Education

Ron Frost with Barnabas came through our Nampa office last year to discuss with us opportunities that he has with a new Bible school being started in Rwanda. We discussed many things, including that we are concerned about the quality of teaching and that we can help institutions and ministries grow in their ability to develop curriculums that better fit their goals for their courses and programs.

Anyway, we did not hear much from him after that, though he did say that he was pleasantly surprised when we interacted with him about these educational things rather than just discuss our digital resources and technical solutions that were looking for problems.

I spoke with him yesterday and in that conversation he spoke quite animatedly that "the orientation in Nampa we really useful and that it had really stuck" with him. Later in the conversation he said, "I have stumbled into some synergy that is valuable," referring to the LT team. He was especially encouraged by the orality dimension of LT and is intrigued about future possibilities with that for his own ministry.

Here are a couple more resources for exploring ePortfolios:
 
If one were to read one resource about ePortfolios, I would suggest the 27-page article, An Overview of E-Portfolios, published by Educause.
     http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ELI3001.pdf
 
Virginia Tech, where I did my graduate work, has quite the set up for ePortfolios. I suggest that you explore the different purposes for ePortfolios described there and that you tour their gallery for design ideas.
     http://eportfolio.vt.edu/gallery.html
They also have a page of research on ePortfolios at- http://eportfolio.vt.edu/research.html
 

Dear LTers,

I’m wondering if anyone in our LT team has had experience or exposure to ePortfolio design, development and/or as user.We have been in touch with an organization interested in developing a missions oriented ePortfolio for Latin American missionaries, as some of you already know.
 
He has some questions and I desire to get more information before emailing back to him.They are exploring solutions still before working in details about the need, audience, etc.
 
I’m attaching an article he sent to me where some of the actual ePortfolio tools are mentioned. The same author of that article published a website with a lot of info around ePortfolios. 
http://campustechnology.com/articles/2010/04/07/eportfolios-finally.aspx (Click "Read More" for the reply.)
 
Mauricio
 
 

La Carpio has no known internet connectivity, partly because of major lack of resources but also because of geographical isolation. It is actually within the capital city of Costa Rica, but because it's a slum built around a garbage dump, it is nicely isolated from surrounding areas by a river on each side, a garbage dump on the third, and the only way in and out is a thin road on a sort of peninsula.

Our partnering with the missionary Steve Edwards who has been serving that isolated community for the last five years, has shaped the Christian impact in that poor area.

A computer lab is already in place and running, installed in August 2008. Steve, the missionary there, has been using the lab almost exclusively to allow kids to use. However, with little supervision, the lab has been largely just an arcade. This has also served to open up the lab to become a nice dish of viruses.

Radio Project Resources

Radio’s wide reach and low cost provide effective communication in rural and remote areas.  Unlike newspapers and magazines, radio does not require literacy, and unlike television, radio receivers are affordable and accessible even without electricity or telephone connections.  Even in very poor communities, radio penetration is vast - an average of one in five people in Africa has a radio [FAOSTAT 1998 – in 1995 the ratio of radios to people in Africa (not including South Africa) was 1:5].   Furthermore, production is cheap compared to other mass media.

Radio has many uses, from entertainment to education and broadcast of personal messages. In some cases, radio stations have linked people to the internet by searching for, translating and broadcasting requested information on air.  In other cases, expert panels or local officials answer questions submitted by listeners by telephone or email, promoting accountability or extending relevant expert knowledge.  Radio has also been used by minority language or cultural groups to assert their identity and provide a cultural reference point.