Title: Utilization of ICT Infrastructure for Collaborative Learning through Community Participation.

Fighting poverty, globalizing economic policies, balancing gender equity, awareness in environmental sustainability and foremost educating society to Information and Communications Technology (ICT) has become the challenging demand of the developing countries. This paper likes to portrait a project on collaborative ICT learning with emphasizing quality computer and Internet literacy. By learning through pragmatic technical infrastructures and innovative methodologies the project participants would be able to compete not only in the national community, but also in the global society.

A micro focus has been made with the quality, while quantity has been treated as the secondary parameter. Throughout the year project participants are given quality training in computing concept, networking theories, web development, multimedia and Internet related materials adopting courses from internationally reputed universities. After completion of the project attachment, participants would be able to work at an independent environment or could continue research, teaching or higher education in world universities either through collaborative learning or through independent study.

Selection of participants is made considering contemporary socio-economical issues. Thoughts are always given to adopt new technologies to fit into the prevailing situations to maintain the quality of education. Institutional collaborations between reputed universities offering educational support, agencies offering technical and logistic support and continuous feedback on acceptance of the innovative methods are important issues which have been handled keenly.

In this way, this computer literate group will form standalone backbone of the community by transforming a neglected mass to useful citizens of the global village. They would be accumulating knowledge and share experiences through the Internet with other developing partners locally, nationally and globally and then disseminate their knowledge and experiences to the society for promoting developmental activities ranging from simple family planning, nature protection, pollution control, poverty alleviation, disaster management to human resource development and technology management. The Sustainable Development Networking Programme (SDNP) of Bangladesh and Institute of Computer Management and Science (ICMS) are initiating this collaborative programme of learning utilizing existing IT infrastructure.

Keywords: ICT, global society, Internet, collaborative learning.