digital divide

							                                      University of the Philippines
                                             College of Education
                              Educational Technology Department
                            EDUC190 – Computers in Education




                Digital Divide


Ferdinand B. Pitagan, PhD
Professor of Education
 Sharing your experience

• What kinds? – mobile phone, iPod,
  Wiki? Blogs (facebook, mixi..)?
  Skype? etc.
• For what?
• How often?
• individual differences?
   Digital haves - Info rich
                                 Access
   The Gap                        Skills
                                Knowledge
                                 Attitude

Digital not haves - Info poor

ICT: information and communications technology
  Digital haves - Info rich     Nations
                              Generations
                                Genders
      A series of Gaps       Ethnic groups
                              “Education”
                               Economic
                                 levels
Digital not haves - Info poor Social status
                               Languages
Evolution of Digital Technologies



    1) Provide opportunities
       2) Create problems
          Digital Technologies

Digital                             Digital
Divide    Changes in Society      Opportunities




               Education
          (Policies, Practices)
Why Digital Divide is
an important issue….
      Digital Divide

      a deepening of
existing forms of exclusion

      Unemployed, poor,
    housebound, disabled,
   less educated, minorities
         Women/girls
Finding Facts
Internet World Statistics (2009)
   http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats.htm
         Digital Divide at A Glance (ITU figures)

• less than 3 out of every 100 Africans
• 1 out of every 2 inhabitants of the G8
  countries
• top 20 countries (Internet bandwidth) ---80%
  of all Internet users
• 30 countries with an Internet penetration of
  less than 1%
• 429 million Internet users in G8
• 444 million Internet users in non-G8
• Mobile = 34% of the world’s total mobile
  users from G8 countries – 14% world
  population

 G8- Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the UK and the US
    Cultural factors
                            Social factors
                            (gender, race..)

                Digital Divide

Other factors

                       Economic factors
Internet Users by Income level of country
                  (2003)
                Asahi Statistics p.189




    •   High-income : 65.5%
    •   Upper middle income : 7.8%
    •   Lower middle income : 21.5%
    •   Low-income : 5.6%
UCLA World Internet Project (2004)
      - Internet Users -
 Britain men 63.6; women 55.0
 Germany men 50.4; women 41.7
 Hungary men 20.3; women 15.1
 Italy men 41.7; women 21.5
 Japan men 54.7; women 46.2
 Korea men 67.8; women 53.8
 Macao men 37.8; women 28.8
 Singapore men 47.2; women 34.0
 Spain men 46.4; women 27.2
 Sweden men 67.7; women 64.4
 Taiwan men 25.1; women 23.5
 United States men 73.1; women 69.0
“…86 percent of women ages 18 to 29
were online, compared with 80 percent of
men in the same age group.

“…among the older group, those age 65 and
older, 34 percent of men are online,
compared with 21 percent of women.”

USA, Washingtonpost Thursday, December 29, 2005
                   White Paper on
    information and Telecommunications in Japan




http://www.johotsusintokei.soumu.go.jp/whitepaper/eng/WP2002/press_information01.pdf
  Japan                    Culture!
    Age                 Language
                   non-alphabet writing)
                       Handwriting
Computer anxiety            Nigate-ishiki

 Computer experience

Education!                Digital divide
   Japan

  Regional gap

               Internet Use via Mobiles

 Generation gap
  - Old people
                           Housewives

People with disabilities
What do these mean?
   Not easy to stop/lessen gaps

 If we don’t do anything about it….

       Need for awareness

     Need for strong policies

Need for international collaboration

        Need for education
What can we do?
World Summit on the Information Society
http://www.itu.int/wsis/tunis/newsroom/stats/Building-digital-bridges_2005.pdf



1. International Collaboration
   “UNDP etc – e Vietnamese Village”
   “Japan – Asian Broadband Project”
2. NGOs/Public sectors
   “Brazil – Tele-centers”
3. National Policies
   “Egypt – E-readiness Plan”
   “Korean Agency for Digital Opportunity”
4. Business Involvement “Sudan – SUDATEL”

#### Individual efforts
World Summit on the Information Society


- 8 key areas for policy suggested-


1.   Access for all to HW & SW
2.   Changed roles of teachers/learners
3.   Promoting lifelong learning
4.   Quality assurance
5.   Enhanced citizenship
6.   Brokering services and agencies
7.   Support, encourage & direct research
8.   Change in role of policy-maker in education
     Free discussion - What do you think?

“Teachers should be trained and retrained to
    effectively and efficiently use ICT in
         teaching and management!”

– from digital divide/opportunities perspective



                  Singapore and Korea
            -Training, retraining every 3 yrs
           -30% of teaching hours/curriculum
             - ICT use in teacher evaluation
- All classrooms connected to the high-speed Internet
   Digital Opportunities

ICT, helping to overcome
 some forms of exclusion

Distance learning to remote areas
   Village tele-centers with ICT
       Maori education in NZ
Digital technologies




  Lifelong society
           Education

             Youth,
   prepare for changing world

             Adults,
enable to participate in this world

          Everyone,
       continue to update
       Do you see any
Digital Divide in Education??
Digital Divide in Education

-Digital divide in investment (input)
-Digital divide in ICT use (process)
-Digital divide in people (output)
 1. Digital Divide in Investment




Input Factors

Hardware, Materials (software),
Connectivity;
Integration of ICT in curriculum;
Supports;
Policies
      Computer equipment in schools
               Source: Japan, MEXT (2005)

                # of        % of the           % of the
             students       Internet           Internet
                per          access             access
             computer       (school)         (classroom)

Elementary     9.6            99.9


Lower
               6.9            99.9          48.8 (average)
Secondary


Upper
               5.5            99.9
Secondary
   “why is it important
to understand and lesson
       digital divide
      in investment
  in formal education?”
“Schools or educational
  institutions can play
     a compensatory
    equalising role.”
       2. Digital Divide in ICT Use



Process Factors

Different approaches to ICT use
      - Used for advanced applications
        and thinking?
      - Used for basic skill training?
      - Used for computer games?
           University Faculty’s Use of ICT in Teaching
                             Source: Japan, NIME (2003)



Administrative communication by email             28.1          25.4


                        Q & A by email         13.0      22.6


                     Presentation tools        13.8 14.3


  Students report submission by email          12.0 13.7


Posting instructional materials on web         9.3 16.3
                                                                            used always
                                         0.8
                                                                            used often
         Posting lecture video on web            0.9

                                           0           20       40     60     80    100
    As a presentation tool?

As a simple communication tool?

   As an administrative tool?

  As a problem-solving tool?

      As a creation tool?

      As a research tool?
              Gaps
  between teachers and students,
among teachers and among students



            in terms of
       Skills & Knowledge
       Ways of using ICT
              Attitude
     3. Digital Divide in Different Groups



          Human (Outcome) Factors

          Digital literacy?
          - ICT skills / knowledge
          - confidence
          - competencies

“What is more important is to empower people……..”
(Week2-reading#1 “Learning to bridge the DD - p.56)”
  ICT Skills (University, Perception)
              Source: NIME (2003)




     “I do not have adequate
     ICT skills and knowledge”

- More faculty than students
- More older people than younger ones
- More people in humanities and social
sciences than those in natural sciences
and engineering
Some policies (Education)

1. USA – “E-rate program”
2. EU- “eLearning Action Plan”
3. Japan - “Millennium Project”,
           “E-Japan Strategy”
4. Romania – “Multipurpose Community
              Telecenters”
   Digital divide in informal learning
(more learning happens outside schools)

           Home differences
          Differences at work
      Differences in communities
       Digital Divide

   Understanding the issue
  from various perspectives

  - As a teacher in the future
   - As a university student

“To make ICT used and useful”
     Group Activity


DIGITAL DIVIDE in the
    PHILIPPINES
      NEXT MEETING

Approaches in using media
      for instruction