The learning experience of children in remote locations has been a cause of concern for both political and community leaders of most countries whether developed or developing. These concerns have been given expression by international development agencies like UNICEF, UNESCO, the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank, among many others, including many international NGOs with a special interest in education. In the year 2000, many these agencies came together to develop a major global effort to bring Education For All (EFA 2000) of the worlds' children. One of the many strategies proposed by the meeting was to use ICTs extensively. We would like you to watch the video programme ‘Bridging Earth and Sky' of a study by Stanford University of the USA in introducing ICTs in rural schools in China.

Besides financial resources, the concerns expressed through the video also include the quality of education in remote areas.  The quality of a child's learning environment is determined by a number of criteria. Can you name a few that you are familiar with?

It is generally accepted that there is no universally accepted or used definition of ‘quality' in education. Many would argue that there are three basic components, which could be used as indicators, namely the school, the teacher, and the classroom. Each one of them in turn would be assigned subcomponents. For examples some authorities would consider the context of the school (school leadership, discipline, vision and mission), teachers (qualifications and experience, academic skills, work assignments, professional development) and the classroom environment (curriculum and its content, learning resources, technology, class size).

Rural and remote schools often fare poorly in comparison to urban schools for a variety of reasons. It is in this context that governments have adopted a number of ICT based strategies (most of which address the need to improve access to quality pedagogy, learning resources, and professional development). These ICT based strategies include some or all of the following:

1. The identification and deployment of appropriate technological tools that fit the rural environment. This would mean installation of electrical and data networks with electrical stabilisation, maintenance regimes for the equipment, and security to protect the equipment.
2. Access to the Internet and the World Wide Web such as radio-based wireless solutions or satellite based solutions.
3. Technical support to maintain and service computers and other communication devices.
4. Content provision in digitised format. While content at school level should conform to national curricula, it is also necessary to take into account rural cultural sensitivities. Non urbanites are steeped in tradition and their sensitivities to language, religious attitudes and other cultural elements of content have to be carefully looked into. There is also a need to consider the special needs of rural children when using commercially available curricula content.
5. Community involvement in enculturising rural populations to ICT is an important aspect of introducing ICT to rural schools. It is necessary to involve community leaders in the planning as well as deploying ICT in rural schools. Their ownership of the technologies would mean that sustainability can be assured.
6. Inducting and training rural teachers and school administrators to use the technologies is also important. The downside of not doing so will result in big investments in the technologies creating ‘white elephants' that are seldom used. Investment in staff training is an important part and parcel of successful introduction of ICT into rural environments.

Can you think of any other considerations for introducing ICT to rural communities generally and rural schools in particular? As you think about this I suggest you read an extract from a report prepared through a grant from the World Bank in 2004 for the Government of Chile in South America. The report both analyses the challenges and considers strategic solutions.