8th September marks the global observance of International Literacy Day. Jamia Millia Islamia too celebrated this day with fervor when the Department of Adult and Continuing Education Extension (DACEE) joined the International Program organised by the ASEM LLL Hub Regional Centre for South Asia titled Achieving Digital Literacy…Will access solve the problem? from 02:00-03:00 PM Indian Standard Time on ZOOM. Prof. (Dr.) Shikha Kapur, Professor and Former Head an expert on literacy and extension from the DACEE joined the discussions from Jamia Millia Islamia, India. The other International experts included Dr. Jan Schiller, Professor, Helmut Schmidt University/ University of the Federal Armed Forces, Hamburg, Germany. Dr. Shalini Singh, South Asia Coordinator, ASEM LLL Hub and founder director of Forum for Lifelong Learning at Copenhagen, Denmark led the discussions regarding issues of digital literacy faced by low-middle income countries like India and high-income countries like Germany.
Based on her work undertaken in slums around Jamia and analysis of government’s programs, Prof. Shikha Kapur elaborated how access continues to pose a major challenge for digital literacy in India, especially for females, ruralites and the underprivileged sections of the society. She based the arguments on research and field activities conducted in the last more than three decades in adult education and extension by her. And that imparting basic literacy could be the way out for overcoming double marginalisation and digital divide in India.
Dr. Shiller, who is based in Hamburg, on the other hand shared data from his recent projects on Digitalisation and argued that while Germany and several other countries in Europe have managed to resolve most issues of access. However, the challenge largely remains in terms of the digital divide in the quality of knowledge and skills which are being imparted to the population. Further, he also emphasised how several digitalisation processes in various parts of daily life are not user-friendly enough, and this pushes several users outside the mainstream of development process.
Dr. Shalini shared her experiences from Denmark highlighting the growing Matthew Effect where the elderly population is being marginalised due to the pace of growth of digitalisation and lack of support for the low skilled while the high-skilled benefit from a growing Matthew Effect. Refering to her research on resource mobilisation for the education of adults it was found that those who had access to digital technology used it for reel-culture and other social media engagement rather than literacy.
Several Academics, Practitioners, Research Scholars and Students from across the globe and JMI participated and discussed that irrespective of several policies, programs and initiatives that use enormous resources in India, the outcomes remain limited in terms of achieving literacy and the standard of what is considered as literacy in India remains poor. The Coordinator of ASEM Lifelong Learning Hub Regional Centre of South Asia, highlighted that ASEM is an intergovernmental body that includes 51 countries from Europe and Asia, European Union and ASEAN, and the ASEM Lifelong Learning Hubs role to promote lifelong learning. Its South Asia Centre focusses on the region.
The program ended with a message from the Honourable ASEM LLL Hub Chair, Prof. Séamus O’ Tuama from the University of Cork, Ireland about including everyone and making use of our thumb, as on digital devices to support others in learning.
Prof. Saima Saeed
Chief Public Relations Officer
Courtesy: Facebook page of the Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi