The Ministry of Education yesterday signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Intel, a company that deals in technological innovations, for the training of 5,000 secondary school teachers in ICT.

Presiding over the signing ceremony at the Ministry’s headquarters in Kacyiru, the State Minister in charge of Primary and Secondary Education, Theoneste Mutsindashyaka commended the project, stressing that it was going to enhance the development of education in Rwanda.

"This programme is going to help our education system because it is going to help the Ministry of Education in its efforts to use ICT as a tool of education,” said the Minister.

The Minister also revealed that Intel was going to help in revamping the Rwanda Computer Centre (RCC), a local computer assembling company to enable it to assemble computers for a larger market.

According to Devan Naidoo, the General Manager of Intel Africa, the key objective of the programme is to train practicing educators in schools in Rwanda on the effective use of technology in education.

"You cannot succeed in implementing ICT in education without engaging the teacher. That is why we thought about first training the teachers and make them get used to technology so that they can be able to teach what they know,” stressed Naidoo.

He added that the programme was going to be a success basing on the experience they have had in other countries in Africa like Nigeria and South Africa where it has already taken root.

"Many teachers in Africa are afraid of Technology and this is a very good opportunity to help them learn ICT and also become competent in their work since they will be able to carry out enough research,” Naidoo complemented.

Initially, fifty people will be trained, they in turn will train the five thousand teachers around the country whose number is expected to increase to ten thousand within three years.

According to the MoU, Intel will fund the development and revision of Intel Teach Curriculum, and will also fund localisation of the programme, while the Ministry of Education will be responsible for liaising with its schools to have participating educators available for the workshops.

After the training, Intel will distribute its state of the art laptop computers to one pilot school in every district.

The laptop computers whose samples were displayed at the Ministry have educational content on which all subjects can be found. It also has an in built science laboratory where a student can carry out experiments.

Groupe Scolaire St. Aloys in Rwamagana, was chosen as the pilot school where the programme will be tested and will receive fifty computers to start the programme.

The training is expected to take a maximum period of six months.

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