INTERNET ACCESS FOR RURAL COMMUNITIES IN NIGERIA FOR DISTANCE LEARNING
INTRODUCTION
Fantsuam Foundation, a not-for-profit organisation, works with rural communities in Nigeria. We have an on-going micro-credit project aimed at alleviating poverty among rural women. Our other projects include Health Education, Promotion of the use of solar stoves, Promotion of Rainwater Harvesting, Literacy and Numeracy programmes for adults and the ‘Staging Post’ project. The Staging Post provides relevant health information and re-training for frontline health workers in our rural clinics and health centres. The internet is our most prolific source of health information at the moment, and we access this whenever we are in the UK, download it on discs and take them back to our field station for translation, re-phrasing and editting to adapt the information for our health workers. We would like to use similar syatem for our distance learning programme.
There is an increasing disparity in academic performance and attainment between student who live in rural communities and those in urban area. The latter and their teachers have access to more educational facilities. Drop-out and failure rates therefore tend to be higher in rural secondaru schools. Women beneficiaries of our Micro-credit schemes are concerned about the lack of access to quality education for their children.
In addition, the cost of re-training and skills up-date are generally borne by teachers. The existing programmes requires the teachers to attend some residential teaching at a university which is about five hours travel from their work stations. The programmes are run by the university during the long vacation which also coincides with the period of intense farming activities in our rural communities. To attend such programme, teachers have to forgo their farm work for that season with its attendant hardship on the family’s budget and nutrition. These factors contribute to the declining motivation for self improvement among secondary school teachers in rural areas. Acquisition of higher qualifications and proficiency is rapidly becoming a privilege rather than a necessity and this also contributes to the poor performance of their students in the National Examinations. Consequently, education with quality content is largely inaccessible to teachers and students in rural communities.
We are therefore making efforts to put a distance learning programme in place towards meeting this educational need in the rural communities we serve. We are starting with a pilot project to provide communication access for distance learning to our communities where there is no access to phones or electricity. Distance can be an effective means providing this service to these communities where there is no access to telephones or electricity.
PROBLEM
We want to provide internet access, affordably, to our Mobile Community Telecentre in Kunyai, Nigeria, where there is no electricity or phone lines. The Mobile Community Telecentre is a van that is being rigged up to carry four computers from one rural community to the next within a 20 mile radius. We want to access quality content at an affordable price for our distance learning programme. The programme will provide basic skills training for our youths, English language lessons and other subjects relevant to the secondary school curriculum as well as relevant information for frontline health workers in our rural communities.
BENEFICIARIES
Our rural communities (comprising women, youths, secondary school teachers and stidents, and Community Health Workers) are the immediate beneficiaries of the distance learning programme. The project will provide communication access for distance learning for secondary school STUDENTS to supplement their formal studies, and also access for TEACHERS to re-train for diplomas and degrees.We want to be able to provide access to information for our secondary school students to supplement their formal studies, and also provide opportunity for rural teachers to re-train for diplomas and degrees. There are three secondary schools serving five of the villages where we work.
There is a leath centre in Kagoro and a clinic in each of the other four villages. The Community Health Workers at the clinics and the nurse at the Health Centre will be able to access information for their re-training and skills up-dates.
VILLAGES INVOLVED
Five village Communities within the radius as of 15-20km have been earmarked as a pilot area in which the distance learning programme will operate. These villages will also have access to email services from the proposed Mobile Community Telecentre.
Our field office for the distance learning is located in the central village of Kunyai with its population of about 1,300. The nearest ISP to Kunyai is anout 5hours drive on some difficult roads. The other participating villages are Kagoro (population about 7,000), Kamuru (2,000), Chenckuk (1,500), Ungwan Rimi (4,000) and Sakwak ( 2,500).
SCHOOLS INVOLVED
The Government Day Secondary School at Ungwa Rimi serves the communities in Kamuru, Kunyai and Chenchuk, while Sakwak has its own Mission secondary school. The third school is the Government College at Kagoro. The tertiary institution (College of Education) at Gidan Waya trains secondary schools and will also be invoved in the project.
This pilot project will involve a total of 360 students, teachers selected from these educational institutions as well as 10 frontline healthworkers. The two senior classes in the secondary schools (SS II & SS III) will provide 250 students and 30 teachers while the College of Education will nominate 60 teacher-trainees and 10 of their lecturers.
AVAILABLE RESOURCES
We have a van which is being rigged up as our Mobile Community Telecentre to provide internet access for the rural communities. We have also acquired four computers which will be carried in the van from one village to the next on designated days.
RESOURCES REQUIRED
TIME FRAME
It is envisged that the pilot project will last 18months.
SUSTAINABILITY
The Mobile Community Telecentre project will be incorporated into our existing micro-credit project, with staff from this project trained to operate the system put in place. We will put in place a Telecentre Sponsorship Programme similar to what obtains in our Micro-credit schemes. Nigerians who love in developed countries are often members of clan, village, and cultural organisations in their new countries of residence. Many of these groups are willing to participate in community development activities for their home villages and clans. They will be invited to adopt the telecentre project for their own villages and provide support for its continued operation. Similar organisations including professional associations within Nigeria will also be invited to sponsor the telecntre programme.
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