Narrowing the gap between the information rich and the information poor :
New technologies and the future of the school

Mobile Internet Unit (MIU)

Kuala Lumpur, Selangor and Kedah states, Malaysia. Also starting in Sarawak, Malaysia

The Mobile Internet Unit (MIU) is a 44-seat bus renovated into a cyber learning station that goes round schools to provide ICT training and electronic classroom experience. Students and teachers (in some cases even communities) are learning how to use computers (basic skills), multimedia software, the basic Internet services and even, how to create a software. Especially targeted for rural schools, MIU's goal is to reduce the gap between the information-poor and the information-rich. A computer is also given to each school visited by MIU to help build local empowerment.

MIU bus and its facilitators visit the schools every couple of months (depending on cases) to teach one unit (10 units for the whole program) . Schools will then stay with homework between the visits (in most cases, it is preparing a website for their own school). Today, MIU has trained hundreds of students on basic Internet technologies in 20 schools of Malaysia, most of which would not have had access otherwise (rural and marginalised secondary schools). Now, entering its second phase, the project will expand to other schools in Selangor state (basic literacy skills). And it has just started a new project in Kedah state, called "School as a Community Hub", targeting at communities and especially parents (first pilot school project called: MIU @Tunjang). The whole project is run by a smart partnership between many institutions concerned with the matter.

This project was started to bridge the looming divide between computer-literate and computer-illiterate students in Malaysia. The Government of Malaysia (Ministry of Education) announced they were creating in 1998 the "Smart School" project (multimedia access within a whole concept for Malaysian schools in the era of information), but it still concerns now only 1% of Malaysian schools (it is at a pilot stage and will expand). An effort has been made to reach more students with MIU, especially those in rural areas, who lack the most basic IT equipments.

Ms. Wai Chin Kang
Project Manager MIU
MIMOS Berhard,
Kuala Lumpur, MALAYSIA
E-mail : Wckang@mimos.my
Tel: 603 8996 5000 ext 2416
Website:http://www.miu.nitc.org.my/

Institutional Partners
MIMOS Berhard
Financial Partners
Ministry of Science and Technology
Ministry of Education
Asia Pacific Development Information Program, KL (APDIP)
United Nations Development Programme, KL (UNDP)
Department of Education Selangor
Automotive Corporation Malaysia
University of Malaya, KL

August 1999: Pilot stage, 20 schools
April 2001: Expansion stage 1: Communities

Mobile Internet Unit (MIU), "The Pilot Study Report", May 2001, by MIMOS
Finalist Project Education category, Stockholm Challenge Award 2000.