eLearning Africa:How Technology is Helping Transform Education in Africa

More than 1200 international education and technology experts, advisers and investors will gather in Cairo in May to discuss how to turn the African Union’s vision of a “transformed continent” into reality. They will look at how developments in technology could enable education and training to boost growth and transform the lives and prospects of the next generation of Africans. The programme for the conference, which is published online today (Tuesday), is available at www.elearning-africa.com.

“New opportunities for expanding education and training are being created across Africa,” says Rebecca Stromeyer, the founder of eLearning Africa. “Everywhere, in every sector, technology is transforming the nature of learning, opening it up and creating new opportunities in both education and training. This is an extraordinarily exciting time for education everywhere. In Africa, the opportunity to create a massive transformation in the lives and prospects of tens of millions of people is enormous.

“The change is already happening. Technology is helping people to learn new skills and in many sectors, such as farming, it is beginning to make a huge difference.Technology-assisted learning has begun to make a significant contribution to economic growth in many countries. The pace of change is only going to quicken over the next decade and the effect will be astonishing. We really are going to see a new Africa, a transformed Africa.

“Education is at the heart of this change. eLearning Africa this year is all about a vision of Africa’s future and how we can make it happen. The African Union has set out its 2063 Vision but how can we turn it into reality? At the conference, we’ll be looking at what’s going on in both education and technology and how these developments can contribute to positive change and growth. It’ll be a very practical conference, featuring hundreds of presentations, proposals, products and solutions from experts and investors from all over the world.”

Themes up for discussion at the conference include the workplace skills of the future; changes in the nature and ownership of learning; improving access and creating new opportunities for students, teachers and trainers; innovation, emerging technologies; higher and further education; and the shape of African education institutions in the future.

Keynote speakers will include Dr Ismael Serageldin, Director of the Library of Alexandria; Professor Thierry Zomahoun, President of the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences; HE Dr Elham M.A. Ibrahim, Egypt’s Commissioner for Infrastructure and Energy; Günter Nooke, German Chancellor’s Personal Representative for Africa in the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development; Tarek Shawki, Dean of the School of Sciences and Engineering at the American University in Cairo; Toby Shapshak, Editor and Strategist; Toyosi Akerele-Ogunsiji, CEO of the RISE Group; and Professor Sozinho Matsinhe of the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa.

eLearning Africa is the continent’s largest conference on technology-assisted learning and training. It is accompanied a special Ministerial Round Table, at which education, technology and communications ministers discuss developments in education and future priorities.