ICT

Project case

Schools in Zimbabwe are currently short of books, audio-visual resources, teachers, laboratory equipment and internet connectivity denying them access to vast educational resources.

Vision

Pupils and Teachers in Secondary Schools throughout Zimbabwe regularly using ICT to further their learning and teaching across the whole school curriculum.
Pupils and Teachers using ICT to facilitate their own personal development.
School Administrators using ICT to simplify and speed their work.

Please see our leaflet for a summary for the project

The Project

ICT in Secondary Schools

Goals

1. The initial goal aims to put the whole project in place but with a single school as the target. This single school has been chosen in a remote rural area to ensure that whatever we do there can be successfully rolled out elsewhere. We say “one school as the target” but this one school will provide some level of support to a small number of neighboring schools: it will act as a lighthouse.

During this initial period partners will sought who can contribute to the overall plan. We will learn to work together and check all elements of the plan with just one focus. Documentation of our strategies and methods will be vital for future replication. Objectives 1 to 8 below refer to this initial period.

2. The second goal is that once we have a proven workable system in place we will move to limited replication. Based on the enthusiastic requests that we have already received to join the project from some other schools and technically competent parents we will probably roll-out to a small number of geographically dispersed schools. This poses further very real challenges which we will need to address.

3. The third goal will be to roll the project out across Zimbabwe. Quite when and how this is done will depend on political and financial factors that are as yet unknown. We do not have a timescale for this phase.

In essence we are developing a complete system that potentially includes

Hardware provision
Eventually in about 150 “lighthouse” schools across Zimbabwe (about 10% of the total) a computer network with a server providing educational resources and services to all networked computers, printers etc.
In other schools there may be more limited facilities appropriate to their needs but with support from the nearest lighthouse school.
The brief evaluation of available educational material and the preparation of notes to help teachers use such material.
An Open Educational Resource Centre that will hold and disseminate material to schools, particularly the lighthouse schools, even in remote areas.
A method of communicating with teachers to inform them of new and interesting resources that are available to them from the educational Resource Centre. This might involve Radio or Newspaper communication.
Training and Staff development material that teachers can use in their schools and at their own pace to help them use the available educational resources effectively.
Technical support facilities to support in-school ICT staff so that equipment and facilities get fixed quickly when they fail.

For more information on the project please contact:

The Project manager
John Coll (Company Director at Connection Software UK)
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
+44 (0)20 7099 5703
+27 11 461 3302