China

WL’s training materials were translated into Chinese and training activities were piloted in 57 Chinese secondary schools in four provinces: Beijing, Shanghai, Chongqing, and Chengdu.  As a result of the pilot, a total of 360 teachers from 57 schools received WL training.  Many of these teachers went on to train their colleagues.  During the evaluation of the pilot, both government representatives and school participants agreed that the WL training programs and methodologies were complementary to China’s recent mandate to introduce more participatory, student centric learning to all schools. 

After securing additional funding from Goldman Sachs and Accenture for a second program year, World Links conducted a feasibility and design mission in August 2004 for the expansion of the program.  The objective of the mission was to gather additional data and develop a strategy for expanding the program in a sustainable manner, while continuing the current teacher training activities in existing and new regions of China.  Based on findings from the mission, World Links and NCET decided to expand the program to primary schools in both the four pilot provinces and to ten new provinces.  Currently, there are 123 primary schools in 10 provinces (Jilin, Yunnan, Shangdong, Hubei, Shanxi, Shaanxi, Zhejiang, Fujian, Hebei, Guangzhou) participating in the program, including the original 57 secondary schools from the pilot phase.  WL and NCET also selected 37 new Master Trainers and 15 teachers from each new school, totaling 1845 new teachers to be trained by the new trainers.  Following WL’s cascade training model, these teachers will then organize and go on to train other teachers in their schools and help implement tele-collaborative projects with their students, anticipating to impact up to 60,000 students.    

The new WL China Program officially commenced in April 2005 with a Public Launch ceremony in Beijing.  At the launch, the mission and program objectives of WL were presented and the projected workshops and activities for the upcoming year were showcased.  A lot of excitement and support was generated, as principals from over 130 schools in more than 10 cities attended the ceremony, including representatives from the Ministry of Education, Goldman Sachs, Accenture, potential sponsors, alumni master trainers, teachers, and students from the pilot phase.  

A series of training workshops were successively delivered after the Program Launch.  Principals and administrators from the new schools attended an Administrators workshop that focused on “WL Training and Approach.”  Participants worked on strategizing on how to localize and integrate ICT projects into the school curriculum.  A separate “refresher” workshop on the same topic was held for alumni schools on July 6-8 in Yiwu City in Zhe Jiang province.  

New Trainers attended the first Master Training Workshop delivered on August 15-19, 2005, in Lanzhou, Gansu Province, on the topic of “Pedagogical Training in Curriculum and Technology Integration.”  In this workshop, 38 Master trainers were trained.  A Chinese blog was also set up for the Trainers as a platform to communicate and support each other throughout the course of the program.   Shortly after the Master Training Workshop, master trainers went to local schools to conduct local workshops for teachers on the same topic of training that they received.  These local workshops began mid-September and were conducted throughout October 2005, where 2170 teachers have been trained.

A follow-up “refresher” training workshop for Alumni Master Trainers (from the pilot phase) was also delivered on October 8-10, where 31 Master Trainers were trained.  The Topic was also on the topic of “Pedagogical Training in Curriculum and Technology Integration.” To end off the year 2005, new Master Trainers attended the Second Master Training Workshop on the topic of “Pedagogical Training in Tele-collaborative Learning projects” in December.  Following the cascade model, the second round of Local Workshops in schools is forecasted to ensue after Chinese New Year in February 2006. 

A core value added in the World Links program is the Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) of program activities, which ensures that the quality of the Program is consistent with World Links standards and to learn about the effectiveness and impact of the program in countries.  Working with a M&E consultant, specific baseline data measurements and data collection tools were developed for the China program.  A series of surveys were devised for participants to fill out after each training session, and will be supplemented by interviews of selected program participants.  The combined data collected will help us better understand WL’s impact on China and supply us the necessary instruments to improve, innovate, and sustain our work and mission to create more opportunities for youth through ICT education.