Out of Africa
Being half a world away is no obstacle for 30 UVic child and youth care students

by Patty Pitts

Classes may have ended on campus, but halfway around the world in sub-Saharan Africa a group of 30 master’s students in UVic’s child and youth care program are still involved in course work. They work on the Web when they can. And if the power fails or the server goes down, they revert to printed manuals.

They represent the hope and future of 10 countries and they’re participating in possibly the only program of its kind in the world.

The Early Childhood Development Virtual University (ECDVU) is the outgrowth of a series of UNICEF-supported institutes led by school of child and youth care faculty member Dr. Alan Pence in the 1990s. Like these institutes, ECDVU uses a “generative” curriculum — one that reflects the African cultures of the students and the children who will benefit from their education.

“The intent is to help countries and communities develop a program that suits them. Everything about the program structure is designed to support the childhood development networks within the students’ countries and across the participating countries,” says Pence.

The students in ECDVU’s first cohort were selected by their countries for participation in the program. In addition to meeting the university’s graduate requirements, the students also had to demonstrate a high level of commitment to, and leadership in, child and family issues.
Program participants take two courses at a time on their own and gather together at a seminar for two weeks in the middle of each set of courses. The cohort met for the first time at the end of November in Johannesburg and will convene again in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania in June.

Cohort manager Lynette Jackson was amazed at the intensity and commitment displayed by the students at their first seminar. “These are people who also have a full career load, yet when we started to do the optional events in the second week of the seminar we’d still have a full house every night.”

The students include a dedicated child care administrator from Nigeria who, because of difficulties going online in her village, took a bus to Lagos, completed her work in a cyber cafe, and then took the three-hour bus ride home. Another student is a children’s entertainer from Eritrea described by Pence as “the Raffi of his country.” While completing his studies, he’s putting his knowledge to good use on a television program broadcast country-wide to a viewing audience that’s never had children’s programming before.

“These students represent government organizations and NGOs. They are both senior administrators at the national level and community workers,” says Pence. “What we hope to support is the creation of an inter-organizational team of workers in the various countries so there is expertise-sharing across the various sectors.”

Pence also hopes the students, who will take two-and-a-half to three years to complete their degree, will spread the idea of online learning into the rural areas of their countries — even if that technology isn’t as dependable as it is at UVic.

“A key challenge was connectivity in Africa. The ratio of computer use there is the lowest in the world. I’m pleased that we have 90 per cent of our students online for over 80 per cent of the time. We’ve purposely created a redundant paper and disc versions of the course as well.”

Support for ECDUV program development came from the World Bank, while program delivery is sponsored by organizations such as UNICEF, UNESCO, CIDA, the Bernard van Leer Foundation and the Aga Khan Foundation in Canada. Participants’ employees support travel and accommodation for the seminars.

“The World Bank’s overall development agenda is based on the idea that if the kids are doing well, then their countries are better positioned do well too,” says Pence. The kids in sub-Saharan Africa now have a better chance of doing well, thanks to the commitment of UVic students on the other side of the world.