ICT in Education in Burundi

Source: infoDev

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Excerpted from infoDev’s Survey of ICT and Education in Africa (Volume2): 53 Country Reports

For more information about this project, please see Survey of ICT and Education in Africa.

This short report provides a general overview of current activities and developments related to ICT use in education in the country.

English-Kirundi, Kirundi-English, and Kinyarwanda-English dictionaries

English-Kirundi, Kirundi-English, and Kinyarwanda-English dictionaries
are now available for teachers working with Burundian refugees.
The dictionariescan be downloaded for free, courtesy of the Free
Methodist Church of North America.

“Marston Memorial”- free downloadable dictionaries
http://www.freemethodistchurch.org/users/marston/Dictionaries.htm
>>

Source: BRYCS ( Bridging Refugee Youth and Children’s Services)
December e-bulletin

African education experts call for renewed efforts to expand education

The following article is from The African Press Agency

http://apanews.net/afric_item_eng.php?id_article=22219

African education experts call for renewed efforts to expand education (2007-02-27 16:23:20])

APA-Addis Ababa (Ethiopia)

African education experts from 20 countries on Tuesday called on African governments and development agencies to pay greater attention to the large number of children who fail to proceed to secondary school because of limited opportunities.

The experts, who are meeting in Addis Ababa, said African governments need to consolidate the gains made in universal primary education by abolishing school fees for secondary education, investing more in vocational and technical education and job training.

Several countries in the region have succeeded in increasing primary school enrolments largely by abolishing school fees and recruiting more teachers, the experts said.

The experts, however, said the transition rates for children from primary to secondary school remain relatively poor.

Burundi, Mozambique, and Tanzania were cited as countries that have transition rates of below 35 %, meaning less than four out of every 10 children make it to secondary school.

Botswana, Kenya, Namibia, and South Africa were cited as among the better performers with transition rates of more than 85 %.

Beth Mugo, Kenya’s assistant minister for education, attributed the poor transition rates to poverty, poor funding for schools, not enough secondary school teachers, inadequate class room facilities, underemployment of school leavers and HIV/AIDS.

For girls, puberty, pregnancy and early marriage are major barriers, with only one in five girls enrolling in secondary school.

“Girls who have a secondary education tend to have fewer and healthier children,” said Aster Haregot of the United Nations Children’s Fund.

“Studies from Uganda and Zimbabwe have also shown that girls who received primary and some secondary education had lower HIV infection rates than those who did not attend school. Secondary education for girls therefore is an effective barrier against HIV,” she added.

DT/pm/APA 2007-02-27 16:23:20

KENYA, BURUNDI AND MADAGASCAR SECURE FUNDS FOR HI-SPEED INTERNET

The following article was seen on The Balancing Act News Update

http://www.balancingact-africa.com/news/current1.html

Kenya, Burundi and Madagascar have secured a US$164.5 million loan from the World Bank to help roll-out high-speed Internet networks. The World Bank said the money was being made available to boost business competitiveness in the region. Eastern and much of southern Africa is the only region in the world not connected to the global broadband infrastructure, the World Bank said.

Kenya will take the lion’s share of the funding, with a $114.4 million loan. Madagascar is due to receive a $30 million loan, while Burundi will receive a grant worth $20.1 million, the World Bank said. The Washington-based lender said businesses in the three countries were being held back because of the lack of high-speed Internet networks.

“University students suffer because they cannot access the Internet, and government agencies cannot communicate effectively with each other and their citizens because they are not connected,” the bank added. Currently, the region relies on satellites for connectivity, with costs among the highest in the world.

But World Bank president Paul Wolfowitz said Africa was becoming increasingly “plugged-in”: “Improving broadband connectivity will add tremendous public value for Africa,” he said. “Low-cost, high-quality communications is essential for economic competitiveness.”

The head of Kenyan outsourcing firm KenCall, backed the World Bank’s move. “It is absolutely imperative that something be done right now to make bandwidth affordable,” said KenCall chief executive, Nicholas Nesbitt.”Otherwise, we’re going to miss a huge opportunity and people are simply going to say that Africa is not ready for these kinds of jobs, is not ready for business.”

Meanwhile the fourth contender to build an East African fibre cable – the SEACOM project – appointed its marine survey company. Tyco Telecommunications, a business unit of Tyco Electronics and an industry pioneer in undersea communications technology and marine services, announced last week it was awarded the SEACOM marine survey by Herakles Telecom, LLC. The 13,000 km marine survey commences the development of the undersea fiber optic network which will provide high capacity bandwidth connectivity between South Africa, Madagascar, Mozambique, Tanzania, Kenya, India and Europe.