Telecommunication firms help in shift to online learning

Telecommunications companies are partnering with governments to help with the shift to online and distance learning as universities shut down campuses to limit the spread of the coronavirus.

Initiatives to support remote education in Egypt, where nearly 3 million university students have experienced disruption to their studies, according to UNESCO, were unveiled by the Minister of Communications and Information Technology Amr Talaat on 15 March.

Cooperation

The initiatives rely on cooperation between the Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research and mobile operators in Egypt and include among others, free access to the Egyptian Knowledge Bank and online educational platforms.

The Egyptian Knowledge Bank is a digital library and online knowledge hub providing access to free education and scientific publications in various branches of knowledge.

Free access will also be provided to the websites of the Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research, which carries educational content without any additional financial burden on students or the academic community.

Monthly download capacities for home internet subscriptions will also be increased by 20% for 30 days at a cost, to be borne by the state, of EGP200 million (US$12.7 million).

Magdi Tawfik Abdelhamid, a professor at Cairo's National Research Centre, said the development was “laudable”.

"The move … sets an example for other corporates across the African continent to follow in terms of partnering with governments and ministries of higher education to facilitate internet affordability and enhance speed,” he said.

“It is the social responsibility of national, regional and international telecommunications companies to provide a digital helping hand to ensure students continue their education during the current health crisis,” Abdelhamid said.

According to UNESCO, 9.8 million students are experiencing disruption to their studies as a result of closures of higher education institutions in 23 African countries.

Africans, including Egyptians, are paying some of the highest rates in the world for internet access as a proportion of income, according to an October 2019 Affordability Report produced by the Alliance for Affordable Internet.

Other countries

In Tunisia, Béchir Allouch, a professor at the Virtual University of Tunis, said the country’s three telecom operators have also started offering free access to educational platforms and sites of the Virtual University of Tunis.

Allouch, who is the president of the Tunisian Association for e-Learning, said other stakeholders such as the ministries of youth and culture as well as civil society organisations should allow university students who do not have personal computers or smartphones to access higher educational platforms from their data centres in the regions.

“The involvement of all parties is an important condition for the success of the national and regional initiatives to generalise distance learning and to save the academic year in this difficult context.”

Telkom South Africa has announced it will zero-rate educational websites, mainly those of universities and colleges, to facilitate remote learning, and those that inform the population about the COVID-19 coronavirus. Such sites include the National Institute for Communicable Diseases and South African government websites.