All ones, no zeroes: challenging the Digital Divide
12th June, 2007
Futurelab today launched its latest research programme:
Digital Inclusion: Building fairer futures, challenging educational divides.
The launch took place in London where Futurelab Chairman David Puttnam announced the vision for this body of work:
The Digital Inclusion programme will address two critical questions:
- In what ways can the design and use of digital technologies promote educational equality?
- How can we address the new educational divides emerging in digitally rich societies?
We aim to build constructive partnerships with other organisations and individuals tackling these issues, working together towards educational equality.
We will gather evidence and conduct original research to understand and address these questions, building on existing good practice, and generating models for new ways to work towards greater inclusion and equality.
Outputs from this programme will provide tools, resources and guidance to policy-makers, learning institutions, networks and practitioners, and the educational, technology, media and creative industries.
The afternoon brought together an eclectic mix of stakeholders (policy and practice communities, charities, technical and creative industries) who shared their knowledge and experience of Inclusion and Equality in Education through an Open House Event hosted by Johnnie Moore. The main discussions from this event will posted on the Futurelab website in the next few days.
We are still in the infancy stage of this programme and are mapping out possible future projects. If you have any ideas or wish to work with Futurelab on tackling education inequalities please share your ideas/knowledge/experience with us. We intend to post regular updates of the work on the website and welcome feedback at every stage. If you would like to speak to someone directly on the Digital Inclusion programme please contact me via the Futurelab website.
Futurelab is always looking for ideas. Find out how you can 
Bob Harrison
Dan Sutch
Richard Sandford
Leon Cych
Martin Owen
Tim Reader
June 15th, 2007 at 4:35 am
[...] Jun 14th, 2007 by Ryan Lanham All ones, no zeroes: challenging the Digital Divide [...]
June 18th, 2007 at 12:42 pm
With a barrier being access to technology, will there be any thoughts on using OLPC technology, such as Asus eee PC?
After all 3rd world countries are struggling for technology, but so are we!
Another barrier is online access, we are still struggling to get students online, esp. in remote communities. Others are drawing ahead, and the gaps are getting bigger.
After this research, will there be a publicised solution?
June 21st, 2007 at 11:59 am
[...] A parte de cambiar de diseño Futurelab, nos brinda un excelente documento titulado “Beyond the digital divide“, dispuesto para bajar en pdf. Es un problema la fractura digital entre personas y generaciones que se irá incrementando en los próximos años. Este documento da un recorrido sobre esta fractura y sus posibles soluciones, en las que el componente educativo es importante. Se deben establecer programas de inclusión digital. El problema es ¿cómo se hacen y a quién implicamos en esto?¿Dónde están las buenas prácticas?. En el blog de Futurelab Flux tienen un post al respecto que dice: We aim to build constructive partnerships with other organisations and individuals tackling these issues, working together towards educational equality. [...]
June 25th, 2007 at 2:19 pm
Have you chatted with the Connecting Bristol folks about this? It’s slap bang in the middle of what we were trying to do within the Digital Challenge, and I’m certain that there are synergies to be found (if they haven’t been already!).