It allows smartphone users to quickly exchange texts and audio and video messages for free, and make calls. WhatsApp is a primarily a communication application but shares a number of features with social media applications.Ĭreated in 2009 in California, WhatsApp has become popular with 1.5 billion users in 180 countries, which makes it the most used chat application, together with Facebook messenger. This is a good move, although the persistent issue of slow connectivity still needs to be addressed.Īnother digital platform that I consider under-utilised and which can provide new impetus for digital education in Africa is WhatsApp. Universities can take a leaf from Mount Kenya University where collaboration with a mobile telecom company, Telkom, saw the issue of 5,000 4G sim cards loaded with 1GB data and aimed at university students. There are opportunities here for special arrangements to be made between universities and technology firms to provide, for instance, discounted monthly internet data to allow students access to materials online. For only TZS1,000 (US$0.43) a student receives 1 Gigabyte, 1,000 SMSes and 110 minutes call time, valid for three days. In Tanzania, a particularly popular offering is Airtel Tanzania’s special internet bundle ‘UNI offer’, specifically targeting university students. In Africa, young people are targeted by marketing from telecommunication companies seeking to attract new customers and retain existing ones amid fierce competition among mobile operators. Using social media for academic purposes is less common, but I would argue that there is potential for universities to exploit here. According to research from the United States, a majority of students spend a greater part of their time in a day on social media platforms, either for entertainment or news updates. The majority of university students, who are mainly youth or ‘Generation Y’, are tech-savvy, self-expressive and open to new ways of doing things, including the use of social network applications. It is inevitable that when universities reopen, things will be different, hence digital applications will be the way to go. The issue of access to the internet and digital platforms is particularly pertinent in Africa, where less than a third of the population has access to broadband connectivity.īut the reality is that universities should be actively preparing digital platforms for students to engage both during the COVID-19 crisis and afterwards due to the fact that the pandemic aftermath may lead to massive budget cuts and redundancies.

Tweet As schools and universities in 165 countries remain closed, affecting more than 1.52 billion children, youth and nearly 60.2 million teachers, it is imperative to look at how digital technologies can be used to ensure that school or university teaching and learning processes go ahead in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, especially for populations in developing countries with unreliable internet and power supply.

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