GeoICT4e

About the project

About this project

GeoICT4e — “Social innovations in Geo-ICT education at Tanzanian HEIs for improved employability” — is a 2020–2024 higher-education partnership funded by Finland's Ministry for Foreign Affairs through the HEI-ICI instrument (EDUFI), with a total budget of €2,437,500. Its main outcome is that Tanzanian universities improve their management and teaching capacities in impact-driven, socially innovative geospatial and ICT education, leading to better graduate employment.

An eight-university consortium delivers it, coordinated by the University of Turku with Turku University of Applied Sciences and Novia UAS from Finland, and five Tanzanian universities — the University of Dar es Salaam, Ardhi University, Sokoine University of Agriculture, the State University of Zanzibar and Moshi Co-operative University. It builds on two decades of UTU–Tanzania cooperation (since 2003) and the preceding HEI-GIS (2013–15) and Geo-ICT (2017–2020) projects.

The central method is Multi-Competence Learning (MCL) — a challenge-based approach delivered through five co-creative “challenge campaigns” (2–3 months each), organised with innovation-ecosystem actors and problem owners such as Dlab, Sahara Ventures and Funzi. Students develop four competence domains at once: understanding real societal problems in space and time; collecting and using open geospatial data and open-source Geo-ICT tools; working in multi-stakeholder teams; and designing climate-smart, resource-efficient solutions.

GeoICT4e produces three outputs: HEI staff able to plan and run MCL teaching (25–30 staff, five campaigns, 100+ professional visits); students with open access to digital e-learning assets — a Tanzania GeoNode of 200–300 datasets and 40–50 nugget-sized mini-MOOCs on the Digicampus platform; and 1,000–1,500 students with improved digital multi-competences. The practices are captured in a Multi-Competence Learning (MCL) Playbook, and 10–12 degree programmes with 50+ courses are revised with open digital content. The project couples tightly with the World Bank–funded Tanzania Resilience Academy, which supplies digitally literate students from its mass-internships, and follows a gender-active (50% female) and Citizen-Panel community-engagement approach.

Objectives

• Build HEI staff capacity to plan and deliver Multi-Competence Learning (MCL) in geospatial and ICT teaching
• Run five co-creative challenge campaigns with innovation-ecosystem actors and problem owners
• Open up digital e-learning assets — a Tanzania GeoNode (200–300 datasets) and 40–50 mini-MOOCs on Digicampus
• Improve the digital skills and multi-competences of 1,000–1,500 Tanzanian students
• Revise 10–12 degree programmes and 50+ courses with open digital learning content
• Publish a Multi-Competence Learning (MCL) Playbook for scalability across Africa
• Advance gender-active participation (50% female target) and Citizen-Panel community engagement

Key activities