) 2012. The eLearning Africa 2012 Report, ICWE: Germany. • Commonwealth of Learning. 2009. ICTs for higher education: background paper from the Commonwealth of Learning. World Conference on Higher Education, Paris. • OER Africa: http://www.oerafrica.org/ • PHEA ETI: http://www.oerafrica.org/phea/PHEAETIProjectHome/tabid/170/Default. aspx • http://c4lpt.co.uk/top-100-tools-for-learning-2011/ • Tony Mays, Saide, 2012, Recapping OER Presentation
Editor's Notes
- #4 New Media Consortium (NMC) – international community of educational technology experts – research looks at impact of educational technology globally in next 5 yearsWork and learning integrated – rise of informal learningDoesn’t matter where it is stored as long as it is accessible – wherever we are and what device we useTeamwork and communication via Dropbox, Skype, GoogleDocs, wikisInformation is everywhere – make sense and evaluateBudget cuts, rise of social networks, hybrid enables best of bothConnect curriculum to real life, more student-centred approaches
- #5 Maintain quality while cutting costs – support growing numbers of students with fewer resources; inclusion of corporate learning institutionsCitation-based – difficult to track sharing via social media ,new reviews: link to blogs, retweetingVary rare in education – develop and use digital media literacy skillsRigid processes and practices, status quo, adoption of new technologies seen as outside of role of researcherOpen content, social media, internet access
- #7 21st century skills -Critical thinking and problem solving, Communication, Collaboration, and Creativity and innovation, Technology and Life skills
- #8 Major constraints:Bandwidth, Limited electricity, Financial resources, Human resources, Hardware, Training
- #9 Data processing - Increases in bandwidth and computing power available have made it possible to conduct complex calculations on large data sets Link researchers globally - Greater access to academic resources, greatly enriching research possibilities, Link researchers globallyDigital searching - online full text databases and digital research libraries + Google, Wikipedia Virtual Learning Environments (VLEs) - Content dissemination and student support, Online AssessmentGrowing interest in the social networking in education working sites, wikis, communication tools and folksonomiesEarly uptake included systems for: admission and records, examination and transcripts, finance and management informationBetter and increased access to services and informationImprove on the quality and capacity of management information systems to support strategic decision-making and policy implementation;stimulate and facilitate free flow of information throughout the higher education system; respond to the needs and demands for better and increased access to university services and information
- #11 5th Annual Survey of Learning Tools,compiled from the Top 10 Tools lists of 531 learning professionals worldwide Implications – number of web applications, few education applications
- #13 Provide a sense of focus and direction and spell out clearly how improving the ICT capacity of the education sector can help to address issues of access, equity and quality at all levels. Enable institutions to generate their own internal ICT policies, strategies and plans, they also foster an appropriate allocation of resources.
- #14 Since students are often more familiar with these technologies than they areProvide a sense of focus and direction and spell out clearly how improving the ICT capacity of the education sector can help to address issues of access, equity and quality at all levels. Enable institutions to generate their own internal ICT policies, strategies and plans, they also foster an appropriate allocation of resources.
- #15 Provide a sense of focus and direction and spell out clearly how improving the ICT capacity of the education sector can help to address issues of access, equity and quality at all levels. Enable institutions to generate their own internal ICT policies, strategies and plans, they also foster an appropriate allocation of resources.foster appropriate allocation of resources determine sustainable staffing issues and faculty roles Enable institutions to generate their own internal ICT policies, strategies and plans, they also foster an appropriate allocation of resources.Funding, talentInstitutional policies and procedures for adopting and adapting technology
- #16 Provide a sense of focus and direction and spell out clearly how improving the ICT capacity of the education sector can help to address issues of access, equity and quality at all levels. Enable institutions to generate their own internal ICT policies, strategies and plans, they also foster an appropriate allocation of resources.Build staff capacity in the areas of ICT procurement and contracting Use of unlicensed software an issue
- #17 Technology is of little use if the pedagogical skills needed to effectively and optimally use it are lackingDo not underestimate the importance of the effective interaction of students with content, fellow students and teachers/tutors during the learning processHidden costs - substitution of capital costs for labourRequires a paradigm shift to a process that promotes interaction, communication, collaboration and construction
- #18 Build staff capacity in the areas of ICT procurement and contracting
- #20 Next Steps….
- #21 26 distinct sub-projects across 7 HEIs over 3 years
- #22 27 ProjectsICT and Elearning PoliciesOnline courses and interactive e-content PortfoliosDigitisation of Exam Papers and ThesesMigration of courses from Blackboard to MoodleOpen CoursewareVideo and Audio LecturesExecutive Information SystemsResearch Papers: Gender ICT Perceptions, Elearning Adoption
- #23 Students need to be made aware that assignments etc belong to the institution and openly licensed; contracts for student support for materials development and publicationStaff employment contracts must spell out commitment to materials development as well as IP/copyright licensingKey institutional policies affected: IP, HR, QA of materials development, ICTOther stakeholders: Same QA requirements for OER-based courses as for copyright reserved
- #24 Institutional commitments to ICT growing Strong focus on deployment of ICT to tackle teaching and learning challenges:All institutions using MoodleSome deployment of other technologies (mobile, radio, e-portfolios)Extensive growth in number of online courses produced Growing use of online courses on campusesResearch via case studies and external evaluation
- #25 Projects : have specific and realistic deliverables and link to already identified institutional prioritiesInstitutional commitment to ICT needed through presence of supportive ICT policies and ICT Funding
- #27 The integration of ICTs in higher education is inevitableICT is moving beyond personal computers to mobile technology, Virtual World, Cloud Computing Role of ICTs in improving quality, widening access and cutting costs in the teaching functionTechnology must be seen as a supportive toolThe use of technology needs to add value