eResults: Bridging the Technology Divide

"Getting examination results from the internet used to be a distant dream for most students in Nepal, particularly those in rural and remote areas. However the situation is changing thanks to an innovative combination of new and traditional technologies.

The results of the School Leaving Certificate (SLC) exams have a huge impact on the futures of young people in countries like Nepal. Until last year, students here had to wait for their results to be published in newspapers and then relayed by telephone from the capital Kathmandu. In more remote areas, the results then have to travel by letter or word of mouth, reaching students often weeks or even months later. It is a time consuming and often expensive process.

Beginning last year, the Examination Board in Nepal started posting results on the internet, however the majority of Nepali villages do not have basic technologies like telephones or even electricity, let alone internet access. Earlier this year, Radio Lumbini established itself as a community multimedia centre (CMC) and started to bridge the gap.

With support from UNESCO, the station added computers and internet to their existing radio facilities and began broadcasting the SLC results to their listeners. This combination of internet and local FM broadcasting has brought exam results to rural areas and remote villages in Mid-Western Nepal where no internet or computer facilities are yet available.

The day the SLC results went up on the internet, the CMC staff and volunteers started to download the information at the centre and began announcing the student numbers of those who had passed their exams. People living in remote rural areas were surprised to hear the SLC results so soon because this sort of information had never reached them so fast in their lifetimes.

Soon after the broadcast began, students, teachers and parents started to gather in front of the CMC to see the results for themselves. To accommodate the growing crowds, the results were posted on the CMC notice board. Some 6,000 students spread over four districts in Mid-West Nepal were able to access their results through the efforts of the CMC.

Other countries have also started to publish public service and school board exams results on the internet and in some cases even through mobile phones. However in most countries in South Asia, radio broadcasting continues to be tightly controlled by government and dominated by business interests. Meanwhile, community radios in Nepal are demonstrating how different media can be combined to take the benefits of new technologies to even the most remote rural areas using simple, traditional media like radio. Among others in this Lumbini experiment, students are seeing the results."

Editor's Note: as of this writing, this article - published in Community Media & ICT News (September 2004, Issue 2) - is not available online, and is copied in full above.

For further information about CMCs (which have been established in Nepal (Tansen, Madanpokhara, and Manigram), Bhutan, India, Sri Lanka, as well as in Africa and the Caribbean) please consult UNESCO's "ICTs in the Hands of the Poor" website and UNESCO's "Communication and Information" portal.