ICT integration in education and training in Africa - ready for the next step

Education and training technologies have been undergoing unprecedented development for several years now. This trend is manifest in the increasing interest in ICT shown by operators and actors in education and training at national and local levels and in both public and private sectors. It is a trend that can also be seen in the close attention paid by international agencies, donors and cooperation bodies to investment in ICT in support of African governments in their efforts to meet the challenges relating to the sector and beyond.

This development is also perceptible in the rapid increase in the numbers of local, national, regional and international gatherings that address the issue of ICTs in education and training (seminars, conferences, shows/exhibitions, workshops, and so on) and their impacts.

In a number of African countries, this interest in ICT has led to deployment of the technology which in many cases exceeds the capacity for assimilation of new methods by the various operators/actors in their education and training systems. This mismatch between speed of deployment and capacity to assimilate innovation becomes a major barrier to the achievement of a positive conclusion to initiatives for ICT utilization, which in numerous instances do not stem from any need felt and expressed by the actors/operators directly involved. Poorly researched and inadequately supported, such failed attempts discredit ICT, discourage innovators and confirm the arguments of skeptics.

The failure of a good number of African initiatives is understandable. Not only are African countries not producers of new technology but ICT integration into education and training is also an enterprise that seeks contributions from the most innovative sector for the benefit of another that is perceived as quite conservative: education.

That being said however, judicious integration of ICT into education and training systems is now a requirement that can be neither denied nor ignored. Every study conducted or commissioned by the various stakeholders – i.e. governments, international agencies, donors, cooperation bodies, operators in education and training, etc. – has reached similar conclusions as to its necessity.

Many countries in Africa have policies for the development of ICT usage. However, rather fewer African countries have designed and implemented a holistic strategy for ICT integration into their education and training systems. Among those that can be cited here are South Africa, Morocco, Namibia, Rwanda and Tunisia.

A number of publications have documented what has been done in Africa in the area of ICT integration into education and training:

• L’enseignement à distance et apprentissage libre en Afrique sub-saharienne: état des lieux dans les pays francophones [Distance teaching and open learning in Sub-Saharan Africa: the current situation in the French-speaking countries] (2001).
• Costing Distance Education and Open Learning in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Survey of Policy and Practice (2005).
• L’infrastructure technologique et l’utilisation des TIC dans le secteur de l’éducation en Afrique: Vue générale [Technological infrastructure and the use of ICT in the education sector in Africa: An overview] (2007).
• Enquête sur les TIC et l'Éducation en Afrique : Un Rapport résumé basé sur une enquête effectuée dans 53 pays [A survey of ICT and Education in Africa: A summary report based on a survey conducted in 53 countries] (2007).
• Intégration pédagogique des TIC: Stratégies d’action et pistes de réflexion [Pedagogical integration of ICT: Strategies for action and focuses for reflection] (2009).
• Formation à distance en Afrique Sub-Saharienne francophone: Etudes comparées [Distance training in Francophone Sub-Saharan Africa: Comparative studies] (2009).
• Use of Mobile Learning in Educational and Training Settings (not yet published).

All the above studies demonstrate the existence today of a substantial number of initiatives for ICT use in Africa’s education and training systems, and that we now have available a fund of African expertise and an international network of experts and practitioners who have mastered the problems in this area and possess thorough knowledge of the current situation with regard to ICT use in the continent’s education and training systems.

To this development is added a gradual improvement in connectivity in Africa, the growing interest of technology suppliers (hardware and software) and above all a growing political awareness at national and regional levels of the issue’s importance. Where ADEA is concerned, in April 2002, its Bureau of African Ministers of Education resolved to make “the use of ICT for educational purposes a key priority” requesting “the holding of a sub-ministerial meeting to consider this issue”. As a result, the sub-regional Ministerial Conference on “Integration of ICT in Education: Issues and Challenges in West Africa” took place in Abuja on 26-30 July 2004.

At that conference, the Chair of ADEA stated clearly that “ICTs offer new opportunities and possibilities for responses to the problems posed by education”. He went on to add that “this does however require in-depth analysis of the various national contexts, a shared vision of the priorities and directions for development and national policies and strategies based on mutual consultation between the various stakeholders, these being the government, civil society and the private sector.”

At the international level, the United Nations organized the second phase in the World Summit on the Information Society (Tunis, 2005) which helped generate a dynamic for mobilization of development agencies and partners around the subject of ICT in general and Africa in particular. This energy has been reflected in a series of regional and sub-regional meetings and conferences in which representatives of the ministries responsible for education and vocational training have taken part. Decision-makers in Africa have become increasingly aware of the importance of ICT for their sectoral policies.

At the level of the OAU leadership, with growing awareness of the increasing importance of ICT, African Heads of State and Government affirmed clearly at the Conference of the African Union (31 January to 2 February 2010) that achievement of the Millennium Development Goals is dependent on “the capacity of (their) States to make use of the immense potentialities offered by Information and Communication Technologies”. They committed themselves, among other things, to “intensify activities to implement the African Action Plan for the Knowledge Economy and to develop programs and actions for training and the acquisition of basic skills in the area of Information and Communication Technologies”.