United Nations ICTD human capacity building centre, APCICT, organized its Second Partners Meeting of the "Primer Series on ICTD for youth" on 10-13 December 2013, aimed at enhancing training in information and communication technologies for development (ICTD) for young people in the Asia-Pacific region.
16-12-2013
Professors and administrators from institutions of higher education across Asia and the Pacific region from 21 Asia-Pacific countries convened in Incheon, Republic of Korea from 10 to 13 December for a meeting aimed at enhancing training in information and communication
technologies for development (ICTD) for young people in the region.
Organized by the Asian and Pacific Training Centre for Information and Communication Technology for Development (UN-APCICT), one of the regional institutions of ESCAP, the Second Partners Meeting of the ‘Primer Series on ICTD for Youth’ brought together representatives from APCICT’s partner institutions to review progress in enhancing the ICTD human capacity building of youth in their countries and to discuss strategies for the further expansion of the programme.
“The Second Partners Meeting of the Primer Series on ICTD for Youth has been very successful in enhancing the understanding of the Primer Series programme. In particular, the group discussions on each of the Primer Series issue have resulted in very useful feedback that will definitely help improve the programme and plan the next steps for its further integration in educational and training programes in the region,” observed Mr. Nail Tahirov, Deputy Chairman and Lecturer, University of Qafqaz, Azerbaijan.
Twenty students enrolled in universities in ASEAN countries joined partners for the first day of the meeting. The students also attended a special lecture on ‘engaged learning’ where they were introduced to ways in which they could apply engaged learning to ICTD education.
“We were very pleased to have students, who are the target audience of the Primer Series programme, join the meeting on the first day and share their comments on the different Primers. Their comments have confirmed its relevancy and have helped ensure that the programme addresses the needs of students and youth,” stated Dr. Hyeun-suk Rhee, Director of UN-APCICT.
The meeting served as a platform for partners to share their experiences in implementing the Primer Series programme and to learn from each other’s good practices. It also provided a valuable opportunity for mutual collaboration and for charting out the way forward for the Primer Series programme.
During the four-day event, partners were introduced to the newly-developed Primer Series 2, 3 and 4, which covered the topics of Project Management and ICTD, ICT for Disaster Risk Management and ICT, Climate Change and Green Growth, respectively, along with case studies on open and distance learning from the region.
Participants also provided feedback on the upcoming Primer Series Issues on the topics of Social Media for Development and ICT and Entrepreneurship. The Primer Series was launched in 2012 as part of APCICT’s ‘Turning Today’s Youth into Tomorrow’s Leaders’ programme, which has been helping ESCAP member states create future ICTD leaders through enhanced coverage of ICTD in undergraduate and graduate programmes at universities in the Asia-Pacific region. Since its launch, the Primer Series has been rolled-out to 13 countries.