2. Our background: GeSCI’s Foundation Developing countries are placing ICT and Education at the centre of their development strategies. However, developing countries are less equipped in terms of human capacity and financial resources to successfully and effectively harness the potential of ICT. With this in mind, GeSCI was founded by the UN ICT Taskforce in 2003, and began operations in 2005 working initially with Namibia, Ghana, India, Bolivia and later Rwanda. GeSCI is now operating also in regional forums and programmes in Africa, Asia and Latin America. WSIS UN ICT TaskForce GeSCI as a Global Programme

3. Context of our work: Knowledge Society In the globalized world, knowledge is increasingly the key factor of production as well as a raw material for economic development (= poverty eradication). Information, knowledge and innovation based businesses are taking over many of the traditional sectors of commerce and industry. While the transition to knowledge-based economies and societies is progressing, the gap between developing countries and developed or industrialised countries can be widening due the lower investments in ICT, education and innovation processes in developing countries “World of Knowledge” “World of Money”

4. Field of our work: Transitioning Education for a Knowledge Society It is acknowledged that transitioning successfully to the knowledge society requires investment in education, innovation systems, ICT infrastructure and implementation of those policies that support such a transition. A coherent Knowledge Society policy requires collaboration across the relevant ministries, especially between ministries of education, S&T, industry and finance. Education ministries are in key role in this development. Therefore GeSCI’s mission is to work together with MoEs empowering their policy making and strategy capacity.

5. Our challenge in Developing Countries While the importance of education is commonly accepted the developing world faces severe challenges with regard to education. Some of these challenges can be addressed with ICT These challenges can be summarised as: a lack of universal and inclusive access to education; poor quality of education; poor management of the education system and the increasing irrelevance of the current education system in the knowledge society. INCLUSIVE ACCESS? QUALITY ? RELEVANCE ? MANAGEMENT ?

6. GeSCI Outreach 2009 - 2011 1. Country programmes involving direct advisory engagement with developing country MoEs to provide high quality strategic advice and support to the countries’ own plans, policies and efforts to deploy and integrate ICTs in education. 2. Regional programmes involving knowledge sharing between GeSCI and the partner countries and between the partner countries, at the regional level in Africa, Asia and Latin America. 3. Knowledge products and research through the identification of major knowledge gaps or common challenges related to ICTs in education. 4. Promoting partnerships and facilitating global policy dialogue with a diverse number of partners, globally, regionally and locally.

7. The way we work: Knowledge Sharing At the heart of GeSCI’s mission is the concept of Knowledge Sharing This requires multi-stakeholder partnerships MoE’s Donors Science Business GeSCI Global Patners Experts Education Community Civil Society

8. Workshop on North/South Research partnerships for ICT in Education Background General N-S research programmes remain easily isolated from development practice and policy making processes Multi-stakeholder approaches must be developed jointly by researchers, policy makers and practitioners Goals of this seminar Bring together researchers, policy makers and practitioners in CT4E To identify emerging issues, challenges and demand areas in ICT4E To share experiences on existing models/ projects in ICT4E To initiate dialogue on joint opportunities for north/south partnership in ICT4E

9. Workshop : Research themes GeSCI is interested to develop further New models and processes to integrate of ICTs in teaching and learning Sustainable deployment models for infrastructure, connectivity and accessibility; Broader institutional issues related to ICT in education like educational management and M&E. Capacity issues related to ICT4E, especially teacher education and ICT Broader issues related to relevance of education as well as ICT and educational content

10. Outcome of the workshop: Connecting research to policy making and development New joint research projects New models for integrating research to education development and policy making New capacities in South and North Policy making Research Education Development GeSCI

11. Thank you for your attention! Jyrki Pulkkinen CEO, GeSCI jyrki.pulkkinen@gesci.org http://www.gesci.org