Arjun sharma's evolutionary thoughts and reflections

Use of ICT at community level around the globe

Arjun — Sun, 11 Apr 2010 10:00:32 +0000

Use of ICT should not create a gap and division among the people and communities rather it should help in strengthening communal unity as well as socioeconomic development of society. Access of ICT and tools at community level might depend on various factors. These factors can be socioeconomic state, accessibility of technology, infrastructure development, level of awareness and literacy etc. Further in general if we categories the globe into highly developed, developed, developing and poorly developing nation then it can be found that ICT has been implemented for different roles and so the impact in those communities. Therefore the role of ICT can be seen from multidimensional perspective in each community level. Depending on the situation, context, purpose, ICT at community level has been applied as telecentres, multipurpose telecentres, community learning centres, telecottage, skill centres, community information centres, community multimedia centres etc.

Latchem C. and Walker D. in their case studies of telecentres implemented at various communities around the globe have made precise analysis of them. I would like to summarise some of them here.

WERN telecottage in Warwickshire, UK aimed to improve the rural socioeconomic state of Warwickshire by providing following main functionalities:

· training;

· a computerised workplace;

· business services, business incubation and IT support;

· marketing and sub-contracting; and

· social events and networking opportunities.

It wanted to stimulate and sustain the rural economy of Warwerkshire through links with enterprises, educational institutions and community groups throughout country.

Western Australia Telecentre Network aimed to address educational needs in rural Western Australia but also to provide a technology hub for a wide range of government, community services and programmes. It was doing tough to improve the declining rural economy and downsizing the relocating services to the major cities. Some of the functions operated were:

Internet-related services — Providing Internet/Web access (all centres), Internet Service Provider/point of presence (POP), e-mail post office, Web page design, chat groups, special events such as Internet Olympathon, Online Australian Day.
Computer-based services — Providing sales and service, training, design of conference/seminar presentation material, etc.
Resource centre services — Providing desktop publishing, printing, laminating, photocopying, facsimile services, secretarial services and administrative support for meetings (all centres).
Social activities — Supporting TeleYouth, KidsClub, TeleSenior and BushNet networks, technology information evenings, etc.
Government services — Providing federal government, state government and local government information services.
Labour market programmes — Supporting the current Coalition Government’s Centrelink scheme, the former Labour Government’s Joblink scheme and Work for the Dole schemes (all centres), providing training via satellite, providing local access to work experience and placement programmes, enabling the long-term unemployed to re-enter the workforce, etc.
Community programmes — Producing community newspapers (50% of all centres); providing tourist nformation, heritage information, information radio, Satellite Shopping Channel, library services, book exchange and community craft shop outlets; organising community projects and activities such as fun runs and vintage car trials.
Local enterprise — Providing landcare and imaging services; accommodating agribusiness centres; supporting Women in Agriculture, and organising Field Days, New Enterprise Initiative Scheme (assisting with new business development) and the establishment of telework, tele-accounting and e-commerce. Communities are also investigating the establishment of Transaction Centres (acting as community banks, Medicare Easy Claim offices and post offices) and other ways in which local commercial activities can be managed through the telecentre system.
General — Selling tickets for theatrical and sporting events in Perth and other major centres; providing payroll services, telephone answering services, art and craft outlets, engraving services, trophy sales, inventory services, security services, video libraries and grant-writing assistance; acting as cyber cafés, advertising distribution points, bus stopover and ticket sales points, and accommodation and equipment rental locations.
Post-compulsory education — Providing for tele-education; enrolling and supporting vocational education and training students (in eight years, enrolments have risen from 640 to 2,500 – 3,000 student units per year); providing rooms, supervisors and technical support for off-campus tertiary examinations (all centres); operating as university “campuses” (two centres). Before the Network was established, 80% of the people enrolled in distance education in the areas covered by the centres were male; two years later, 80% were female.
Lifelong learning — Providing short courses on demand for local communities, training for seniors and others in uses of information and communications technology (ICT), administering Scitech programmes (science/technology activities for children), etc.

As well, a number of other functions for the Network currently being envisioned for the future like Telehealth, Telelaw, Australian Country Information Service, On-Line WA (distribution of all government information), and community radio stations.

Community skill centres in Kitimat, British Columbia, Canada where rural inhabitant are 12000 approx, quite isolated from urban area of Vancouver. The aim of community skill centres in Kitimat, British Columbia Canada were

basic skills upgrading for the local industries’ workforce;
trades training and upgrading;
occupational health and safety training for industry;
training in management and personnel development;
technologist upgrading, specifically in electrical engineering and computer technology;
general computer training;
professional development for teachers;
emergency and fire services training;
language training (French, English and Spanish);
small business development;
recruitment and human resource support for Alcan; and
employment services for Human Resources Development Canada.

AMIC@ at municipality of Asuncion Paraguay is one of the largest city with more than one million inhabitants. It has several problems including major problems like unemployment, crowded, poorly resourced public schools, marginalized zones etc. In collaboration with USAAID this centre was launched which had aimed for some of the following functionalities:

offering formal training programmes, open to anyone in the community and ranging from keyboarding skills for absolute beginners to more advanced training in word processing, electronic spreadsheets, presentational software, desktop publishing,
image processing, Web page design and multimedia courseware development;
providing job skills training, career development programmes and opportunities for employment searches;
training Facilitators and municipal employees in computer applications and telecentre management;
providing Internet access for Web browsing, e-mail, chat sessions and videoconferencing;
providing access to civic and community services such as the National Voter Registration Database during electoral periods when citizens can enter their ID details and find out the location of their polling stations;
co-sponsoring computer-based contests such as one in Web design involving NGOs;
enabling students to use AMIC@ facilities for special projects such as entering the Junior Achievement competition, a highly regarded programme conducted throughout the Americas to engage young people in leadership-related activities;
mounting guided tours of AMIC@ facilities to familiarise would-be users with the services, technologies and potential of ICTs; and
providing open lab times when people involved in formal courses of study can practise what they’ve learned, using the AMIC@ facilities.

Nakaseke multipurpose community telecentre, Nakaseke Uganda is one of the sub county with 31000 inhabitants. This rural area is economically very poor and this multipurpose telecentre was operated with following major function

telephone and fax;
resource centre and book box for schools;
Internet and e-mail;
ICT training and applications;
topical video shows;
outreach programmes and community development programmes;
secretarial services;
compilation and dissemination of indigenous knowledge;
sports and entertainment;
telemedicine; and
demonstration site for modern agricultural practice and, in partnership with the FAO, linking of research centres with extension agents and rural farmers.

Community Information Centre (CIC) Project in North East India was meant to provide Internet connectivity and citizen services delivery. It was part of an economic package announced by the Prime Minister of India in January 2000 to speed up economic development in the North East region. It was meant to connect all the 487 administrative blocks of the region with ICT availability. The implementation period for the project was slated for two years while the total time of the project was five years. The project envisages a community center with Internet facility through V-SAT at each administrative block.Each of these centers was equipped with a LAN having five PCs, a server and accompanying equipment like printers, UPS, furniture and power generating set. In some of these centers, facilities for video-conferencing was made available. Each of the centres was manned by two persons appointed by the respective state governments. These CICs would eventually be points of citizen delivery in a larger e-governance initiative. Following aims were envisioned in this project:

Interface between citizen and government
Connectivity to Internet through NICNET
Web Browsing and email facilitation
Distance learning programmes
Familiarising use of computers among special groups like children and women
Enabling IT-enabled services as needed for the local community
Generation of employment opportunities
Dissemination of information on matters of local interest

Kristy Martin and K.P. Bhutia in their case study in Nepal related with Community multimedia centres (CMC) tries to analyse about access of ICT to poor, disadvantaged and marginalised people.

The study presents the context that UNESCO in 2003 supported the creation of Nepal’s first pilot Community Multi Media Centre (CMC) in Tansen, Palpa. Since then, the organisation has supported the creation of two additional CMCs in Nepal, one in Madanphokhara (Palpa District) and one in Lumbini (Rupandehi District). The three CMCs are networked with 5 telecentres throughout Rupandehi and Palpa Districts. A CMC combines old and new media. In Nepal this includes community radio and local cable television, with new media facilities. The CMC media mix in Nepal consists of FM broadcasting services, office applications, audio equipment, internet, telephone, fax, photocopiers, scanners, video and audio programmes. The CMCs not only offer low cost public access to new media technologies but also run discounted training courses on the equipment and software for local users.

According to the research the CMC’s in general has combined new and traditional media which has brought about benefits in local, remote and poor areas. It has facilitated community access to ICT’s by breaking down existing social barrriers including langguages, access, affordability and education. It has also engaged local youth in content creation and programme production at that community level.

Spence R. states poverty will not be eradicated by ICTs – and for many poor populations, more basic needs may take precedence. But equally, poverty will not be eradicated without these technologies, and failure to maximize their potential for poverty reduction, in this era, would be incongruous.

It can be seen that diffusion of technology and assimilation of the services of ICT depends on the nature, state and context of communities. There comes a issue of participation of stakeholders, implementation, engagement, continuation, evaluation of any activities. In poor and developing countries ICT, is much more expected as a direct commodity to help them in their day to day living. This scarce technology when taken at the community level the whole community expect if it is a useful commodity that can directly help them with their day today living. After that comes information sharing and learning using those technologies. People do not have much patience to use ICT in sharing and learning. But it does not mean learning and sharing knowledge does not happen but that becomes secondary usability in that case. Participation of community can be highly achieved in these communities. Instead in developed countries where there is wider access of ICT at personal level the use of technology is different and diversified. It can be realised that innovative technologies, learning methods, networking and sharing activities are prioritised. They have tendencies to use for skill development, trainings, sharing skills and ideas, networking and innovating new technologies and ways of communicating for the social and economic development of the region. It can be seen that diffusion of ICT at community level certainly enhances social, economical development of any societies. I think the evolution and development of ICT technology has already brought many revolutionary changes. But exclusion of this development in rural communities will create a huge divide among the communities that can eventually bring a devastating division and conflict among people. Therefore it becomes necessary to think, minimise and eliminate this gap of digital divide and apply this technology for the people and for the development of all communities.

References:

Spence R. (2003), Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs) for Poverty Reduction: When, Where and How? , http://www.idrc.ca/uploads/user-S/1074024575110618469203RS_ICT-Pov_18_July.pdf last visited 11th Oct 2008

Latchem C. and Walker D. (2001), Telecentres: case studies and key issues, The Commonwealth of Learning, Vancouver

http://www.col.org/colweb/webdav/site/myjahiasite/shared/docs/telecentres_complete.pdf last visited 11th Oct 2008

Bhutia K. T. and Martin K. (2007), Community multimedia centres in Nepal, UNESCO, http://portal.unesco.org/ci/en/files/25723/11981456231forging_innovations_en.pdf/forging_innovations_en.pdf last visited 11th Oct 2008

ICT for people, society and development

Arjun — Sun, 11 Apr 2010 09:42:51 +0000

Information and communication technology (ICT) has already been experienced as one of the most powerful development of 21st century. The development, diffusion and use of ICT have brought revolutionary changes in various sector of the globe. There is no doubt that the formation of knowledge economy, globally interconnected societies is the result of development and usage of ICT. The development and usage of ICT like other development has varied greatly from societies to nations. But something different that we can see is that this technology has changed the pattern and dimension of development. For example several developing countries like India, China and other such countries which have favoured ICT development and usage have highly benefited in the development and growth of economy. Similarly developed countries are able to construct a strong knowledge based economy, informed and networked societies using the potential of ICT. This is realised true when we see only the developed part of it. But when we try to see the other part being specific and from many aspects then a question arises if every nation, societies are really able to exploit the power and advent of ICT? Then the answer is not that easy as we explain. Like several other advents and developments ICT is also creating a dangerous gap between people, societies and nation. This negative and dangerous impact might be in same or different pattern but if this development brings divide and inequity among people and societies like other in the past then this is a real challenge.
Becoming aware of this issue I am trying to analyse various possibilities of ICT in overall development of developing countries. This might be as well implied for developed countries in some cases.
ICT has been now taken as a major sector for economic development by many nations. India has tremendously developed IT market and thus contributed in the economic development of its region. There may be different ways and preferences to use ICT in economic development. But ICT has become a major part of economy is several other developing as well as developed countries. Automation work, software development, development of communication and such other information tools has generated a huge market creating a huge economy. This has created a competitive human capital, knowledge oriented market, lot of new jobs and income for people thus increasing consumption in overall market. ICT has greatly contributed to stimulate the economic growth in some developing countries like India, China and some other developing as well as developed countries. India has developed itself as a back office for global destinations by taking outsourced technical and customer service work. Software development and export also contributes a lot in economic growth of India. China’s economy is greatly supported by export of ICT tools, devices and software’s as well. This has proved that ICT can greatly support in economic growth and development.
When we look at the overall development of the society and the role of ICT for socio-economic development then we can see a very large vacuum. It has been generally seen that ICT is revolving within urban region, few organizations and people in developing countries. In developed countries also it has been noticed an increasing digital divide, difficulty in accessing ICT technology and its optimum usage has also been seen as a problematic issue. The bitter truth is that many developing countries still remain rural in terms of infrastructural development and people suffer from chronic poverty. In Nepal, thirty-five percent of total population lives in poverty, nearly fourty-five percent people are illiterate. Those people have no access to clean drinking water, food, basic health, education. People have very low income or no income. People are unskilled so have very low wage rate. Minority groups have not been integrated in the main stream of social development. There exist several ethic group based on language and origin who don’t understand official language. There are divisions between castes, ethnic group, and religion. Huge population lives in rural area where there isn’t infrastructural development. In this preface many question can be raised. Can ICT be an important tool for the socio-economic development? Is ICT able to reduce poverty, improve livelihood and empower people and society?
If ICT is considered as a revolutionary advent of 21st century then this technology and tool should be able to address above illustrated problems and help in the transformation of society. (Spence, 2003:19-22) mentions the use of ICT in social development by poverty reduction in following ways.

• Access to information on community-level
• Demand-driven development of new technologies
• Gender-equality and empowerment initiatives
• Education and Human Resources development
• ICTs as growth engine
• Livelihoods development
• Public sector,social services & poverty reduction management
• Environment and natural resource management
• Innovating and empowering role at several levels.

Some initiatives have been seen in the use of ICT for overall development of people and society. Community based learning centres (CLC’s) are enormously growing in several developing and developed countries. In developed countries CLC’s are operated by local government in public and social partnership. But in developing countries because of lack resources the CLC’s have been initiated with support of UNDP, UNESCO and several other International development organizations. These CLCs are seen to be functioning according to the context and need of their own community. CLCs is said to have already achieved many positive impacts in developing countries to empower people, support in reducing poverty, helpful for livelihood. But this is also a matter of study whether these initiatives are supporting disadvantaged community, underprivileged people, and sustainable development in their capacity. Similarly the concept of CLC’s in developed countries, its usage and impacts are still under investigation.
Reference Used:

Spence R., http://www.idrc.ca/en/ev-53023-201-1-DO_TOPIC.html: last accessed 1st October 2008.

E-learning 2.0

Arjun — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 09:13:57 +0000

The emergence of web 2.0 is seen as a social evolution rather than technological in order to bridge the need of social interaction, information sharing and collaboration in the information society. A continuous effort can be found in using the properties of communication networks for this purpose. In this context e-learning is also rapidly shaping towards e-learning 2.0 by accommodating the potential and features of web 2.0. This incorporates web 2.0 features like wikis, blogs, rss feed, social bookmarking, social networks, audio video sharing applications and different virtual environments. The integration and interoperability of web 2.0 features is seen as a challenging issue. E-learning 2.0 is said to be combining traditional learning management system (LMS) functionality with integrated social networking tools. Recently University of Cambridge’s Judge Business School has adopted e-learning 2.0 LMS called TOPYX developed by Interactyx. The main feature of this LMS has been claimed that it integrates the social networking tools in the LMS which provides users and learners a collaborative, networked, engaging, open, user friendly and flexible learning environment. What is the real potential of e-learning 2.0 applications and the impact in pedagogies will still be a major concern in the coming days ahead. s

Main issues about E-learning

Arjun — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 21:29:35 +0000

The most precise definition of e-learning is given by e-learning strategy for Wales as “e-learning is the use of electronic technology to support, enhance or deliver learning”. Learning in form of modern education and trainings can be enhanced by using range of innovative electronic technologies. Multimedia plays an important role in the support and delivery of e-learning.

As the 21st century society is changing into information society, access, analysis, use and management of information plays a major role in the development of societies. Garrison D.R. & Anderson T. (2003) states that e-learning as an open system and with the power of internet, learning and teaching transaction has expanded unfathomable amounts of information. US web based education commission states that e-learning is exciting from the perspective that it enhances and enriches both content and context.

When viewing the global arena it reflects that e-learning is the most capable medium to spread literacy, skills and knowledge across the world irrespective of class and various differences. United Nation and other similar organizations highlights that the main problem of the underdeveloped societies and nations in the 21st century is hazardous poverty which is caused due to lack of opportunity in education and skills. When I think about the development of any society then industrialization, business, trade and services are found to be playing the major role. Scientific research and sustainable development plays a vital support in the advancement of these processes of social development. Snow, C. P. (1959) has stated that the most fruitful outcome for people arises from the clashes between the technologist perspective and the humanist perspective. This also means a responsible system which focuses on using the power of technological innovation for the welfare of people and development of society is the best approach. It’s the human attitude and behaviour which rather unnecessarily introduces the political color and flavour in the society. This again means awareness, education and skills plays the vital role for the development as well as civilization of the society.

In this context Garrison D.R. & Anderson T. (2003) again states that the goal of quality e-learning is about blending diversity and cohesiveness into a dynamic and intellectually challenging ‘learning ecology’. They also mention that this allows interactivity beyond one way transmission of content and extends our thinking regarding communication among human being engaged in the educational process.

The main challenge that has been exposed is that there are no simple rules and regulations for designing and delivering effective e-learning experiences. So designing and creating context, with appropriate level of social presence that is congruent with the content and fulfilling the educational goal that supports and enhances cognitive presence and realization of higher-order learning outcomes has been seen as the main challenging issue.

When it come to designing and organization of e-learning then following are the main concerned issues as highlighted by Garrison D.R. & Anderson T. (2003):

Designing issues

Establishing curriculum

Identifying resources

Defining clear expectations and goals

Addressing activities (collaboration & individualization)

Setting time frame

Devising assessment process and instruments

Selecting media

Organizational issues

Policy development:

-underlying background

-define core values

-describe strategic goals

Need and Risk assessment

-identifying issues

-identify challenges

-best practices

Educational principles and outcomes described
Implementation initiatives and strategy

-link to institutional priorities

-create a steering committee

-identify community of practice

Infrastructure

-design multimedia classroom

-describe educational process

Info structure

-designing institutional community

-create knowledge support system

Cost and budget
Support resources
R&D
Benchmarking

Setting up a worpress blog

Arjun — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 23:53:16 +0000

Bogging has been a useful way for me to reflect some of my thoughts and ideas. I practiced blogging a year before and now I have shifted to this blog URL. Different people have been found to be using blog for various purposes and in different styles. Some of you might still be wondering how to set up or configure a blog for yourself. Let me reflect here some of the steps I followed during the configuration and setting up my own blog.

I would say that configuring a blog from www.wordpress.org is really simple.
The first and foremost thing is that you need to have a registered domain name, upload and access to configure your files to a server. After registering a domain name and host, it is quite helpful if you have some technical skills to getting connected to the host server and uploading the files that you download as open source blog files from www.wordpress.org/download . Let me explain this process in few steps:

1. Download wordpress open source files to your computer as stated above. Unzip the folder.
2. Upload all the files to the root folder i.e public_html folder of your host. To upload easily it is best to use ‘upload supporting software’. I use Filezilla for this purpose.
3. When the upload is completed, then it is necessary to configure the database file in the host computer. In this case you need to open the My SQL database and create a database, a user name of the database and set a password.
4. The database name, user name and password has to be updated (filled up) in the wp-config-sample.php file from among your uploaded wordpress files and save. Then rename the wp-config_sample.php file to wp-config.php. Detail instruction on setting database is found on http://codex.wordpress.org/Installing_WordPress#Detailed_Instructions

5. That’s all. Now to install your wordpress blog, type www..com/wp-admin/install.php and enter. But if you don’t upload files in a separate folder then there is no need to specify the folder in your url.

6. Your blog will be installed and you can access your blog by typing the url address in the address bar.

7. After this you can configure or manage your blog by logging inside and following the wordpress support link http://codex.wordpress.org/Working_with_WordPress

If you find any difficulty please forward your enquiry at global.arjun@gmail.com. Thankyou!