Part II Humanitarian Technologies
4.3 Conclusions
This paper has analyzed the contribution of Open Educational Resources to build- ing twenty-first-century skills; noted the value of tutoring and mentoring models for optimal learning outcomes, learner retention and the provision of language and sub- ject matter support; and explored the technologies, including learning technologies, that best mediate higher level learning in fragile contexts. Variables such as sus- tainability, operability, equal access, cultural and linguistic ownership, livelihoods, and context relevance were used to analyze available evidence in an effort to inform optimal design and scalability of such learning spaces, as well as their potential use in migrant refugee contexts.
We conclude that human-centered design is central to both pedagogical and tech- nological development in fragile contexts. In light of the fact that protracted dis- placement settings can differ considerably from one another, there is no substitute for adopting a bottom-up approach and developing learning spaces that allow for both intellectual and artistic expression. Traditional HE programs are usually geared to specific degrees, still offer little flexibility, and do not cater adequately yet to alter- native learning pathways. Online education platforms offer a wide range of learning options and a variety of pedagogical approaches. Such innovative tools and programs increase access to learning and offer great potential for higher education; however, such initiatives may face resistance from traditional university programs, particularly due to challenges regarding accreditation, recognition of degrees, and credit transfers (Hullinger2015).
OERs have the potential to inspire non-traditional learners and encourage an explore-and-develop approach rather than a listen-and-reproduce mentality. They are thus a gateway that allows refugees to unleash their innovation potential. We empha- size the importance of refugee ownership and empowerment as vectors for ensuring the sustainability of higher level learning in HE spaces in fragile contexts, analyze the potential of ubiquitous learning supported in broadly conceived and flexible learning spaces for fostering creativity and innovation, and encourage the inclusion of inno- vative and learner-centered pedagogical approaches that support such learning in the larger framework of Education for All and Sustainable Development Goal 4.
References
Blank, S. (2013). Why the lean start-up changes everything.Harvard Business Review, 91, 3–9.
Bloom, L. & Betts, A. (2014).Humanitarian innovation: The state of the art. Occasional Paper Series UN-OCHA, November 2014/009. Available fromhttp://www.unocha.organdhttp://www.
reliefweb.int.
Bryman, A. (2004).Social research methods. New York: Oxford University Press.
Burde, D. (2014).Schools for conflict or for peace in Afghanistan. New York: Columbia University Press.
Corbin, J., & Strauss, A. (2007).Basics of qualitative research: Techniques and procedures for developing grounded theory(3rd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Evans, R., & Lo Forte, C. (2013).A global review: UNHCR’s engagement with displaced youth.
Geneva: Switzerland.
Hullinger, J. (2015). This is the future of college. Last accessed November 12, 2017 fromhttp://
www.fastcompany.com/3046299/the-new-rules-of-work/this-is-the-future-of-college.
InZone. (2015).Technology-access-matrix. Unpublished internal InZone report. Geneva: University of Geneva/InZone.
Merriam, S. B. (2009).Qualitative research: A guide to design and implementation. San Francisco:
Jossey-Bass.
Moser-Mercer, B. (2014). MOOCs in fragile contexts. In U. Kress & C. D. Kloos (Eds.),Proceedings of the European MOOC Stakeholder Summit 2014 (EPFL Lausanne)(pp. 114–121). ISBN 978- 84-8294-689-4. Available fromwww.openeducationeuropa.eu.
Moser-Mercer, B. (2016).MOOC multi-center-study 2015. Unpublished Internal InZone report.
Geneva: University of Geneva/InZone.
Radcliffe, D. (2009). A pedagogy-space-technology (PST) framework for designing and evalu- ating learning spaces. In D. Radcliffe, H. Wilson, D. Powell, & B. Tibbetts (Eds.),Learning spaces in higher education: Positive outcomes by design(pp. 9–16). Brisbane: The University of Queensland.
Ries, E. (2011).The lean startup: How today’s entrepreneurs use continuous innovation to create radically successful businesses. New York: Randomhouse.
Sheehy, I. (2015). Tertiary education in conflict and crisis: The new landscape. Lecture. Last accessed November 11, 2017 fromhttps://mediaserver.unige.ch/fichiers/view/89797.
Smith, A., Fressoli, M., & Thomas, H. (2013). Grassroots innovation movements: challenges and contributions.Journal of Cleaner Production, 63, 114–124.https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.
2012.12.025.
UNESCO. (2015).EFA global monitoring report 2015: Education for all 2000–2015: Achievements and challenges. Paris: UNESCO.
UNHCR. (2011).Refugee education: A global review. Geneva: UNHCR.
UNHCR. (2016).UNHCR statistics portal. Geneva, Switzerland. Last accessed November 13, 2017 fromhttp://www.unhcr.org/figures-at-a-glance.html.
Zeus, B. (2011). Exploring barriers to higher education in protracted refugee situations: The case of Burmese refugees in Thailand.Journal of Refugee Studies, 24(2), 256–276.https://doi.org/10.
1093/jrs/fer011.
Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.
The images or other third party material in this chapter are included in the chapter’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the chapter’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder.
Healthsites.io: The Global Healthsites Mapping Project
René Saameli, Dikolela Kalubi, Mark Herringer, Tim Sutton and Eric de Roodenbeke
5.1 Introduction
The world is facing an increasing number of complex natural or man-made humani- tarian crises. In order to respond to these growing challenges, humanitarian actors are deploying more and more innovative technologies and approaches to support relief aid (Haselkorn and Walton2009). Geo-information are an example where human- itarian practices have dramatically evolved in the recent years with the emergence of the phenomena called by Goodchild (2007) Volunteered Geographic Information (VGI), or more generally by Burns (2014) “digital humanitarianism”. Indeed, the democratization of access to Global Positioning System (GPS), satellite imagery and web mapping platforms, such as OpenStreetMap (OSM), and more recently mobile phone data collection tools have enabled large numbers of remote and on the ground individuals to produce geographical information to support humanitar- ian action. This technological evolution has offered greater opportunities of use for humanitarian actors. It has enabled the collection and sharing of large amount of data in short period of time at a fraction of the costs of the traditional data collection and
R. Saameli (
B
)·D. KalubiInternational Committee of the Red-Cross, Lausanne, Switzerland e-mail: [email protected]
D. Kalubi
e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected] M. Herringer·T. Sutton
Healthsites.io, London, UK e-mail: [email protected] T. Sutton
e-mail: [email protected] E. de Roodenbeke
International Hospital Federation, Bernex, Switzerland e-mail: [email protected]
© The Author(s) 2018
S. Hostettler et al. (eds.),Technologies for Development, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-91068-0_5
53
map-making methods (Haworth and Bruce2015). However, the full scope of oppor- tunities offered by VGI is still underused by traditional humanitarian actors. In order to understand this situation, Richards and Veenendaal (2014) have analyzed com- prehensively the gap between the United Nations World Food Programme Crisis Mapping Operations and Crowdsourcing Technology. They conclude that crowd- sourcing captured a large amount of data, but not sufficiently the required ones for the agency operations and with not the needed quality. Haworth and Bruce (2015) also highlight this need of enhancing data quality assurance to enhance the relevance of VGI for disaster management. Data quality in VGI relies heavily on Linus’s law, which implies the more observers, the more likely an error will be identified. As shown by Haklay et al. (2010) in their analysis of Open Street Map data quality, this law seems to work well for spatial accuracy. However, Mooney and Corcoran (2012) have also discovered serious quality issues with tags or annotate objects in OSM. Such attribute data is usually much more needed than accurate geographical coordinates to support humanitarian management.
Geo-information on health facilities in disaster areas are a good example of the challenges of the use of VGI for humanitarian action. The most comprehensive healthsite geodatabase based on VGI is probably OSM, but information on services offered are still largely incomplete and questionable in terms of reliability. Other health geodatabases with comprehensive set of helpful attributes for health workers exist, but these databases are not easily shared outside of the health organizations which have gathered them, or are only regional in their coverage. OSM and these restricted datasets complement each other in terms of geographical coverage and in terms of the information they contain, however they are almost never readily available in a consolidated, freely and accessible way. Data exchange between VGI communities and health organizations is usually unidirectional and punctual. Tradi- tional humanitarian agencies tend to task digital communities only for specific tasks lasting a rather short period of time (Burns2014).
In order to address this issue, the Global Healthsites Mapping Project has been launched in 2015 to create an online interactive map, Healthsites.io, of every health facility in the world and make the details of each location and services easily acces- sible. A team of freelance developers, researchers, the International Committee of the Red-Cross (ICRC), and the International Hospital Federation (IHF) have joined their competences and networks in order to provide a single point of reference for healthcare workers, aid agencies, contingency planners, government agencies, and citizens who need access to a highly curated global dataset of healthcare facilities.
In order to meet this aim, the project team has to address three major challenges:
1. Integrate multiple unstructured datasets in one unique database 2. Enhancing the reliability of data
3. Foster sharing and updating of information
In Sect.5.2, this paper will present the approaches that are currently developed to address these three challenges. In Sect.5.3, the paper will analyze the potential impacts, risks, and the perspectives of this project.