As mobile technologies become increasing agile and affordable, Ford and her team are constantly on the lookout for new and innovative applications - 'We thrive on coming up with a new idea!"
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Merryl Ford
When it comes to mobile technology, Merryl Ford's passion for local innovation knows no bounds. As the research and innovation manager of the technology and society research group at the CSIR Meraka Institute, she loves the challenges and opportunities of working in the exciting African context, where her group is currently experiencing the phenomenal mobile phone revolution.
In The World Bank's 2009 Information and Communications for Development report, Extending reach and increasing impact, authors Mohsen Khali, Philippe Dongier and Christine Zen-Wei Qiang state that "mobile networks now constitute the world's largest distribution platform and create a major development opportunity". The report estimates the number of mobile phones globally at four billion and states that "mobile phones now represent the world's largest distribution platform". In January 2009, South Africa reached a 100% penetration rate of mobile phones.
It is interesting to note that today's high-end mobile phones have the computing power of a mid-1990s PC- while consuming only one one-hundredth of the energy. Even the simplest, voice-only phones have more complex and powerful chips than the 1969 on-board computer that landed a spaceship on the moon!
With a keen instinct for matching technology and information society applications, Ford and her co-workers have come up with a range of projects in which the cellphone is integral as "the platform of the current world". She expands, "I am constantly challenged by an article in The Economist, title The meek shall inherit the web, in which the author states: 'Shackled to our desktop and laptop computers, we in industrialized nations might just be missing the next computer revolution. Wouldn't it be deliciously ironic if developing countries leapfrogged ahead of us by using inventiveness born of the need to make-do with less? It might very well already be happening in the form of mobile-phone-based computing.'"
The portfolio of projects, which Ford leads, has grown substantially over the past three years and are particularly relevant to the rural context in which many South Africans live. Well-publicised projects include Dr Math, the mobile mathematics tutoring system that runs on MXit, a popular instant-messaging service available via cell phones, and which has 6 000 learners subscribed to the service. Using volunteers from the University of Pretoria, the service offers real-time mathematics support at a fraction of the cost of an SMS. The project has received support from the Department of Education (DoE) and will ultimately benefit more than 25 000 schools throughout South Africa. New developments for Dr Math include drill-and-practice competitions and text-based mathematics adventure games.
The first mobile learning application the group developed in 2006 was the MobilEd audio-wikipedia system. The system enables learners to access information by sending a search term via an SMS to the service, which then calls back and 'reads' the information retrieved from wikipedia. This enables learners at schools where there is no access to information (be it digital or via traditional means such as books and libraries) to access content. Since this time, the group has worked on several additional services, such as 'Street memory' (context-aware content provided by mobile messaging services), SNAP-ME (content-access by photographing 2D barcodes), IGLOO (the ability for teachers to provide content and questionnaires to learner's' mobile phones easily), HADEDA (a spelling drill-and-practice application) and in-development applications like IOTA (a facility to summarise and search for 160 character content via SMS) and ECHO (a Twitter-like, community of practice for teachers).
TekkiTotsMobile is a spin-off from the TekkiTots initiative that links pre-schoolers with student volunteers from Pretoria University. The students present hands-on lessons on science and technology to the pre-schoolers, because even at this stage many teachers do not have enough confidence to teach basic science to the children. TekkiTotsMobile packages the lesson plans into small mobile-friendly presentations and videos, which the teachers can then use to prepare and present. Teachers will be able to download these lessons from a wap (wireless application protocol) site directly to the cell phones. They will then be able to freely share the videos among each other.
As fast as the projects roll out, Ford's group is finding ways to do things differently and smarter "We're working on a new mobile technology platform - robust, stable and easily scalable," she confirms. "This will make it possible to spread the benefits of our projects in an affordable and easily implementable way."
Complementing these projects is the Mobiquette kit, a manual for schools on how to integrate mobile devices in education, prepared on request from the DoE. "Our target audience includes learners, educators and parents," Ford explains. "We provide guidance for them on online safety and security issues in the educational context."
As many schools become equipped with computers, Ford takes the approach of the "Best of both worlds" (a project proposal currently under consideration for funding by the South Africa Finland Knowledge Partnership for ICT). However, she makes it clear that "for us, the mobile base is primary and computer access secondary".
The reach of this research has extended beyond South Africa. The group's reputation as world experts on mobile learning in the developing world has resulted in fruitful research collaboration with international organisations. One example is the work with the United Nations Children's Fund on projects such as the BEE, a mobile telecommunications hub based on the Digital Doorway, for use in post disaster situations, which relies, amongst others, on SMS services.
Her group has conducted information sharing and education workshops in Africa with major stakeholders to demonstrate the advantages of mobile computing devices in education. These will be replicated in South African schools, with educators receiving practical instruction on how to use the cell phone in a class room.
As a computer science graduate and CSIR bursar, Ford started her career at the CSIR where she was responsible for setting up and managing one of the first internet service providers in South Africa, which was finally commercialised and sold to M-Net to become M-Web. She worked for IBM and then returned to the CSIR.
Her contribution to innovative solutions is the outcome of her passion to make a difference and see an impact in people's lives, her responsiveness to challenges and trying new things, and her temperament - "I am a dreamer. I find it exciting and a privilege to be able to contribute in this way."
She admires a number of people. "As a whole I admire anyone who dares to be different, who pushes the envelop and persists against all odds," she reveals. "So, obviously, Nelson Mandela is one such person. Also Richard Branson and Barack Obama. If I look at women, then one woman stands out who has inspired me. Maria Montessori, who was incredibly forward-thinking in the early 1900s, initiated a new method of teaching where she recognised that given the right circumstances, children will teach themselves." Both Fords's children are at a Montessori primary school, where fundamental values inherent in the way they learn include respect, a lifelong love of learning, self-confidence and self-discipline. "In my work in the ICT in education domain, Montesorri's principles have guided me in all that we've done."
Ford attributes the group's success to the quality of the members of the group, particularly fellow female researchers, Adele Botha and Laurie Butgereit, who have been inspirational with their creativity, enthusiasm and energy. Project manager Madelein van den Berg has looked after the mobile research work over the past three years and "has managed to help us keep our feet on the ground". She is also very appreciative of Meraka Institute centre manager Kagiso Chikane "who believes in me and supports me in all that I do".
Ford loves reading fiction and always has a book with her - "Nowadays it's access to ebooks via my cellphone - I tend to practise what I preach!" These include science fiction, thrillers and detective novels. "I've also started writing fiction over the past two years - I believe I have a novel in me." She edits and creates videos and loves the YouTube world. Travel, gadgets and the X-files TV series make up the other passions in the life of this talented researcher.
As mobile technologies become increasing agile and affordable, Ford and her team are constantly on the lookout for new and innovative applications - 'We thrive on coming up with a new idea!"
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