Learning for a Better Future: Overcoming Disadvantages

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Learning for a Better FutureOvercoming
Disadvantages
Keynote Address presented at the 20th ICDE World
Conference On Open and Distance Education April
1-5, 2001 Duesseldorf, Germany
Professor Dr. Abdul W. Khan The Commonwealth of
Learning Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
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The fundamental cure for poverty is not money
but knowledge. Sir W. Arthur Lewis, Nobel
Laureate, Economics
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The elimination of ignorance, of illiteracy and
the needless inequalities of opportunities are
objectives that are valued for their own
sake. Amartya Sen in India Econocmic
Development And Social Opportunities (1995)
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Education and Sustainable Development
Human Capital Productivity

Family Health Nutrition
Macro-Economic Growth Development
Reduced Poverty
Education
Personal Development
Social Development
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Educational
change
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Change and the Future of Learning

• Nature of change
• Nature of response to change
• Speed of change
• Conceptualization of change
• Changes in identities to individuals and groups

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Societal Trends and Learning

• DEMOGRAPHICS
• World Population is estimated to be 7.2 billion
  by 2015,
• a rise of 1.1 billion since the year 2000
• 95 population increase in developing countries
  alone.

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Societal Trends and Learning

• SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
• ICT, biotechnology, material science and
  nanatechnology
• will generate enormous opportunity for
  the creation of
• new knowledge and its intelligent
  utilization.
• BUT it could widen the gap between rich and poor
• UNLESS effective measures are taken to
  harness the
• potential of Science and Technology

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Societal Trends and Learning

• NATURAL RESOURCES AND ENVIRONMENT
• Sufficient food to feed the world population
• Poor infrastructure and distribution
• Political instability
• Chronic poverty will lead to malnourishment in
  parts
• of Sub-Saharan Africa.
• The dwindling resources available for education
  will
• further decline

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Societal Trends and Learning

• THE GLOBAL ECONOMY AND GLOBALIZATION
• The networked and interdependent global economy
  will be driven by rapid and largely unrestricted
  flows of information, ideas, cultural values,
  capital and goods and services.
• The developing countries can only benefit from
  globalization, if they can provide opportunities
  for their people to acquire knowledge, skills and
  attitudes to be competitive globally.
• Failure to do so will mean widening the economic
  divide and marginalization.

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Societal Trends and Learning

• CONFLICT
• Risk of war among developing countries is low,
  but developing countries will face both, internal
  conflicts and regional interstate wars stemming
  from religious, ethnic, economic or political
  disputes.
• The number of refugees, homeless or displaced
  people may increase significantly requiring
  educational provision of a very different kind.

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A World of Contrasts
Knowledge Prosperity Globalization
Ignorance Poverty Marginalization
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(No Transcript)
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Gross Disparities between Urban and Rural Areas
in Developing Countries

• In Peru illiteracy rates are three times higher
  in rural areas than urban areas
• In Pakistan, 54 per cent of urban children aged
  10-14 have completed school twice the level of
  rural children in the same age group
• The net enrolment rate for the Ethiopian capital
  of Addis Ababa is three times the national
  average, and the capitals gender gaps in
  enrolment are the narrowest in the country
• Nigers capital Niamey has a net enrolment rate
  of over 90 per cent, compared to less than 20 per
  cent in rural areas
• Malis national capital region of Bamako has a
  net enrolment rate in excess of 80 per cent.
  Rural northern regions as Kidal, Timbuktu, and
  Gao have enrolment rates of less than 20 per cent

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Gender Inequality in Education

• Women are 60 per cent more likely then men to be
  illiterate
• There are 42 million fewer girls in primary
  school than boys
• Gender gaps in enrolment have not narrowed
  significantly, even at the primary level. In
  South Asia, the net enrolment rate for girls in
  20 per cent lower than for girls in Sub-Saharan
  Africa and the Middle East, it is 10 per cent
  lower
• There are 12 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa with
  a gender gap of more than 20 per cent in
  enrolment
• An average six-year-old girl in South Asia can
  expect to spend about six years in school three
  years less than an average six-years-old boy

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Barriers to Learning Opportunity

• Increasing access
• Reaching the disadvantaged groups and communities
• Providing educational inputs of good quality
• Making educational opportunities available at
  affordable cost
• Enhancing the relevance of educational provision
  to societal
• and individual needs
• Providing opportunities for lifelong learning

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Paradigm Shift

 
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Factors for ODL Growth

• Political desire to increase provision for
  learning
• Economic desire to cut the cost of education,
  while increasing the participation level
• Social desire towards egalitarianism to ensure
  equity and equality of opportunity
• Educational desire to improve the relevance and
  the quality of the curriculum and to make
  provision for lifelong learning

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Constraints in Exploiting the Potential of ICTs

• Access to technologies
• Cost of technologies
• Lack of infrastructure
• Lack of adequately trained human resources
• Language barriers
• Institutional barriers
• Lack of techno-literacy
• Policy and regulatory constraints
•  

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Strategies to Reach the Unreached

• Multiple Media Approach
• Appropriate ICT
• Integration of training in ICT application
• Sustainability
• Satellite mediated networks
• Community access approach

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Community Telelearning Centres A Model for
Developing Countries

Educational
Products
Vendors
Consumers
Providers
a
Provider
-
1
b
Community Telelearning
Provider
-
2
Centres offering
both web
-
based and
Learners
conventional
c
Provider
-
3
course delivery
d
Provider
-
4
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Forecasts on Technology

• Computers in the future may weigh no more than
  1.5 tons (Popular
• Mechanics, forecasting the relentless
  march of science, 1949).
• I think there is a world market for may be five
  computers (Thomas Watson,
• chairman of IBM, 1943)
• I have traveled the length and breadth of this
  country and talked with the
• best people, and I can assure you that data
  processing is a fad that wont last
• out the year (The editor in charge of
  business books for Prentice Hall, 1957)
• There is no reason anyone would want a computer
  in their home (Ken Olson,
• president and chairman and founder of
  Digital Equipment Corp., 1977)
• This telephone has too many shortcomings to
  be seriously considered as a
• means of communication. The device is
  inherently of no value to us
• (Western Union internal memo, 1876)
• The wireless music box has no imaginable
  commercial value. Who would pay
• for a message sent to nobody in
  particular? (David Sarnoffs associate in