Location: Clayfield Room, Ground Floor Building A, Caulfield Campus (see Map of Caulfield campus; casual parking is available on the 7th floor of the multi-storey carpark - purchase and display parking ticket)
This forum has now past and a forum report along with presentation documents and videos are available.
The purpose of this research forum is to highlight Meraka's current activity in South Africa as well as work that Monash is currently undertaking around social-technical skills and knowledge transfer into Australia and the Pacific region, and to explore opportunities for partnership with Meraka and other organisations.
The Meraka Institute derives its mandate as a national strategic initiative from President Mbeki's 2002 State of the Nation Address. It is a major research and development body. The major objective of the Meraka Institute is to facilitate national economic and social development through human capital development and needs-based research and innovation, leading to products and services based on Information and Communication Technology. Meraka is part of the South African CSIR.
The Institute supports regional initiatives under the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD), collaborating with ICT organisations through staff and student exchange, and the establishment of co-operative programmes. In addition, the Meraka Institute leverages international science and technology collaboration and establishes global links to international programmes to contribute to and take advantage of international efforts in redressing the digital divide. The Digital Doorway initiative is one of the Meraka Institute's projects to bridge the digital divide. The initiative is a combined approach in which robust, purpose-built ICT solutions are supported and modified through ongoing community engagement and Meraka involvement for community development.
UNICEF Pacific is interested in the broad issue of how the Digital Doorway Initiative can help sustainable development for island nations in the Pacific. UNICEF Pacific has a proposal to implement the Digital Doorway Initiative in the Solomon Islands. It is also investigating implementation for Kiribati.
Marlien Herselman is a Research group leader: Living lab User Methods Project, Integrative platforms and Technologies, Meraka Institute, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, South Africa. She also has adjunct positions in the School of ICT, Faculty of Engineering, the Built environment and IT at Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University and in the Department of Information Systems, Faculty of Management and Commerce, University of Fort Hare.
A C3 National Research Foundation South Africa researcher, she was the recipient of the 2005 Women Researcher of the Year Award from the Tshwane University of Technology and the 2009 IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers) Women In Engineering Female Scientist of the Year Award.
Her work has taken her all over the world, discussing the Digital Doorway Initiative and the application of the Living Labs methodology to ICT research (see Digital Doorway: Social-Technical Innovation For High-Needs Communities [pdf]).
Julie Fisher is an Associate Professor and Associate Dean Research in the Faculty of Information Technology at Monash Australia. Among her many research interests is the area of technology uptake and use. In particular she is interested in ICT for development. Julie has published in leading information systems journals such as European Journal of Information Systems and Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology.
Ian Trust is Executive Director of the Wunan Foundation, an East Kimberly Indigenous organisation whose objective is to assist Indigenous people to help themselves. The Foundation does this by using its commercial investments to produce outcomes in employment and training for Aboriginal people of the East Kimberley, as well as building the capacity of Indigenous organizations to provide a better service to their members. Mr Trust was Chair of the ATSIC Wunan Regional Council for three consecutive terms, and was also Zone Commissioner for the Kimberley for the final term of ATSIC. In addition to the ILC and Wunan, Mr Trust is also a member of a number of national, state and regional boards including Indigenous Business Australia, Kimberley College of TAFE, Kimberley Group Training, East Kimberley Job Pathways and the WA Aboriginal and Education Training Council. Ian has visited South Africa to see the Digital Doorway Initiative.
For further information about this forum, contact Susan Foster via email on Sue.Foster@monash.edu.