ULK TEACHING STAFF TRAINED ON E-LEARNING

On 7^th May 2020, a cross section of the ULK teaching staff came together for a training session on the use of E-learning. This comes after the zoonotic disease, COVID-19 forced schools not only inside Rwanda but also on a global scale to close doors. The recent communiqué by the Cabinet Meeting disclosed that if the killer disease is kept at bay, schools will reopen in September 2020; thus the resort to e-learning, as one of the ways to help learners, is a move in the right direction.

Officiating at the seminar, Dr. SEKIBIBI Ezechiel, the Vice Chancellor of Kigali Independent University ULK, thanked everyone for having sacrificed their time for the event. He went further to stress that education that does not incorporate the segment of e-learning lacks a great thing. This thus triggered him to appeal to each and every participating lecturer to endear e-learning as it is an element that can help them put food on their table even during difficult times.

Dr. SEKIBIBI Ezechiel, the Vice Chancellor of Kigali Independent University ,ULK opening the seminar

“Some people see things happen, others make things happen while others wonder how things are done. We should be the ones making things happen. We must therefore strive to be among those who make things happen. Let’s be proactive and allow others to borrow a leaf from us. This can’t happen unless we go with the new changes in the sector of education whereby e-learning is winning a fertile ground. To be frank, the only person who is to survive is the one embracing E-learning.   Besides, let’s love our country as it is doing all it takes to eradicate the pandemic”, he told the academicians.

The seminar mesmerized all participants simply owing to the fact that trainers delivered their points in turns. The first presenter to instruct the attendees was Dr. Pius Ndayambaje who gave an overview of the ULK E-learning Platform. As he said, E-learning is not a new song this higher learning institution is singing since its inception goes back to 2015. Stressing the importance of e-learning, he said that it enables the lecturer and the institution to fully deliver quality education since the system allows learners an ample time to independently study while the lecturer comes to facilitate once they encounter hurdles.

Dr. Pius Ndayambaje giving an overview of the ULK E-learning Platform

“As a teacher, you are a facilitator or mentor of your students. The blended system implies that the teacher will give learners much time to freely  go through their lessons online and then the he will take a short time somewhere at the end of the lesson to hear from students and possibly sort out the problems they might have encountered”, he said.

He also added that for any learning exercise to become fruitful there is need for learners to be interested in the learning mode and this cannot happen unless the facilitators properly play their part. “Learning becomes active when students are responsible and engaged. You can’t claim to be an active teacher when your learners are not interested in what you teach; hence the use of e-learning comes in handy to help out in this as it will enable the students to spend a lot of time on their work”

More other trainers such as Mr. Sabin Hitimana, Ibrahim Niyonzima, Noah Muhawenimana and Olivier Nsanzabega took the floor to spice up the training with more inputs. As they demonstrated, there is an interface that connects lecturers to their students whereby the lecturer can perform a number of activities such as delivering course contents, assigning students, giving them quizzes, chatting with them live, grading their work, monitoring their attendance, to mention but a few.

Trainers

At the end of the seminar, trainees proved to have grasped a lot of information on e-learning and they vowed to use the acquired knowledge and skills to reach out to ULK students wherever they are scattered across the globe.

The Vice Chancellor’s vote of thanks marked the end of the event.

Trainees following the trainers

After training differents ULK Staff shared their experiences about e-learning platforms.