THE COMPUTER

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DIGITAL
OPPORTUNITIES FOR
DEVELOPMENT

Computers
in Schools
Education systems around the world face formidable
challenges that are taxing conventional strategies. Fresh
approaches are needed to address persistent problems of the
past and provide students with an education appropriate to the
needs of a modern, information-based global economy. Now,
after more than two decades of unfulfilled promises to
revolutionize education, computer and communication
technologies are finally able to offer opportunities to
significantly improve teaching and learning.
Education and learning are among the most important of
all human activities and always have been the principal means
of creating productive and sustainable societies. With
globalization and the increasingly dominant role that
information and knowledge play in all economies, providing
quality education is becoming ever more important. At the
same time, the emergence of information and knowledge as
core assets for development and economic growth is widening
the gap between the rich and the poor. The gap is growing
between those who have access to and can manage modern
information and knowledge systems and those who lack the
access and ability to actively participate in the information age.
As shown in various gender and ICT use studies, this gap is
particularly pronounced for women of developing countries,
and strategies must be created to address the gender as well as
the digital divide (Hafkin and Taggart, 2001).
Quality education is fundamental to successfully addressing
development problems and bridging the information gap.
Recognizing the fundamental link between education and
development is easy. Creating systems that provide quality
education for all, even when demand outstrips human and
capital resources, is an extremely difficult challenge. Yes there

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