New Commonwealth initiative to boost digital education skills

To create an enabling environment and culture of lifelong learning, an intergovernmental organisation created by the Commonwealth Heads of Government has launched an online platform that can help both teachers and students to improve their digital education skills.

The platform, launched by the Commonwealth of Learning (COL), is designed to assist teachers and students to assess their digital education skills, learn digital education skills based on areas that need improvements, and receive a certificate according to their depth of understanding - beginner, intermediate or fluent.



Named Commonwealth Digital Education Leadership Training in Action (C-DELTA), the platform allows students and teachers to develop communities and demonstrate their effective use of digital education tools, and thereby influence others as leaders in digital education skills, COL said in a statement on Friday.

"Digital Education skills will be the primary skills for success in the 21st century. Through this platform, COL intends to strengthen the digital education skills environment in the Commonwealth," said Sanjaya Mishra, COL's e-learning specialist.

To support the adoption of C-DELTA, the British Columbia, Canada-headquartered organisation said it would work with the governments and educational institutions of the Commonwealth member-states.

The curriculum framework for C-DELTA has been developed in collaboration with the Centre for Innovation in Learning and Teaching and the University of Cape Town, South Africa.

The modules have been developed by experts and peer-reviewed by an advisory group from across the Commonwealth, the statement added.

Staff Training and Research Institute of Distance Education (STRIDE) -IGNOU

Introduction 

Division of Distance Education in 1986, soon after the establishment of IGNOU in 1985 to cater to the training needs of various functionaries of the Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU).

Later, based on the proposal by Commonwealth of Learning (COL), the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD), Government of India, the Division of Distance Education of IGNOU was upgraded into the Staff Training and Research Institute of Distance Education (STRIDE) in 1993 to set up a training and research institute for distance education in the South Asian Region.

STRIDE has been conducting training and research activities for IGNOU, State Open Universities (SOUs) and distance education institutes in India as well as serving the distance education training, research and capacity building needs of the Asian, African and the Caribbean countries (around 45 countries). More than 500 major training programmes have been conducted by STRIDE since 1985. Also around 40 major research projects have been completed by STRIDE.