Introduction
The scale of the demand and need for teachers world wide far outstrips existing provision. If the Millennium Development Goal of Universal Primary Education is to be achieved, new models of teacher education need urgently to be explored, experienced and evaluated globally. The countries of Sub-Saharan Africa face particular challenges: over 40 million children of primary school age are without school experience and the numbers are growing. Added to this, the poor quality of much schooling means children leave schools with inadequate knowledge and skills.
The Digital Education Enhancement Project is a research and development project focusing on the potential of new information and communications technology (ICT) to improve teacher education and the quality of pupil learning in schools serving poor communities.
Originally funded by the U.K. Department for International Development (DFID), DEEP is a partnership between the Open University (United Kingdom) and several project partners:
- University of Fort Hare (South Africa)
- Nelson Mandela Foundation's Unit of Rural Schooling and Development (South Africa)
- Programme, Planning and Monitoring Unit (Egypt)
- The Open University of Tanzania
- Relief International-Schools-Online (Bangladesh)
- The Open University of Sudan
Project partners share a common commitment to improving educational quality, through teacher professional development and the use of appropriate professional tools. Such commitment is aligned with the second Millennium Development Goal of Universal Primary Education, and the belief that all learners should have an equal opportunity to participate in high quality learning communities (Article 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 1948).
