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Using African Storybooks in Cameroon: Context matters

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About Us

Our Mission

Saide is committed to the process of transformation of education and training so to increase equitable and meaningful access to knowledge, skills and learning through the adoption of open learning principles, distance education methods and educational technology.

Our Vision

A society in which all people value, have access to, and succeed in lifelong education that meets national and regional priorities in the context of the global knowledge economy.

Governance

Saide is a non-profit organization that is registered as an educational trust (Registration Number: 1355/92). It is also registered as a Non Profit Organisation (041-137 NPO). We currently have a level one B-BBEE status. Saide’s Trustees are: Mr Sedupe Ramokgopa (Co-chairperson), Mr Siven Maslomoney (Co-chairperson), Professor Ahmed Bawa,  Ms Jennifer Glennie, Professor Mary Metcalfe, Professor Shireen Motala and Ms Linda Vilakazi-Tselane. Saide's Director is Ms Jennifer Glennie.

Funding

Saide was initially entirely supported by the European Union. From 1995, Saide began to diversify its funding. In early 1997, Saide turned its attention to its financial sustainability around different sources of income: project grants with agreed deliverables, commissioned project income, general income from funding agencies (organizational grants), other (including interest, royalties, use of administrative services etc). The balance among these types has shifted dramatically, with no organizational grants since 2005. Saide is committed to balancing the above sources of income to ensure that it retains a strong committment to its mission and is not driven entirely by the 'market'.


What we do

Saide is not an implementing agency but acts as an advocate, catalyst, and facilitator to bring about change in existing educational practices. Saide is in a unique position to facilitate networks and provide advice on the planning and implementation of distance education and the evaluation, development and sharing of courses and materials. Educational providers in South Africa and neighbouring countries have increasingly sought Saide's assistance in planning and evaluating their programmes, courses and systems and supporting them by facilitating professional development for their staff.

Saide is a non-governmental organization conducting projects throughout South Africa and sub-Saharan Africa. Saide's task is to contribute to the development of new models of open learning, including the use of distance education methods, educational technology and open educational resources. These should accord with and take forward the values, principles, and goals of the evolving education systems in the sub-Saharan Africa. 

Staff members

Our Services

Saide offers a number of services accross all educational sectors - higher education, teacher education, early childhood development, schooling, technical and vocational education and community education. We do not deliver education programmes, but work with educators, programmes and institutions as well as government to enable successful open learning for all.

Coordinate programme and course design projects

  • Provide support to developing programmes in which the principle of open and flexible learning is balanced with the provision of sufficient learner support
  • Provide support to developing programmes in which the principle of open and flexible learning is balanced with the provision of sufficient learner support
  • Lead collaborative course design processes in which learner support, assessment and course materials are integrated
  • Lead collaborative course design processes in which learner support, assessment and course materials are integrated

Coordinate learning materials development processes

  • Coordinate materials development in a team according to a planned process
  • Guide practitioners in the development process through extensive feedback, development testing and critical review
  • Make the materials available for the widest possible use, preferably as Open Educational Resources.

Promote the use of Open Educational Resources (OER) to support open learning

  • Identify and make available on Saide’s OER Africa platform high quality OER to meet the needs of African educational providers
  • Stimulate and/or coordinate projects for the adaptation and development of OER
  • Encourage institutions to develop policy that supports the use, creation and sharing of OER
  • Support and contribute to networks and communities of practice involved in the development and use of OER.

Support policy development

  • Assist in developing policy in distance education and open learning and the use of technology
  • Contribute to policy processes from this perspective
  • Conduct systemic reviews of distance education provision and the use of technology in education.

Promote the appropriate use of technology

  • Research the use of technology in education
  • Encourage and support appropriate use of technology in education

Build and disseminate knowledge

  • Refine understandings of open learning, distance education and the use of technology in education
  • Build an internationally recognised distance education collection with both hard copy and digital publications
  • Identify relevant information which is shared through our website, newsletters and online catalogue
  • Network with the community of distance educators.

Conduct monitoring, formative evaluation and research

  • Work with the client to develop the evaluation plan, including appropriate indicators
  • Collect and analyse both quantitative and qualitative information systematically and sensitively
  • Feed the information back to the client to improve the initiative.

Build capacity

  • In programme planning, course design, materials development, assessment and learner support for both paper-based and online distance education delivery
  • In management of distance education and costing
  • In quality assurance

Projects

Since inception, Saide has developed and sustained an excellent reputation for the quality and effectiveness of its work, and for its ability to manage a wide range of projects. The project pages provide information on our projects, related services and staff involved. Where possible we include links to resources and outputs related to these projects. The search facility  can also be used to look for our resources.

Acting as a backbone organization, Saide with seven Partners (funded by the Kresge Foundation) and five Participant universities work together to improve student success through evidence based interventions at scale. The Network includes national and local network components. The National Network includes a coherent set of services focused on student success (provided by Partner universities as well as by Saide) and the USA based Achieving the Dream, five sub-networks, convening meetings with Partners and the annual conference. Partner institutions coordinate regional sub- networks and Saide coordinates the national network.

Creating a digital library of African storybooks for early reading and facilitating their use and versioning for local languages and contexts, made available through openly licensed digital storybooks distributed by means of web-based Internet and mobile app services.

The African Storybook Initiative is recognised as an official partner of the Department of Basic Education's Read2Lead Campaign.

Contact

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Address

  • Saide
    14th Floor,
    19 Ameshoff Street,
    Braamfontein Johannesburg,
    South Africa
    -26.187392, 28.037548
  • Email
    info@saide.org.za
  • Phone
    +27 11-403-2813
    +27 60 436 4823