Boosting digital literacy, what does it mean?

COVID-19 highlighted limits in the traditional way of teaching. The digital transformation for increased resilience has not been self-evident everywhere, with the digital divide only becoming more apparent. Eastern and Southern African countries had at that time also temporarily closed educational institutions, affecting learners at all levels. Lack of continued quality education dramatically deepened existing social inequalities and might even destabilise societies in the future. In 2020, 82 % of learners in sub-Saharan Africa did not have access to the internet. As countries are exploring the use of e-learning, many are lacking sufficient support to provide quality digital education aligned with the national curricula that reaches a large proportion of pupils and students and ensure inclusive access for rural populations.

The start of the school year is a good opportunity to discover the activities and infrastructures that have already been implemented, but above all to get the opinion of partners, school directors and teachers directly affected by these initiatives. “Thanks to this software (Moodle in combination with H5P) I can now create my own content and use new technological tools. It allows me to facilitate my daily tasks and create more interactions with my colleagues.” Marie-Rose Abayisenga – CBA VERIFIER (Competence based Assessment), IPRC Kitabi.

“During the trainings I have realised that using digital content and tools make my course more interactive. It allows me to give some tasks to students remotely and then giving concrete feedback. We have created more interactions between trainers and trainees and I find it very pleasant. (…) Besides I can say that we are now in a good stage in the learning process because I’ve followed more trainings than my colleagues and can share now my knowledge with them. They know we can collaborate and they can ask for my support.” Gedeon Manirakiza – Lecturer, IPRC Kitabi

“It is really important that our teachers can follow ICT trainings and discover more on how digitalisation can assist them in their work. With the new classroom we hope that our students will also be able to develop new techniques and share knowledge aligned with the requirements of the modern world.” Simon Habanabashaka, Kanyinya TVET School Manager

“Digitalising the existing content for TVET trainers should allow trainees to be more resilient and flexible when it comes to teaching new approaches. We also hope that digitalised content will add quality in TVET education.” Maria Bernadette M. Ramos, project leader (Senior TVET Specialist) - Rwanda TVET Trainer Institute