Nearly 200 mobile technology experts and international education leaders met at the first annual UNESCO Mobile Learning Week last month, December 12-16, at UNESCO’s headquarters in Paris.  This was the first such UNESCO meeting in which mobile technology took center stage.

Ministry of Educations’ officials, along with other experts from the fields of mobile technology and education, discussed the potential uses and benefits of mobile technology within the field of education in developing countries which has been informally debated and discussed the world over, the technology’s limited accessibility often hindering sustainable policy-changing actions.  The meeting was prompted in part because of the growing access to mobile networks now available to 90% of the world’s population and 80% of the population living in rural areas, according to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in its “The World in 2010” report.

These figures have certainly gained the attention of top-policy makers.  Discussions on how to use mobile technologies to transform educational processes will contribute to the anticipated Guidelines on Mobile Learning Policy which is currently being developed by UNESCO and due to be released in 2012.  The guidelines will help to develop the future of mobile learning beyond the UNESCO global movement of Education For All (EFA) goals.

The weeklong meeting was split into two events.  Leading officials in the ICT field gathered for the International Experts Meeting on Mobile Learning which was limited to selected attendees.  Following the meeting, representatives from Nokia, Pearson Foundation, SK Telecom, ISTE, iLearn4Free, ICTP, Microsoft, Commonwealth of Learning, Alcatel-Lucent, Orange, Intel, Ericsson, KERIS and the Mobiles for Education (mEducation) Alliance showcased recent developments in mobile technologies and projects on mobile learning from the field during the UNESCO Symposium on Mobile Learning.

Several keynote speakers at the symposium identified and discussed major challenges to implementing policies and innovative ideas for creating sustainable solutions.  Stephane Boyera, Lead Program Manager of the World Wide Web Foundation, stressed the importance of considering the sustainability, scalability, and replicability of mobile learning initiatives during his presentation, “Mobile Technologies, Education and Socio-Economic Development”.  He indicated that the main obstacles to development are directly linked to policy makers’ understanding of specific cultural needs.

Dr. Paul Kim, Chief Technology Officer and Assistant Dean for Stanford University School of Education, spoke about the contextualized innovations in education and mobile empowerment design in his presentation, “Future Trends in Mobile Technology Development: What Can We Expect in the Next 5, 10, and 15 Years?”

The event achieved UNESCO’s goal of promoting the potential contribution of mobile technology to education and promises to lead to positive changes in policy development.  Working papers that were developed during the event are due to be released sometime in early 2012.