Key considerations when developing an ICT in Education strategy

An output of the EdTech Hub, https://edtechhub.org


ICT Development Strategy for Education (Draft)
It is crucial that ICT in Education strategies are aligned to, and work in service of, the goals of wider national education sector plans and strategies.
Both ICT in Education and broader education sector plans should be: ■ Vision driven -guided by an overall, long-term vision ■ Strategic -providing practicable and evidence-based strategies to reach that goal ■ Holistic -centring learners / students as the principal beneficiaries of the education system, and recognise all forms and sub-sectors of education ■ Evidence-based -using recent, robust, and reliable data to inform the basis of strategies and approaches ■ Achievable -providing a framework for budget and management decisions, and recognise that stakeholder ownership largely determines feasibility ■ Sensitive to country context -based on a sound situational analysis of contextually specific vulnerabilities and address resilience (preparedness, prevention, risk mitigation) ■ Attentive to disparities -identifying and attending to issues of equity (gender, religion, socio-economic status, disability) across the plan, including where disparities intersect, and addressing specific needs of different groups (⇡GPE & UNESCO, 2015).

Balancing comprehensiveness and feasibility
Comprehensive ICT in Education strategies often cover the following components:* *These components are based on the SABER-ICT policy framework (⇡Trucano, 2016). They were identified as a framework for ICT in Education strategies and also serve as a good theoretical framework for an analysis of the state of EdTech.

Balancing comprehensiveness and feasibility
What makes these strategies specific and feasible is prioritising within those components and addressing questions such as: ■ Do the objectives, programmes, and activities address the key challenges identified in the situational analysis?
■ Are the objectives, programmes, and activities coherent and compatible with one another?
■ Who will take ownership / responsibility for each objective, programme, or activity?

Component: Vision and planning
16 "Over the next 5 to 10 years, educational technology will help make education more: Self-Directed: By developing pedagogy, tools and structures to help students develop intrinsic motivation and take ownership of their learning.
Personalised: By creating learning experiences that customise the pace and path that cater to each child's needs.
Connected: By developing collaborative learning experiences and connecting students' learning to the community and the world.

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The Principles for Digital Development, developed by various stakeholders including the Gates Foundation, SIDA, UNICEF, World Bank, and USAID, can be applied to the strategy development process.

Design principles, delivery approach and standards
1. Design With the User: Gather information about the user through conversation, observation and co-creation; and use the gathered information in building, testing, and redesigning tools until they effectively meet user needs.

Understand the Existing Ecosystem:
Consider the particular structures and needs that exist in your country, and dedicate time and resources to analysing the ecosystem to ensure that the selected technology tools will be relevant and sustainable and will not duplicate existing efforts. Ecosystems are defined by the culture, gender norms, political environment, economy, technology infrastructure and other factors that can affect users' ability to access and use technology.

Design for Scale:
Achieving scale can have different meanings in different contexts, but it requires adoption beyond a pilot population and often necessitates securing funding or partners that take the initiative to new communities or regions. Designing for scale means thinking beyond the pilot and making choices that will enable widespread adoption later, as well as determining what will be affordable and usable by a whole country or region.
(⇡"Principles for Digital Development", no date) Design principles, delivery approach and standards 4. Build for Sustainability: Sustainability is essential if user and stakeholder contributions are not to be minimised due to interruptions, such as a loss of funding, and it is thus vital to maximise long-term impact. A programme built for sustainability is more likely to be embedded into policies, daily practices, and user workflow.

Be Data Driven:
Decision-making needs to be informed by quality data collected through rigorous methods. Investigating the readiness of national infrastructure and users (both learners and teachers) is essential for making informed decisions. If possible, break down the collected data geographically and demographically. Design principles, delivery approach and standards 7. Reuse and Improve: Instead of starting from scratch, look for ways to adapt and enhance existing products, resources, and approaches. Start by identifying relevant technology tools and digital content that have already been tested. While an existing tool may not exactly fit all your needs for reuse, consider improving and building on it, rather than creating something entirely new. Reusing and improving can also dramatically reduce the time needed for development and testing, and reduce your costs.

Address Privacy & Security:
Carefully consider which data you will collect and how it will be acquired, used, stored, and shared. Ensure that there are measures in place to protect confidential information and the identities of individuals represented in data sets from unauthorised access and manipulation by third parties.
9. Be Collaborative: Share information, insights, strategies, and resources across projects, organisations, and sectors to increase efficiency and impact.

Design principles, delivery approach and standards
Choosing which of the following components to prioritise will depend on the local context, the specific challenges that a country is experiencing, and the opportunities that are available. The priority areas should be aligned to the vision and informed by the situation analysis.

Educators and teacher training
Maintaining and updating the strategy will require elements of monitoring and evaluation (M&E).
Monitoring is "a process that tells us what is going well or where we should pay more attention" (⇡Kaye et al., 2020).
Evaluation "is a process that attempts to determine as systematically and objectively as possible the relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, and impact of activities in the light of specific objectives" (⇡Khalayleh et al., 2021).