BRIDGING THE DIGITAL DIVIDE COMPUTER BASED LITERACY

The term digital divide refers to gap between those people who have effective access to digital and information technology and those without access to it. In other words we can say it is the troubling gap between those who use computers and those who dont. The major causes of digital divide are gender, age, educational attainment and income levels. The harmful consequence of digital divide is that it widens the gap in the economic divisions around the world. Countries with a wide availability of internet access can advance the economics of that country on a local and global scale. While the countries where the internet and other technologies are not accessible, education is suffering, and thus the uneducated are not able to compete in the global economy. This leads to poor countries suffering greater economic downfall and richer countries advancing their education and economy. By these effects we arrive to a conclusion that there is a need to bridge the digital divide. This can be done through various ways such as undertaking projects like one laptop per child that is distributing inexpensive laptops to the children of developing nations, undertaking research that is to find out, how minorities or marginalized users use different technology to meet there objectives or a simple and efficient way to bridge digital divide is by making computer literacy compulsory. By Computer literacy we mean the knowledge and the ability to use computers and technology efficiently. It also refers to the comfort level someone has with using computer programs and other applications that are associated with computers leading to the acceptability of its usage in daily life. It doesnt mean merely to recognize, identify, or be aware of facts about computing but the ability to DO computing, so that it can be used for the benefit of the society.

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There are three types of digital divide. The first divide is the one which exists within the nation, between those who are rich, educated, and powerful, and those who are not. The second divide is the one which is linguistic and cultural that is the divide between those people who speak English and those who dont or speak any other language. The third divide follows inevitably from the first two -- it is the growing digital gap between the rich and the poor nations. Computers and connectivity, help a country to progress at a fast pace on the path to raising literacy, information and skill levels amongst the population. Three stages are involved in establishing computer based literacy system. The first stage involves the establishment of computer learning centres along with trained teachers and curriculum development. This stage refers to the provision of infrastructure involving spending the money to make available the right technology. An important aspect is the availability of the trainers with local knowledge who can connect with the people. The trainer will also need to have a correct curriculum. An education program that is directed at the needs of the recipients and is developed based on appropriate research. The second stage includes integrating the role of ICTs (information and communication technology) into the education process. This refers to the availability of the Internet access at affordable prices. Without this, remote rural areas will not be able to access the required info. The third and final stage involves the realisation of the full potential of ICTs by transforming the way people learn. This stage widens the learning parameter i.e. the learning process goes beyond school and it takes place at work place , community centres, etc. Once the basic training in using computer technology is provided, then the communication technology will enable the people to continue their engagement and learning process even outside the learning centres. In community meetings, at homes etc learning process continues as people tend to use the technology in their daily interactions. These stages can be only established if we are able to overcome various barriers. These barriers are of three types which are Connectivity related, content related and capability related.

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Connectivity related barriers involve cost of hardware and software, lack of appropriate infrastructure and poor design and layout of web platforms. This type of barrier is most commonly faced in rural areas. India which has a population of one billion has only one percent of the population which has home access to computers and half a percent of the population has home access to internet. Telephone connectivity is a must for the access of internet but in India, telephone connectivity is about 3% and will not raise much above that level unless the cost of connections can be lowered. Not more than 3% of the Indian population can afford to pay the real costs of a new telephone line. Mobile phone revolution is now helping to bridge this gap. Content related barriers include learning process hindered by a particular subject content which cannot be easily translated online also most of the contents are in English. Given that in India most of the people do not speak English thus they cannot learn computers. A large population resides in villages where education is provided in the local languages. This diversity of India itself becomes a curse in bridging the digital divide. Though some computer software has been developed in local languages but they are very few and it is difficult to make them accessible to a large population of country unless massive efforts are taken by the government. Capability barriers include Inadequate or lack of interaction between students, or between students and teachers, Limited support and professional development for teachers, inadequate or lack of support of students and inadequate induction for students and teachers. The above barriers can be overcome by taking a number of steps. The first step is that, information technology should be only introduced when they are able to help the people in meeting their basic human needs and fulfilling a number of fundamental rights. For example computer is of no use to a farmer who lives near a port as he can use his own personal transport to go to the port and find out the latest prices at the port. Thus there is no need to provide computer to every farmer at every village. That computer would be more useful to a famer who lives far off from the port. Second step is that the creative use of ICTs should not be only restricted to the use of computers , email or internet access but rather the use of other computer based technologies such as embedded chips, satellite

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based information, etc. in order better to meet local needs. For exampleIndia is the world's largest producer of milk and dairy products. Traditionally individual milk producers brought their milk to a central collection point where payment was based on volume and butterfat content. Volume was easily ascertained, but assessing butterfat content was a complex process. This took a few days and as a result payments to the farmers were delayed. The solution for this was the use of locally designed computer based assessing equipment which is less sophisticated, less expensive, partially automated and which requires some human intervention and which produces accurate butterfat readings in a few minutes. This enabled the dairy to make payments to farmers immediately. Another example is that sophisticated satellite technologies are used to tell fisher men where fish is most likely to be found. "Honeybee" project in Gujarat, with its original concept of 'knowledge rich, economically poor' rural people and its use of Internet to disseminate local knowledge and enable local communities to profit from this dissemination and the use of cell phones, both in Gujarat and in the much-publicized Grameen Bank cell phone work in Bangladesh are good examples of how ICTs are used for other activities but eventually help in bridging the digital divide. The third step involves building the ICT projects on an assessment of local needs, as locally defined by local people. Before bridging the digital divide through computer literacy one of the things that have to be kept in mind is the actual needs of the people on a local scale. Women may require information related to childcare, health, child rearing and reproduction while men may require information related to prices, crops and economic life. The projects of the Swaminathan Foundation responded to the local needs. Before introducing new technologies of communication and information in Pondicherry they spent countless hours ascertaining what information is required by the people of Pondicherry , Through this knowledge they were able to tailor the internet and were successful in providing the required information which resulted in the increase of enthusiasm amongst the locals to use new technology. Based on the success of this, a proposal was also made by World Tel, Reliance and Government of Tamil Nadu to not only build an infrastructure of Optic Fibre cable network but also to develop Internet Library in Tamil relating to issues of local significance like Crops, pests, health needs etc. The fourth essential step is to create and develop more content in local languages. It is a proven fact that if rural people cannot understand the

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available information on Internet than they will not be motivated to use computers and computer applications in their daily life. The people will use computer based applications only if they can understand it and as a result use the data for making decisions in their daily life. To encourage this, it is necessary that computer based applications are developed in local languages. In the absence of the content in Tamil, Hindi, Punjabi, Bengali and other local languages, majority of the people will be unable to make use of the digital information to improve their life. Not only is the content required in local languages but also this has to reflect the local culture e.g. information on growing cauliflower is more relevant to an Indian farmer than growing Broccoli. The web content has to be relevant to the Indian rural culture and traditions and need is to create lively local sites rather than just translating the content to local language. That also means we need to deal with the issue of creative writers. Currently most of the web content reflects the western cultural and a rural Indian will find difficult to relate to that. Good creative writes along with software developers can help in creating such fun filled content. The last and the most important step is that projects must be made economically self sustaining. If the projects are not economically viable then there is a high possibility that the project may fail. For example a project was funded several years ago by Apple Computers in Rajasthan involving the computerization of record kept by local health care workers. A year's devoted effort was given by three computer experts. After a year the three computer experts left, and the project disappeared after the first year of funding was over because the project had no other sources of funding. To conclude, Bridging the digital divide involves a lot of procedures and lot of facts have to be kept in mind, it is a complex process but if we observe the whole process is in the form of a cycle that is provide infrastructure, ensure communication reach and weave in the local requirements. All three of these have to be executed perfectly otherwise these projects might fail .Bridging the divide can improve the living conditions of the people and can help them earn more money to meet their requirements. But for this purpose, these projects have to be based on the local requirements and culture. These need to address the requirements of the people and should not be limited to providing computer education only. This is about making computers and computer application a good friend of the people and encouraging them to think of the innovative ideas to use technology in their daily life.

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