COL helps countries to identify where livelihoods can be improved, and to
create matching learning opportunities. Successful approaches to improving
rural and peri-urban economies draw on COL's close relationship with
international agricultural bodies. The Virtual University for Small States of
the Commonwealth is a collaborative network for creating open educational
resources for work-related learning.
In this sector of activity, COL brokers proven distance learning programmes
already offered around the Commonwealth, including COL's International
Organisations Programme. As well, COL develops and delivers eLearning courses
to staff in agencies such as the World Health Organization (WHO) and the World
Bank and transforms technical guides developed by these organisations into
effective learning materials.
Learning for Livelihoods Sector Initiatives:
Learning and Skills for Livelihoods
 | Identifying where livelihoods can be improved or expanded and creating
learning opportunities to exploit them. |
| Increasing access to basic literacy and occupational training for young
people and illiterate and neo-literate adults. |
| Developing technical and vocational education and training using ODL
methods for low technology environments. |
Rural and Peri-urban Community Development
| Developing ODL and ICT-based teaching/learning models for sustained
improvement of livelihoods in rural and peri-urban communities, depending on
the food and environment sectors. |
National/International Community Development
| Building ODL capacity among strategic national and international
agricultural education, extension, research and policy-making bodies with
mandates and resources for education, training and research in the food,
agriculture and vocational sectors. |
Virtual University for Small States of the Commonwealth
| Developing a collaborative network of 24+ small states aimed at creating
and sharing materials for livelihood-related post-secondary programmes. |
Transnational Programmes
| Developing and managing learning programmes for international
organisations and sharing ODL programmes of proven effectiveness with
institutions globally. |
Impacts:
Policy: COL encourages government policies that enhance rural
connectivity and communications to facilitate the deployment of village ICT
kiosks and the spread of community radio. Too often outdated regulations
impoverish the village communications environment. To encourage the creation
of jobs and self-employment, COL works with governments to create better
connections between education for literacy and training for livelihoods. It
helps agricultural universities and extension services to develop policies for
conducting distance education at scale.
Systems: COL emphasises the importance of multi-directional
communication between all those involved in its programmes. Enhancing the
effectiveness of farmers' associations as local actors is one example of
capacity enhancement at the grassroots level. The appetite for training in how
to conduct distance learning is particularly high in organisations that bring
together literacy and livelihoods.
Models and Materials: COL has found a self-replicating model in its
Lifelong Learning for Farmers programme. This continues to spread in India and
is now being tested in Africa. Closely linked is COL's Media Empowerment
model, through which agricultural extension units enable many more farmers to
learn to diversify their crops. COL facilitates the preparation, in local
languages, of very basic materials related to livelihoods.
A diploma course for technical and vocational teachers developed through
COL's assistance in the Caribbean is being adopted in Ghana and Pakistan. The
COL-brokered Commonwealth Executive MBA and MPA programme, produced through
regional cooperation in South Asia, will now be offered in Nigeria, Malaysia
and other regions. The collaborative development of materials for small states
in eLearning format will be a key activity in 2006-2009 under the Virtual
University for Small States of the Commonwealth. Countries will reap the
benefit of COL's investment in the technology and know-how of learning object
repositories in facilitating the transfer and adaptation of materials.
Partnerships: To improve livelihoods in rural communities, COL has a
close relationship with some of the institutions that form the Consultative
Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), as well as with various
agricultural universities. As COL extends this work in Africa, it will benefit
from the developing relationship with the Forum for Agricultural Research in
Africa (FARA). COL's work on literacy and livelihoods has led to a Memorandum
of Understanding with the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS)
and its Caribbean equivalent, CARICOM. In the private sector, a relationship
is developing with India's National Institute for Information Technology (NIIT)
for skills training. The Virtual University for Small States of the
Commonwealth involves partnerships between 25 Commonwealth states.
