Monday, February 8, 2010

Roundup of Weekend News Reports on International Initiatives

Over the weekend, several news agencies reported new online learning initiatives in various spots around the globe.

In Ghana, for example, the University of Education, Winneba, is now training 7,978 professional teachers through its distance education program. In addition, 17,001 students throughout the country have enrolled in courses to become professional teachers.

Akwasi Asabere-Ameyaw, vice chancellor, said the distance education program is delivered through 13 study centers located throughout the country. The program is in addition to traditional education at teacher training institutions. The Carnegie Corporation of New York provided equipment to the centers and 64 per cent of the new students are females.

For more info see the February 6 issue of http://www.modernghana.com

In China, the China Distance Education Holdings Limited (CDEL), has begun providing higher education online in Yunnan Province with the Yunnan Provincial Admission Education and Examination Authority. Students can obtain degrees by passing exams and satisfying requirements. Zhengdong Zhu, chairman, CDEL, said "As a major province in Southern China, Yunnan Province accounts for roughly 150,000 of the approximately ten million self-taught higher education examination takers in China.”

For more info see, http://ir.cdeledu.com/ .

And in Canada, the Aboriginal Nurses Association of Canada and the Canadian Healthcare Association signed an agreement February 4 to develop new online courses for health care managers and professionals in the workplace, according to earthtimes.org. One new course will focus on "Cultural Competence and Cultural Safety in Nursing Education: A Framework for First Nations, Inuit and Metis Nursing". Rosella Kinoshameg, president, A.N.A.C., said, “This course, delivered by distance education to nurses in their practice settings across Canada, will improve the health of Aboriginal Canadians and those with minority backgrounds."

For info see, http://www.anac.on.ca/competency.php and http://www.cha.ca/ .