Spider Initiative to form a Network for ICT in Education

Spider ICT for Education Network Workshop held in Uganda, August 28-29

Spider project partners at the workshop. From left John Sebaganwa (Open Learning Exchange Rwanda), Regina Monyemangene (Open University of Tanzania), Iryna Kuchma (EIFL), Tito Okumu (Makerere University), and Ulf Larsson (Spider). Raul Silveti (Fundacion LaPaz) participated via skype. Spider and five project partners within education has held a successful workshop in Kampala, Uganda where the Network for ICT in Education was formed.

The workshop took place on August 28-29 and was modeled after the start-up of other networks among Spider-funded projects, such as the East Africa ICT4Democracy network. The project partners at the workshop were Makerere University from Uganda (where the project coordinator Tito Okumu participated), EIFL, Italy (Iryna Kuchma), Open Learning Exchange Rwanda (John Sebaganwa), Open University of Tanzania (Regina Monyemangene) and Fundacion LaPaz, Bolivia (Raul Silveti).

During the first day, each project partners introduced their organizations and projects at the workshop and shared what they perceived benefits and challenges for their respective projects to join a network. Generally, the major benefits were the possibility to exchange experiences and resources, the potential of a platform for higher visibility of project results, and possibility to collaborate on joint project applications in the future. It was agreed that forming a network would be beneficial for all participating projects.

During the second day the practical aspects of forming a network was discuss. To our help we had Ashnah Kalemera of CIPESA who was the first facilitator for the East Africa ICT4Democracy network. She gave valuable tips and experiences. A Memorandum of Understanding was drafted and agreed on by all partners present. As facilitator for the network Tito Okumu of Makerere University was selected.

The network has set up an ambitious plan of activities for the coming year which aims to produce the outcomes of: Having established a collaborative platform for ICT in Education as a community of practice sharing knowledge, resources and expertise within the network and globally. Having good practices on ICT in Education disseminated.

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