Communications for Development

This is an interesting article about how universities are using cell phones to share study material. It adds to my hypothesis that in Africa the cell phone is the blackberry and the personal computer. If used for business, study and organizing (see my previous post on Twitter), there is a lot of power people can unleash for low cost. This is important because many students in Africa do not have personal computers, but do have cell phones, though as the article discusses, cost is still an issue.

• Distance Learning at Makere University Goes Cellular

“The Department of Distance Learning at Makerere University has deployed an amazing mobile-telephone-based application to aid research supervision by students who learn and study long distance.

Not only have they addressed a teething issue of limited collaboration between the distance learner and the supervisor; the Department is also taking learning to a place it has never been before.

One wonders how the department has managed to pull off this inspiring innovation.” <— that’s a great sentence.