1. IX Conference "Virtual University: VU2009 " PJIIT Warszawa, 17-19/06/2009 Formation of E-learning Networks in Asian Pacific Countries Satoru Ozawa* Graduate School of Science and Engineering, Ibaraki University, Hitachi 316-8511, Japan ozawa@mx.ibaraki.ac.jp * Professor (Synergetics) of Ibaraki Univ. (1992-), Visiting Professor of Univ. Leads (1993), Invited Professor of Univ. Heidelberg (1993-4), Director of Information Processing Center (1997-2009), JICA Expert (1998, 1999, 2000-1, 2002, 2003)

2. Different Idea about E-Learning seen in Asian Pacific countries Example 1: Samoa E-Learning = Distance learning between islands Example 2: Sri Lanka E-Learning = University at home Example 3 : Bangladesh E-Learning = Business strategy of private university Example 4: Japan E-Learning = Knowledge sharing platform

3. Example 1 Samoa

4. Let us do Google Map search Thousands of islands in Pacific Ocean Hawaii Australia Papua New Guinea Guam

5. How to educate people on scattered islands? Fiji Am. Samoa Samoa Tuvalu NUS USP

6. In Samoa: Distance Education from Fiji (Microwave connection) is working

7. Summary of Example 1 Distance learning by satellite (Microwave) connection (1Mbps) working successfully Teaching material (method) : Text-based Microwave connection ( ～ Mps) between islands Optical fiber connection ( ～ 100Mps) Better connection Multimedia-type E-learning Major optical fiber backbone : USA – Hawaii – Fiji – New Zealand, Australia Hub University: Univ. Hawaii, Univ. Fiji Optical fiber Branches are growing from the backbone

8. Submarine Cables in Asian Pacific Region Hawaii Fiji Samoa Gum Japan New Zealand Australia USA

9. Example 2 Sri Lanka

10. 18 Universities in Sri Lanka UGC: 14+1(OU), UOE: 2, UOD:1 National universities (Higher education : Strictly controlled by the government) University Capacity : much less than needs E-Learning

11. Why do they use E-learning method in Sri Lanka? Limited University admission. Building capacities are limited. Qualified teachers are not available. Many students are seeking higher education opportunities.

12. How E-learning is working? (1) Some higher education Institutes has already introduced E-learning mode courses. These course are 50% E-learning and 50% traditional teaching. Course materials are power point slides and text based documents. Teachers publish their assignments for students through Internet. Students submit their assignments by E-mail.

13. E-learning courses : selected subjects only It is 5% of total subjects E.g. : University of Melanoma, Sri Lanka in 2008 200 students (Biological science students), total students were 3200 Some but not all teachers use LMS: Moodle How E-learning is working? (2)

14. What kind of teaching material do they have? Power Point slides (50% text based and 50% pictures) Text based additional teaching materials (Scanned version of selected books) Text based assignments Students can check their results / marks of assignments on the university web site

15. How teaching materials prepared and managed? Prepared PP slides by teachers. Scanned suitable additional teaching materials from selected books and upload to the web site. Some teachers upload their assignments and teaching materials to the Moodle web site.

16. How many students finished the e-learning course? 100% students finish their courses Results are better rather than traditional courses Students prefer E-learning mode courses But they have many difficulties No internet facilities at home Limited computer facilities at university Slow bandwidth for file downloading Lack of E-literacy skills

17. What are the problems in E-learning in Sri Lanka? High cost of hardware and software No collaboration or no proper networking between teachers Lack of E-Literacy skills among the students and teachers Lack of attractive E-learning materials, partly because of limited knowledge of teachers how to create attractive teaching materials The lack of broadband Internet facilities The language in E-learning is English Students prefer their native language

18. Asian peoples’ feeling E-learning is identified as an attractive mode of teaching/learning

19. Example 3 Bangladesh

20. Number of newborn universities in Bangladesh 31 national universities, 54 private universities (Higher education : much more freedom as compared with the case of Sri Lanka)

21. How different the newborn universities from the national universities

22. Universities in Bangladesh 31 national universities, 54 private universities and 2 international universities One 100% E-learning University “Open University” About 50% of the universities are in Dhaka area 31 private universities born in the last 10 years E-learning method is more noted in private universities rather than in national universities Private universities = a kind of business E-learning method = business tool : an attractive character of university & efficient remote campus management (Main campus : in Dhaka, remote campuses in local cities)

23. Example 4 Japan

24. Integrated Research Systems for Sustainability Sciences (IR3S)

25. IR3S : Integrated Research System for Sustainability Science Supported by the Ministry of Education and Culture of Japan Cooperative Research and Education Project : Univ.Tokyo, Kyoto Univ., Osaka Univ., Hokkaido Univ. and Ibaraki Univ. Main Research Topics: 1.Sustainable countermeasures against global warming 2.Development of Asian recycling-oriented society 3.Reforming of socioeconomic system based on this idea

26. Energy problem What happens if we consume all of the possible oil resources on the earth? This happens surely in this century! Climate problem What happens if global warming continues? If the all ice on the Antarctic continent melts, the sea level will rise 56m. Food and Health problem Do we have enough foods and medicines? Do we have Global Sustainability?

27. We must produce new sciences & technologies and provide ways to realize sustainable system on the earth. Integrated Research System for Sustainable Sciences (IR3S) by Tokyo Univ., Kyoto Univ., Osaka Univ., Hokkaido Univ. and Ibaraki Univ. To solve these problems

28. The name of the subproject : ICAS (Institute for global Change Adaptation Science) Ibaraki University started a sub- project under the umbrella of IR3S Key ideas of ICAS: Estimation of risks related to climate change Methods of the risk management How to adapt to climate change Education of Sustainability Science

29. IR3S and ICAS cover wide range of Sciences and Technologies Let me limit ourselves to the problems related to ICT A recent paper A recent paper ： Submitted to J. S. S. “ Development of Social Networks for Education of Risk Managements of Natural Disasters in Asian Pacific Countries” Satoru Ozawa, Gamunu Dassanayake, Vaise Patu, Sandun Fernando, Atsushi Minato, Hiroshi Noguchi and Hideyuki Tonooka

30. What can we do for Global Climate Change with the aid of ICT ? The community in Japan The community in Fiji The community in Samoa The community in Sri Lanka The community in Vietnam Our answer : Research and Education of Sustainability Science Communication servers, which enable Cooperation of Teachers communities in Asian Pacific counties.

31. Why Teachers Communities? We want to send our messages to young peoples; Teachers work as the interface Why Communication Servers? Research/Education of Sustainability Sciences are essentially “global” in nature and need global cooperation. Distance Research and Distance Education techniques should be utilized.

32. Images rather than words ClickClick Photo + Movie (Multimedia) Collecting such data all over the world Use of ICT (Cooperative server system) Editing data and distributing contents Use of ICT (Cooperative server system) Contents will be used in schools in Asian Pacific countries E-learning method Our Method of Global Education

33. Cooperative Servers System (KISSEL Project) KISSEL : Knowledge Integration Servers System for E-Learning ・ A web portal for teachers communities of Asian Pacific countries. ・ Works as a platform of sharing knowledge between peoples in Asian Pacific countries.

35. Why Many Servers Instead of One Server? JAPAN SAMOA : International Sector : Local Sector Members of Teachers Community Editorial Members Internet To send massages especially to younger generations, their native tongs are most suited.

36. The key technique is Data Mirroring over the Internet

37. Mirroring Function of the KISSEL Server Automatically mirror the contents of servers which are located in different places on the globe. - Server OS – Fedora core 8 - Tools/utilities which we used: Rsync Cron

38. What is rsync? rsync –synchronizes files and directories –open source utility/freely available. –version 3.0.0 is the latest. rsync updates only files that have changed. It only mirrors new/changed files.

39. What is a Cron Job? Cron job –checks every x minutes if there is something to update on Linux or fedora server. * * * * * command to be executed - - - - - | | | | | | | | | +----- day of week (0 - 6) (Sunday=0) | | | +------- month (1 - 12) | | +--------- day of month (1 - 31) | +----------- hour (0 - 23) +------------- min (0 - 59) Eg: */5 * * * * rsync -avz --delete --exclude=**/error -e "ssh - i /root/rsync/mirror-rsync-key" someuser@xbase41.ibaraki.ac.jp:/var/www/ /var/www/

40. Configuration – Server/Mirror Install rsync – server/mirror as root user. Create an unprivileged user on Server. Eg: someuser Assign a password. Test rsync on mirror server as root. Create the private/public keys on mirror server. Copy our public key to server1. Update the cron job on mirror server.

41. Mirroring Data Transfer Rates Between Japan and Sri Lanka Size (Mb)Data RateSecond.Minutes letter.pdf 246,051.0026947.949.1306051590.152177 untitled.bmp 2,359,350.0061986.1838.062516520.634375 Paper_1.rar 12,709,060.0058701.88216.50175433.608363 Norton Anti virus Professional.exe 43,001,704.0063692.38675.146760111.25245 FC-6-i386-disk1.iso 708,780,032.0048232.1214695.18719244.9198 FC-6-i386-disk2.iso 714,240,000.003965418011.80209300.1967 FC-6-i386-disk3.iso 711,491,584.0043876.8616215.64497270.2607 FC-6-i386-disk4.iso 715,229,184.0051234.7613959.84258232.664 FC-6-i386-disk5.iso 677,183,488.0031000.7521844.10016364.0683 FC-6-i386-disk6.iso 89,618,432.0038768.62311.62414938.52707 12-03-2008 at 5:48pm (Japan) and 2:18pm (Sri Lanka)

42. Data Transfer Rate Monthly Average times of mirroring data transfer (December/2008) Name of the fileSize of the File (MB) Data transfer rate (Mbps) Duration(s) index.html176,589318595.54 el001.html231,322344566.71 el003.html239,958283508.46 el004.html275,059295609.31 el005.html278,249348607.98 el006.html256,402334287.67 disaster.html424,4483905010.87 Tsukuba.mpg396,109,8243854010277.89(171 min)

43. How to accumulate data on KISSEL? 1.The each KISSEL server of the country is managed by the teachers community of the country. 2.The local sector of the KISSEL server is freely used for any domestic purposes. 3.Some contents in the local sector, which are worth sharing, are translated into English and put into the international sector. Knowledge Sharing

44. Present Status of International Part of KISSEL Contents 1.E-learning techniques The Internet and the Web, HTML Programming, Power Point Presentation, Flash Animations, Streaming Techniques, Audio Processing, Photo and Movie Editing Techniques, C Programming, X Window Programming, Computer Simulation, LMS (Moodle, Zoops) 2. Lessons learned from previous of natural disasters Tsunami disasters in Sri Lanka, Hurricanes in Samoa 3. GIS techniques and kite photographykite photography

45. Emergency Communication by KISSEL Chatting / BB Emergency Communication (Data Sharing) Bulletin Board Main function : Data sharing

46. Summary 1.KISSEL project, which links up the members of teachers communities in Japan, Samoa, Sri Lanka, (And also Australia, Fiji, Vietnam, Hawaii, etc. in very near future) 2.It is a knowledge sharing platform for E-learning and sustainability sciences. 3.The contents of KISSEL are developed by the effort of all the members of the society. 4.The society members help each other over the Internet in case of emergency as well as in normal situations.

47. 26 Dec 2004, Sri Lanka

51. In Sri Lanka, 49,000 peoples were killed or missed by the tsunami.

56. Colombo Galle The tsunami deprived not only human lives but also various infrastructures: houses, roads, railways, harbors, communication systems, etc. In particular, governmental data of lands and peoples. Delay of recovery processes What Sri Lankan have learnt should not be forgotten and should be shared with the other peoples

57. Conclusion(1) Example 1: Samoa E-Learning = Distance learning between islands Example 2: Sri Lanka E-Learning = University at home Example 3 : Bangladesh E-Learning = Business strategy of private university Example 4: Japan E-Learning = Knowledge sharing platform Different idea and different use of E-Learning in Asian Pacific countries

58. Conclusion(2) E-Learning methods is useful for education outside schools (universities) There appears many important subjects which should be taught outside of regular curriculum of schools or universities Exchange of experiences, idea, data (contents), techniques of E-learning is important in Asian Pacific countries KISSEL is useful for producing sustainability science is this region The reason why we restrict the area is that the people have similar socioeconomic background