A group of international educators has developed an online resource aimed at teaching digital skills to Public Servants.
The project seeks to increase the supply of “digital-era Public Service skills” into Governments worldwide.
The program is the brainchild of educators from 10 international institutions, including Harvard and Cambridge universities.
It gives professors and educators within universities, as well as in-house Government academies, access to free teaching materials on the “digital-era skills that all Public Service leaders now need to have”.
It also includes a support network to help educators improve the way they currently teach digital skills to Government employees.
The program has been developed by the Teaching Public Service in the Digital Age organisation, a new community of educators who are concerned with the shortfall of digital skills in Government.
One of its co-founders, Tom Steinberg (pictured) said institutions such as universities and in-house teaching academies “define the skills of future Public Service leaders”.
“We want to help these institutions to teach 21st century skills to help solve 21st century problems,” Mr Steinberg said.
The program is developing a masters-level course that will be released as an open educational resource in October,” he said.
“Underpinning this is a set of digital-era competencies that were developed by the experts over the past six months.
They include valuing the experience of service users and their ability to collaborate, along with anticipating and mitigating privacy, security and ethical risks, and understanding the need to blend traditional Public Service skills with digital skills.
Washington, 3 August 2020
