LIDC is committed to improving teaching in areas of international development, both within its member Colleges and through international partnerships.

Our teaching programme focuses on two areas:

 

 

Our teaching activities benefit from the world-renowned experience and expertise of our Colleges, both in delivering courses and conducting research. The Colleges offer over 300 postgraduate course units relevant to international development, in subjects ranging from agriculture to economics, and from health to poverty.

Most of our Colleges provide both distance and face-to-face learning. LIDC has a particular focus on distance learning and   we work closely with the University of London External System, a leading global provider of degrees through distance and flexible learning.

Research groups within our Colleges are also carrying out pioneering research to see how modern technologies, including mobile phones and the internet, can be used to support teaching in diverse settings, from veterinary nurses in Zanzibar to schools in the UK.

If you are interested in international development degrees and courses  delivered by our Colleges, visit our Distance Learning for Development (DL4D) portal www.dl4d.ac.uk , or the development-related pages of our Colleges’ websites (click on the College logos on the left-hand side of this page) .

 

The DL4D project seeks to encourage innovative approaches to teaching and learning for those living and working in developing countries. Distance learning is a flexible and low-cost alternative to conventional postgraduate study, enabling  people to study whenever they want and from wherever they are in the world.

In addition to advocating for distance learning as a mechanism for enhancing the skills and qualifications of otherwise hard-to-reach audiences, the DL4D project places a particular emphasis on interdisciplinary study as a means of ensuring practical approaches to sustainable development.

These benefits combine to make the DL4D concept of distance learning particularly attractive for international development professionals living and working in developing countries. It is the needs of this core audience that the DL4D project is seeking to address.

In keeping with these objectives,  the DL4D portal www.dl4d.ac.uk  has been created to provide  details of over 140 short courses from the University of London External System. These courses are designed for development professionals  and can be used both as a means of enhancing the individual’s specific skills and knowledge, or of contributing towards a larger postgraduate qualification. The range of courses on offer cover seven key categories:

 

 

DL4D activities also include working with our member Colleges to create  a collaborative and interdisciplinary Master’s programme in international development practice.

 

Distance Learning for Health (DL4H)
The DL4H project is being undertaken by LIDC on behalf of the UK Department of Health. It involves conducting a global review of health training at a distance in low- and middle-income countries to provide a comprehensive overview of distance health training initiatives around the world.  DL4H will endeavour to provide evidence of the value of distance learning as a means of addressing the need for trained health professionals across the developing world. Also, based on case studies of innovative and effective programmes, the project will provide evidence of best practice and recommendations for future developments.

The findings of this review will feed directly into the DL4H initiatives being developed by the University of London . More importantly, however, it will also seek to inform the practices of those in the spheres of health and international development, including government departments, UN agencies, funders, donors and NGOs.

 

Development awareness
LIDC is participating in a £232,000 grant from the Department for International Development (DFID) to understand how students in professional training learn about international development and how their development awareness can be enhanced. The project, entitled Students as Global Citizens, is led by the Development Education Research Centre (DERC) based at the Institute of Education (IoE). It involves training programmes of the Royal Veterinary College , the School of Pharmacy  and University College, London (UCL) for veterinarians, pharmacists and doctors, respectively. These institutions have varying experiences in making connections between development and training for the professions and provide models for securing engagement in development education from within these professions. The DERC project team is working with these Colleges to identify and implement opportunities within courses, deliver staff development sessions and undertake surveys with students to assess the relationship between their learning and engagement in global issues. The project will disseminate outcomes of the learning gained to professional bodies, academic institutions and student networks.