THE MAJOR CHALLENGES OF EDTECH IN CAMBODIA

• Lack of computers only 3% of Cambodian households have access to a computer (ITU, 2019) while 41.1% of households in the Asia & Pacific region have access to computer

• No or poor Internet access, particularly unreliable and/or insufficient bandwidth.
• Absence of or unreliable LAN infrastructure in schools.
• Lack of competent staff to manage the EdTech infrastructure and support users in schools.
• MoEYS, 2019: only 17% of upper secondary schools and 5% of lower secondary schools have access to computer labs.
• 40% of upper secondary schools have access to the internet; in most of the cases, the internet is solely used in the school administration office for administrative purpose only.

FUTURE OPPORTUNITY
Cambodia has invested significant time and resources into creating and implementing plans to increase the effective use of ICT in education. Strong commitment from the government on supporting the technology in education. The Royal Government of Cambodia (RGC) has incorporated ICT strategies include the in the Rectangular Strategy Phase IV, ICT Master Plan 2020, Telecom/ICT (T-ICT) Development Policy 2020, Law on Telecommunication, and the ICT Strategic Framework.

MoEYS adopted a curriculum framework in 2016 and course syllabus at all levels in 2018 that included student centered concepts and approaches by using an inquiry-based learning. Computer Programming has been integrated into the new national curriculum for students from Grade 4 to Grade 12.

The Cambodia Education 2030 Roadmap, Education Strategic Plan 2019-2023 provide that in-service and pre-service training is to include new and modern pedagogical approaches and integrate ICT; to develop teachers’ capacity and reform the teacher training institutions at NIEs, TECs and RTTCs to ensure the equivalence of training outcomes especially in STEM, ICT.