Author: claire

Trends

African Libraries under Threat

The Latin poet Horace famously brags that his book of Odes is “a monument more lasting than bronze”. It is certainly pleasant to believe that an author’s ideas can live on in print after his death, according him a certain measure of immortality: the sight, however, of a shelf of crumbling paperbacks is enough to shake the firmest faith in the durability of the […]

General

Happy birthday to the mobile phone!

It was exactly 40 years ago today that Martin Cooper, a Motorola executive and researcher, stood on a Manhattan sidewalk and called his rival, Dr Joel S. Engel of Bell Laboratories, to announce that he’d successfully beaten him to creating the first-ever mobile telephone. “Joel”, he said, according to a 2003 BBC interview, “I’m calling you from a ‘real’ cellular telephone – a portable, […]

Field Stories

Africa’s digital busy bees

These networks of geeks – IT experts (1) who are building, sharing, instructing and innovating – aim to pollinise the Continent with digital know-how (3) without necessarily needing to wait for funding from initiatives of governments and international organisations. By Philippe Royer

Conference sneak preview

Namibia country profile

Throughout its seven years, eLearning Africa has travelled the length and breadth of the African continent, from Addis Ababa, Nairobi and Dar es Salaam in the East all the way to Accra, Dakar and Cotonou in the West and Lusaka in the South. This variety of locations affords different perspectives and diverse cultural contexts within which critical conversations on the evolution of eLearning in […]

Field Stories

Figureheads of development: women’s roles in Africa’s technology industry

Innovation and social entrepreneurship are taking off in a big way in Africa and huge progress is being made, especially when it comes to the growing community of women embracing technology in Africa. Change is happening rapidly, but what effects will this have on the Continent’s numerous traditions and cultures? Next year’s eLearning Africa conference will examine the crossroads of tradition, change and innovation.

Trends

Finding the sweet spot: open educational resources in the developing world

With debate about the benefits and future of the MOOC dominating the educational blogosphere in the last year, discussions about the open sharing of educational resources are becoming more prevalent. Open Educational Resources, or OERs, offer a potential tool for impacting education in developing countries and fast growing economies, particularly in the emerging technology hubs of Africa. These open, freely available educational resources can […]

Trends

Crowdsourcing: is the African continent a step ahead?

Can it be an asset for educational projects on the continent? The African continent is certainly in a good position to utilise knowledge and skills sourced through or funded by a “crowd”, as it can rely on a strong link between tradition and innovation. Whether to provide help in times of economic hardships or to demonstrate common solidarity with the community, alternative or complementary […]