Juan Enrique Hinostroza (PHD)
Director,
Instituto de Informática Educativa (IIE - Institute for ICT in Education),
Universidad de La Frontera
Chile
Juan Enrique Hinostroza
1. First, can you tell us about the Instituto de Informática Educativa and its role in the ICT for Development in Chile?
The Instituto de Informática Educativa (IIE - Institute for ICT in Education), was established at the Universidad de La Frontera in January 1997 as a consolidation of the team that started the implementation of the Chilean ICT in Education Policy (Enlaces) in the early 90’s. The IIE is a self-sustained institution with 110 professionals and researchers from different backgrounds dedicated to develop research and development projects focused on the innovative use of digital technologies in the areas of teaching, learning and training, electronic government, community development and public policies for the use of ICT in education. In this context, the IIE's mission is to "raise peoples’ living standards, through the creation, development and appropriation of digital technologies". The Institute’s vision for 2015 is "to be the most highly regarded R&D institution in Latin America in the use of digital technologies for the development of people".
During the last ten years, the IIE has played a key role in the design and implementation of the Chilean ICT in Education Policy (Enlaces), public access to ICT initiatives in Chile (digital gap) and has supported other Latin American and Caribbean countries towards the integration of ICT in their educational systems. These contributions were possible due to the IIE capacity to effectively implement research projects that are transformed into scalable initiatives to be implemented at national levels. This strategy was important to achieve sustainability in the long run and transfer the projects to the government or other funding agencies.
2. What are your main responsibilities at the Institute as the Director of Instituto de Informática Educativa?
My main responsibilities are to:
1.Manage the Institute’s administration and accountability related issues.
2. Oversee the implementation of the more than 40 different projects that are currently being implemented at the Institute. In this regards, my role is to ensure that we maintain our innovation and quality standards.
3.Implement projects that are related to the design and evaluation of ICT related policies and large scale national and international initiatives.
3. Can you please tell us about the “ICT and Public Access: Investigating the social and economic impact of public access to Information and Communication Technologies" in Chile”.
The project is part of the five-year global research project that aims to investigate the impact of public access to information and communication technologies (ICTs). The global research project is a joint initiative of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the International Development Research Centre (IDRC). The project is managed by the telecentre.org program at IDRC. The Center for Information & Society (CIS) at the University of Washington’s Information School coordinates the overall research activities in this project. The project attempts to answer prevailing research questions facing public access initiatives today, particularly:
Question 6:
-> What are the observable social and economic impacts of public access to ICT?
-> What is the magnitude of these impacts and how can we measure them?
-> What is the relationship between costs and benefits of providing public access to ICTs?
The joint program will undertake longitudinal and comparative research looking at the impacts from different models, such as libraries, telecentres, cybercafes, and other public access to ICT models that may emerge over the course of this project. The research will look at both positive and negative downstream impacts of public access to ICTs in areas such as:
• employment and income
• educational levels
• civic engagement
• government transparency and democracy
• Heritage, cultural and language preservation
• improved health
From a global perspective, this research has the potential to inform future partner investors and advance overall understanding of the field of public access to ICTs. It is likely that the research will also have broad ripple effects, contributing to the evolution of new program models that are focused on even greater social and economic impact. This could move the public access to ICTs field forward in a significant way.
The global research project started in 2007 and will run over five years. Phase one will run through December 2008 and will focus on secondary data research and the development of research methodologies that can be piloted to generate early results and inform the research strategy for Phase Two. Phase Two (the remaining years) will strive to generate hard evidence of impact from a series of longitudinal and comparative field studies in an expanding number of countries. Chile will continue to be one of the countries included in the field studies.
In this framework, for us, this project constitutes both, an opportunity and a challenge, since it opens a space to critically analyze ICT related policies from the perspective of its impacts as well as to re-define priorities and strategies to foster the effective use of ICT in Chile.
4. What do you think is the main reason behind selection of Chile as one of the three preferred location for the project?
Probably, the main reason is that Chile has been one of the leading countries in Latin America to implement policies aimed at strengthening the availability and use of ICT in the country. In the early 90s, the Enlaces project pioneered the introduction of computers and Internet in the educational sector. By the mid 90s, Chile had already started to provide public access to ICT, implement public access in deprived areas through telecentres, public libraries (e.g. Biblioredes program), computer labs in schools (e.g. Open School for the community Program) and other facilities. In the early 2000, Chile had a public-private agreement regarding the priorities and strategies to develop the ICT sector, called the “Digital Agenda”. Still now Chile is still among the leading countries in terms of the availability of ICT.
5. You said that in the early 2000, Chile had a public-private agreement regarding the priorities and strategies to develop the ICT sector, called the 'Digital Agenda'. Can you tell us more about the “Digital Agenda”.
The Digital Agenda is a national agreement (government, private and third sector) that defines the strategic initiatives to incorporate digital technologies in the different national sectors (education, commerce, health, justice, etc.) and defines a five years plan to implement these initiatives (currently we have in place the third version of the agenda). Although each agency or sector is responsible for the implementation of the strategies, the steering committee of the Digital Agenda, which includes representatives of several ministries, private and third sector, assumes a coordinating role, promotes initiatives that cross several ministries (for example, public access to ICT and the acquisition of basic ICT skills of the general public) and brings into attention areas that lack initiatives and require additional efforts.
6. What role do you see of tele-centers for delivering e-enabled services to the citizens
Telecenters have a very important role, since they not only provide public access to ICT, but also provide assistance in the use of the available services as well as basic ICT skills training for non-ICT users which generally correspond to deprived groups. In this sense, Tele-center managers have a key role in the delivery of these services, specially contributing to the equity of these initiatives.
Additionally, it should be noted that Chile was able to “digitalize” an interesting number of government services, facilitating citizens’ access to development related opportunities (funds, subsidies, projects) and other services (taxes, buying, etc.). This helped to provide sense and purpose to the public use of ICT and therefore it was a significant contributing factor to the widespread use of free of charge public access to ICT venues. Specially attracting groups of users that otherwise would not go to a public access to ICT venue (for example a cybercafe), such as elderly people, unemployed middle age low socio-economic groups, etc.
7. What do you think was the biggest challenge while implementing tele-centers in Chile?
The biggest challenge in Chile, and probably elsewhere, is the sustainability of the public funded initiatives (or the ones that provide free access to ICT). In fact, there is still no clear solution of how to continue with these initiatives in the long run.
8. What do you think are the strategies required to overcome the problem of 'digital divide' in the developing countries?
My view is that the “digital divide” is much more complex than it is generally presented and that there is a need for a deeper understanding of what we really mean by access to ICT (public or private, frequent or sporadic, short or long periods, etc.), use of ICT (functional, procedural or instrumental use) and appropriation of ICT (for example, living your daily life assuming 100% of availability and capacity take full advantage of all the services provided through ICT). In this sense, in developing countries we need to plan and implement strategies that consider these issues, and provide not only access, but also capacity to use, meaning of use and value of the use for all users.
On a “theoretical” note:
In this regard, many authors are now conceptualising the digital divide not only as the gap between the ones that have access to ICT and those that have not, but also as the degree in which the ones that have access can take advantage and engage with ICT, given their socioeconomic, cognitive and cultural resources (Selwyn, 2004; van Dijk, 2006; Peter,J.,Valkenburg, P.M, 2006). The gap in use is referred to as “second-level digital divide”, where a divide remains in the capacity to purposefully use ICT (Hargittai, E. 2002; RobinsonJP.,DiMaggio, P.Hargittai, E., 2003). In this sense, it becomes a more complex concept where differentiated skills and use are expected (Peter,J.,Valkenburg, P.M, 2006; Hargittai, E. 2002). Selwyn (2004) describes the gap as a “hierarchy of access to various forms of technology in various contexts, resulting in differing levels of engagement and consequences” (p. 351). Furthermore, as Dewan & Riggins (2005) claim, most research has focused on the first order effects (access) and only some of it is focused on the second order effects (use).
In this context, Selwyn (2004) describes stages of the digital divide, which includes not only the mastery of certain applications or the development of certain abilities, but the progress of the users in making full use of the potential of ICT. These skills are defined as
Table 1 Stages in the digital divide
| Stage | Definition |
| Formal/theoretical ‘access’ to ICTs and content | Formal provision of ICTs in home, community and work settings that is available to individual in theory. |
| Effective ‘access’ to ICTs and content | Provision of ICTs in home, community and work settings that individual feels able to access. |
| Use of ICTs | Contact with ICTs in any form. May or may not be ‘meaningful’ use. May or may not lead to medium/long term consequences. |
| Engagement with ICTs and content | Meaningful’ use of ICTs. Use where the user exercises a degree of control and choice over technology and content. Use could be considered to be useful, fruitful, significant and has relevance to the individual. |
| Outcomes – actual and perceived | Immediate/short term consequences of ICT use |
| Consequences – actual and perceived | Medium/long term consequences of ICT use in terms of participating in society. Could be seen in terms of: -> production activity -> political activity -> social activity -> consumption activity -> savings activity |
Source: Selwyn, 2004, p. 352
Yes, developing countries do have a set of shared challenges (as well as own ones), and although they vary greatly in terms of intensity and frequency in each country, they are still relevant in all of them. Additionally, from a policy making perspective, there are proposals for a shared understanding of what we mean by “human development”, and, even if it changes, this implies that there is also a common set of goals to achieve. Finally, there is also a consensus of the role that ICT can play in the society and economy that implies that we also share a set of tools.
In this scenario, in which we share similar problems, aims and tools, although the combination of strategies may vary from country to country, I am sure there is a common set of strategies that can be used in all countries (yes, with different intensities and/or some particularities).
10. What is your suggestion towards incorporating ICT into the overall public sector reform strategy?
As mentioned before, from a general perspective, the incorporation of ICT in the public sector can be a powerful catalyst for encouraging the use of ICT among the public providing sense and purpose.
Additionally, from an internal perspective, it can produce significant improvements in the way in which public processes are implemented.
11. What role do you think should the NGOs and grassroots organizations play in knowledge creation and diffusion?
These organizations play a very important role, contributing to the equity of the public access to ICT initiatives and adding what could be called “social meaning” to the use of ICT by the general public.
12. There is a fear that ICT has caused more divide rather than bridging it. What is your take on the issue?
The tendency is similar to other technology related gaps, such as access to fixed telephone lines, cable TV, etc. In this sense, ICT access itself is not necessarily responsible for this. What worries me more is that due to the development of the information society and the emergence of a “digital generation” or “new millennium learners”, the educational gap is increasing. This is, what youngsters are expected to know at age 18 today is significantly different from what it was 5 years ago, and educational systems in developed countries are starting to provide the opportunities to learn these new skills and abilities, while developing countries are far behind. In this sense, the “digital gap” as commonly understood is only one part of the divide that now includes not only access, but also the skills and abilities to effectively participate in the information society.
13. Any suggestions to the government of developing countries?
I believe that developing countries should design and implement policies that take an holistic perspective on the access to ICT, including strategies that ensure access, use and appropriation of ICT as well as contents, meanings and purposes for ICT that are meaningful and useful for their development needs.