48 | http://www.nomadafricamag.com | ...Celebrating the world’s richest continent | Issue 11
“The African experience has been that education during
colonial times was driven by missionaries. The conventional
wisdom suggests that this was mainly through altruistic
considerations – albeit racially tinged – to bring light to the
Dark Continent and enlightenment to its natives.”African based service has well over 50
million users, not only allows its users to
stay in touch by text chatting, and facil-
itating live tutorials such as Dr Maths.
Its statistics are not to be scoffed at hav-
ing helped 30,000 school-aged children
work through mathematics problems by
connecting them with mathematics tu-
tors for live chat sessions.
It is also very affordable – some would
even say cheap – since the service itself
is free with minimal costs payable to
their mobile network, and to boot, it op-
erates 24 hours 7 days a week.
This is only just one solution that can as-
sist Africans in the Diaspora, but is also
very much dependant on access to ex-
isting digital infrastructures that each
country has to offer its citizens.
Africa needs more MXit like innovations
such as Nokia Life, a subscription infor-
mation service designed for emerging
markets that offers a wide range of in-
formation services covering healthcare,
agriculture, education and entertain-
ment. It reaches over 70 million sub-
scribers in Pakistan, India, China,
Indonesia and Nigeria.
In a UNESCO led think piece on educa-
tion and skills, “Education and skills for
inclusive and sustainable development
beyond 2015”, predictions are that grad-ual shifts away from class-room cen-
trededucation will occur with a more
pronounced approach to informal learn-
ing within the learn “anywhere, any-
time” concept, this being sustained and
made possible with the inevitable mobile
market penetration to learners across
the spectrum, from urban to rural areas.
The report goes on further to state that
along with basic education tools such as
literacy and numeracy, digital and infor-
mation literacy, critical thinking as well
as online communication skills will be
necessary. Under the guidance of teach-
ers, who also need to equip themselves
with these skills, the mobile phone mar-