How Africa can expand higher education

Here is the answer. In developing markets like Africa and the Middle East human capital development is crucial to the next generation of economic growth.

This example has been followed by many other institutions. For instance Open Study and the
OpenCourseWare Consortium have provided interaction by building student communities around online materials, the largest one being Mathematics, with 83,000 students. They have also started granting informal certificates to students who finish a course. EdX, a joint MOOC platform of MIT and Harvard, is doing the same and the first US university has already decided to formally recognise edX certificates.

Taken overall, digital technology and the internet are thus key to tackling several of the grand global challenges in education, including: allowing people from around the world, especially in developing countries, access to educational materials that they would not otherwise have; circumventing the rising cost of ‘traditional’ education in many (especially developed) countries; accommodating the massively increasing number of students seeking higher education; and bridging the gap between education and the world of new generations of students.

As with all upheavals, the full implications of this revolution are not easy to predict. However, it can only be positive for human development and advancement across the globe at a time when both are badly needed to help ensure social cohesion and sustainable growth.

Anka Mulder is Secretary-General of Delft University and Global President of OpenCourseWare