Brussels, 25/09/2013 (Agence Europe) - Today children are thoroughly familiar with digital technology from their infancy, yet few schools are digitally equipped. And those that are often lack the most up to date equipment. Commissioners Androulla Vassiliou, Education, and Neelie Kroes, Digital Strategy, presented a new joint strategy on Wednesday 25 September to put an end to this situation and open up the world of education to new technologies. The aim is to allow all individuals to learn anywhere, anytime, through any device and with the support of anyone. “The education landscape is changing dramatically, from school to university and beyond: open technology-based education will soon be a 'must have', not just a 'good-to-have', for all ages. We need to do more to ensure that young people especially are equipped with the digital skills they need for their future. It's not enough to understand how to use an app or program; we need youngsters who can create their own programs. Opening up Education is about opening minds to new learning methods so that our people are more employable, creative, innovative and entrepreneurial”, said Vassiliou. Kroes added: “My dream is to have every classroom digital by 2020. Education must be connected to real life; it cannot be a parallel universe. Young people want to use digital technology in every aspect of life. They need digital skills to get jobs. All of our schools and universities, not just some of them, must reflect that reality”.
Currently only between 20% and 50% of European school pupils and students use digital textbooks, exercise software broadcasts/podcasts and simulations or learning games. Pupils in Latvia, Lithuania and the Czech Republic are the best served: more than 90% have internet at school. That is double the number in Greece and Croatia, where the figure is around 45%. Indeed, most teachers at primary and secondary level do not consider themselves as “digitally confident” or able to teach digital skills effectively. The Commission plan, adopted in the form of a communication, seeks to gives schools and universities the means to provide high quality education and to reach the digital skills that will be required in 90% of jobs by 2020. The new technologies will also help meet the challenge of the ever increasing size of the student population, by affording universities the opportunity to offer, in addition to traditionally delivered courses, online learning, such as Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) that will enable students to access education at the time and place of their choosing and through any device.
The main objectives of the communication are:
1. to create opportunities for organisations, teachers, students and pupils to be more innovative in the way they teach and learn by making more use of digital technologies and content;
2. to boost the use of open educational resources (OER - learning content, generally in digital form, that can be used and shared, free of charge for users) by ensuring that educational materials produced with public funding, such as Erasmus+, the new EU programme for education, are freely available to all. - the new Open Education Europa portal, also launched on 25 September, will provide a gateway to high quality OER produced in Europe, in their original language;
3. to increase transparency for users of educational resources with regard to copyright;
4. to help schools and classrooms to get broadband access and support ICT infrastructure for education and training. It will also stimulate the market to produce new interactive content and learning tools by promoting the development of open frameworks and standards for interoperability and portability of digital educational content, applications and services.
5. to strengthen cooperation with international organisations and stakeholders to better understand the impact of technology in education and explore new modes of teaching and learning.
In all 24 initiatives are included to achieve these objectives. These initiatives will receive EU funding from Erasmus+, Horizon 2020, the new programme for research and innovation, as well as structural and investment funds. For example, from 2014, Erasmus+ will offer funding to education providers to ensure they adapt their business model to technological change, boost the assessment of digital skills and support teachers' development through open online courses. All educational materials supported by Erasmus+ will be available to the public free of charge under open licences. The high-level group for the modernisation of higher education will present its recommendations next summer, boosting the impact of the new initiative. (IL/transl.fl)