UNICEF's State of the World's Children Report 2005 was released in Shanghai on Friday. The report outlines threats facing children around the globe, including the lack of access to information. Even in China, with its well-developed media infrastructure, there are major regional and economic disparities that are affecting the development of children.

Internet users in China have increased from 620,000 in 1997 to over 87 million today, making the country second only to the United States in Internet connections. But this massive expansion has been uneven, so that the country's six most developed provinces, municipalities or administrative regions have 50 percent of these connections, while the six poorest account for less than 1percent.

The estimated 60 percent of the total Chinese population that lives in predominantly rural areas has access to only 0.8 percent of Internet connections. With information and communication technology such an integral part of education today, this digital divide will impact heavily on the development potential of China's children.

By the end of 2000, a total of 70,000 primary and secondary schools nationwide were offering IT education. Some 50 million students per year have begun learning to use the 2.1 million computers provided to these schools.

By 2003, more than 10,000 primary and middle schools in the underdeveloped western provinces had been equipped with computers.

Citigroup of the US is working with UNICEF to pilot an innovative action research project in tele-collaborative learning aimed at reducing the digital divide and improving education quality.

Under this program, participating schools are matched with partners to upgrade the quality of distance education. They will have technology integrated into their curricula and eventually make an important transition from teacher-centered to learner-centered instruction in child-friendly learning environments.

Two Shanghai primary schools are participating in the tele-collaborative learning project. The basic idea is to develop IT links between schools in the more developed areas of Shanghai and Guangzhou with schools in the poorer western provinces.

The project is piggybacking on the schools already participating in a Distance Education (DE) project on which the Ministry of Education (MOE) and UNICEF are cooperating.

As the IT infrastructure in western China is weak, not all project schools have the same capacity to get involved. This year, 15 pilot schools were selected from three UNICEF-supported DE project counties in Guangxi and two in Chongqing. In 2005, this will be expanded to 50 schools under the MOE-UNICEF project. Altogether the project is expected to extend to 10,000 students.

Eight partner schools have been selected from Shanghai, Anhui Province and Guangzhou City to lead and facilitate the tele-collaborative learning process. They will share their experiences and educational resources with the project schools, and will host the project schools on visits. The partner and project schools will form an education community to undertake project-based learning, co-construct knowledge, and learn from each other.

Other organizations and entities facilitating the project are the MOE's National Center for Educational Technology and provincial and county centers for educational technology. Eastern China Normal University and Southern China Normal University are also working as partners.

(China.org.cn December 10, 2004)