eLearning Fundi

This week, while in Mozambique, I encountered a context that made me ask myself a question that was once asked when I was learning Principles of Programming Languages. In Maputo, the majority of the people speak Portuguese (as the only international language), and here I am, without any knowledge of Portuguese (and ignorant of the fact that there might be people in Africa who would not understand a word in English). Then the question, what is in a language? I know different disciplines would try to approach this questions differently. For an anthropologist, something like culture, community, society might come up, while for a computer science person, things like functional, and procedural approaches would probably be considered. Whatever the discipline, I believe there would be some form of agreement in that a language creates some sense of identity, pride, and to a lesser (though important fact) economic power (a language sells).

I have worked in eLearning projects where we preach of contextualization, localisation, or adaptation of learning content, processes and scenarios but my experiences here made me appreciate better their meaning and importance. The ideas being preached should enhance the identity of the learning to the specific target, which in turn can create a sense of pride among the audience. Once this is achieved, some economic transformation might occur.

why has the use of technology and research and development in general so limited (in terms of funding, use, and advancement) Africa? Well to answer this question is a presentation from the Minister for Communication, Sciences and Technology, Botswana, Ms Pelomoni Venson-Moitoi. In her presentation at the IST-Africa Conference, she said that in the political and economic scenes in Africa, research plays a minor role, and to the politicians, sometimes (if not all the times) research is seen as a “waste of time”. Most of the research policy that has been employed in Africa is based on demographic studies, and always aimed at pleasing the electorate, or at least for the politicians or administrators to advance their own interests. This in most cases has lead to the oversupply of some developments with very short-term effects, and to the neglect of the most important projects that would have long-term and far reaching results.
What this means is that, most research that has been done in Africa, is not documented in Africa, but elsewhere. And the little that is in Africa, is too complex for the average politician to understand as “most of the time the we [politicians] do not know what you [scientists and researchers] are talking about, yet we are embarrassed to admit”.
As a remedy, the politicians and the scientists need to talk freely, and without the “arrogance” or the jargon (that is seen as arrogance by either sides) to ensure development for Africa, and the governments in Africa start implementing development programmes informed by research and at the same time funding research. To illustrate this, she said that the problem is no longer one sided or belonging to the political class alone as “the trap is no longer for the mice” (refering to an infamous joke of a farmer trapping a mouse, chicken, pig and cow):

A mouse looked through the crack in the wall to see the farmer and his wife open a package. What food might this contain?” The mouse wondered – he was devastated to discover it was a mousetrap.

Retreating to the farmyard, the mouse proclaimed the warning. There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house!”

The chicken clucked and scratched, raised her head and said, “Mr. Mouse, I can tell this is a grave concern to you, but it is of no consequence to me. I cannot be bothered by it.”

The mouse turned to the pig and told him, “There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house!”

The pig sympathized, but said, “I am so very sorry, Mr. Mouse, but there is nothing I can do about it but pray. Beassured you are in my prayers.”

The mouse turned to the cow and said “There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house!”

The cow said, “Wow, Mr. Mouse. I’m sorry for you, but it’s no skin off my nose.”

So, the mouse returned to the house, head down and dejected, to face the farmer’s mousetrap alone.

That very night a sound was heard throughout the house – like the sound of a mousetrap catching its prey. The farmer’s wife rushed to see what was caught. In the darkness, she did not see it was a venomous snake whose tail the trap had caught. The snake bit the farmer’s wife. The farmer rushed her to the hospital, and she returned home with a fever.

Everyone knows you treat a fever with fresh chicken soup, so the farmer took his hatchet to the farmyard for the soup’s main ingredient.

But his wife’s sickness continued, so friends and neighbors came to sit with her around the clock. To feed them, the farmer butchered the pig. The farmer’s wife did not get well; she died. So many people came for her
funeral; the farmer had the cow slaughtered to provide enough meat for all of them.

The mouse looked upon it all from his crack in the wall with great sadness.

She further said that what is now needed to move forward the development agenda for Africa forward is a sense of urgency(speed) and commitment and that the legislation in Africa should be developed towards research and development based on research. Core to this is collaboration and sharing in research and research findings. She said, the way science and research is treated in Africa is like witchcraft in the African mythology (which should remain top secret, and should never be document but passed on through word of mouth to selected and trusted few).

Some of the myriads of problems that are facing the generations, especially in Africa and the rest of the developing world is unemployment. For example, the International Labour Organization reports that despite reported increase in economic, human development, and productivity there is no matching reduction in unemployment and poverty in Africa. While the estimated unemployment rate in the world is 6.3%, in Africa is at a high of 10.3% not to mention that some of the ‘employed’ in Africa are working poor (according to ILO persons working but still living on less than US$2 per person in the household, per day. This is what I would call modern day slavery).

Although the working poor and the unemployed would be more likely to be associated with the uneducated, the case in Africa seems to be different. The access to higher education, for example, is limited to less than 5% in Africa as compared to the global average of 16% . Paradoxically, Africa with its low enrollment rates suffers a very high unemployment rate of its graduates that seems to incline that the number of graduates are more than the markets demand. In as much as we might want to attribute this to the slumps or slow growths in our economies, I think there is still the issue of niche training, retraining, education and reeducation that is required in the 21st Century labour market.

The dynamics of the workplace (globalisation, speed of service, changing demographics etc) needs some tailored and quality training, both of new entrants and the incumbents. In this way, we are sure to ensure, sustainable economic developments and a increased demand for high quality labour.

Fortunately, the time is right for just-in-time and highly customised training using technology. eLearning provides a means for the training and education required for the 21st century workforce. Even if we still have issues with the access to the right technology, I believe with the little that we can access still we can make a difference. The sooner organizations and individuals started taking advantage of technology and innovations in the advancement of their knowledge, the better for the our continent, and for the world. My tip for organizations in Africa is to invest into their most important Capital, the human capital, by putting in place mechanisms of training and educating it (using technology) and also to liaise with other educational providers so that they can shape the educational content that is relevant to the urgent and immediate needs of the African continent. This way, I believe we would solve the problem of unemployment and slavery of working and still living on less than a dollar a day.

For this May day, I pay my tribute to:

• all those who have and are still working to ensure education for all in Africa, and especially Higher Education.
• all those who are fighting to training and educating the African continent in readiness for, and on how to overcome the challenges of the 21st century.
• all those who are using eLearning in Africa!