NN37, May 2006
Special Theme on Education and Training out of Poverty? A Status Report
INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATIONS TECHNOLOGIES (ICTS) IN PRIMARY EDUCATION: TOWARDS A NEW STRATEGY FOR POVERTY REDUCTION IN AFRICA
By Dalia Ghebreyal, New York University
The impact of ICTs as a tool for development has positive implications on fighting poverty in developing countries, especially in Africa. No doubt, primary education is a big contributor to the development. It is important that policy makers should realize the need to discuss the promises and limitations of ICTs in primary education and its relation to livelihood. This paper will bring to the surface the dissonances within theories and practices of implementing ICTs in primary education and the resulting implications on poverty reduction in the African countries. It will attempt to throw light on ways of addressing barriers to livelihood and development in Africa through an analysis of the use of ICTs in primary education. In addition to that, this paper will address the limits of ICT's implementation in primary education, the realities and the future. I assume that primary education issues in Africa still remain as "added on" or are treated as a secondary issue to the main problems of development. Also, I assume that a better integration of ICTs in primary education will greatly contribute to the poverty reduction efforts in Africa. Therefore, many African countries need to develop new strategies for better ICTs integration in primary education. Examples will be used to illustrate my assumptions. This paper is based on an analysis of materials published by different governments as well as publications of International Organizations such as OECD and the World Bank. Based on these assumptions, the study will present an analytical model that illustrates a new strategy in researching, designing, and developing the uses of ICTs in primary education. This model will identify key issues in implementation of ICTs in primary education in Africa, including analyzing and assessing needs to identify goals, mobilizing financial resources, identifying the role of governments, NGOs, the private sector, and then developing evaluation plans.In addition to that, the model will examine the types of support, training, and environment that are likely to make possible the effective integration of ICTs in primary education. The findings of this paper shed new light on understanding the relationships between the uses of ICTs in primary education and poverty reduction in Africa. It shows that primary education in Africa still needs a lot of effort for better improvement. It, also, shows that with the lack of understanding of the important role of ICTs in primary education, there is a risk that many investments in fighting poverty will go unmatched with the desired outcomes. The results of this study demonstrate that using ICTs in primary education is positively and significantly related to higher levels of livelihood in African countries. As a result, there is a need to design an effective strategy for better ICTs integration in primary education. That will include the cooperation of the international donor community to launch new initiatives for providing the schools with the necessary equipments, teachers' trainings, volunteers, and to develop new methods to measure the cost- effectiveness of the ICT's inputs in development.