Digitalisation opens up a new era for learning society construction
A parallel session on “Education digitisation and learning society construction” was held here as part of the 2024 World Digital Education Conference yesterday.
The conference was participated by more than 240 representatives from educational departments, universities, and research institutions from 35 countries and regions.
Focusing on the theme of “Digital Education: Application, Sharing, and Innovation,” the conference delved into the theoretical and practical issues of building a learning society in the digital age from different perspectives.
China’s Ministry of Education Vice Minister Wu Yan pointed out that the construction of a learning society is an important issue of international concern.
With the improvement of the level of higher education popularisation, especially the rapid development of information technology, the vision of “learning anytime, anywhere, and by everyone” has become a reality.
In recent years, the China’s Ministry of Education has implemented a strategy for digital education and established a national smart education platform, creating a digital foundation for a learning society.
China has been continuously promoting the construction of learning cities, learning communities, and learning enterprises, encouraging everyone to have a passion for learning. With the world’s largest scale of digital education, China is serving the world’s largest learning population.
China is willing to strengthen cooperation with relevant countries and international organisations to build an all-weather digital learning platform, a comprehensive digital learning space, and a fully covered digital education community, contributing to the construction of a digital education community.
Unesco Institute for Lifelong learning director Isabell Kempf introduced the Unesco’s concepts and initiatives on building a lifelong learning society and achieving inclusive digital learning.
The International Council for Open and Distance Education secretary-general Torunn Gjelsvik believed that digitisation is key to building a global learning society, emphasising the importance of quality and inclusivity.
The Asian Association of Open Universities and the African Council for Distance Education shared their respective organisations’ new ideas and strategies for a learning society.
The University of Macau, the Korean Institute for Lifelong Learning, Anadolu University of Turkey, Moscow City Teacher Training University, and The Open University of the United Kingdom also shared the practical cases and successful experiences from their countries and schools in driving a digitaldriven learning society.
Gabon’s National Education and Civic Training Minister Camélia Ntoutoume Leclerq and New Zealand’s Education and Immigration Minister Erica Standford introduced the policies and measures of their respective countries in promoting digital education and lifelong learning digitalisation in their respective countries and schools.
The African Union Commission’s Commissioner for Education, Science, and Innovation Mohamed presented the African Union’s coordination of lifelong learning practices in African countries.
Both Chinese and foreign participants generally believed that the rapid development of digital technology and the wave of digitalisation will bring about profound changes to education. It requires countries and international organisations to share highquality resources and effective solutions while strengthening global governance in the field of digital education to cope with the profound challenges brought by technologies such as artificial intelligence to education and even to humanity.
Governments, schools, and businesses worldwide should strengthen cooperation and jointly build an allweather digital learning platform to provide roundthe-clock, uninterrupted learning support for learners worldwide.
They should also create a comprehensive digital learning space, develop more intelligent and portable learning terminals, enabling learners to start their “learning journey” with just one click, regardless of their location.
By building a fully covered digital education community and establishing sound mechanisms for data security, digital ethics, and privacy protection, learners can receive more personalised and userfriendly learning services, thus ushering in a new era of a learning society.