Page 175 - Educational Technology A Primer for the 21st Century

10.2 Educational Project 167
10.2.2 Characters of Educational Project

According to the definition of educational project, we can know some characters of
educational project, such as desired educational outcomes, clearly start and end, and
well-defined goals and objectives. In order to achieve viability and sustainability, a
development educational project, regardless of its size and extension, should be
oriented to the following characteristics (ILO, 2010):

• The starting point of a project is the existence of a problem affecting a certain
group.
• A project is a participatory exercise from start to end.
• A well-defined project is result-based.
• Being result-based, a project seeks clearly defined objectives or outcomes, and it
includes a series of interrelated and coordinated activities.
• Whereas the problem is the project’s starting point, the objectives are the end
point.
• Project implementation is organized with a fixed budget, limited resources, and
specific deadlines.
• Each project has a specific management structure.
• Each project includes a monitoring and evaluation (M&E) system.
• A project has to be sustainable in relation to society, finance, institution, and
environment.
• Finally, each project is unique.

10.2.3 Life Cycle of Educational Project

Every project must follow a series of phases, allowing the process to be booted
before the problem is identified until it is resolved. This series of phases is known as
the life cycle of project (shown in Fig. 10.1). Project life cycle generally involves:
(1) tasks completed at each stage or substage and (2) the team responsible for each
of the phases defined (Prabhakar, 2009). Figure 10.1 depicts a typical project cycle
which is somewhat familiar to the instructional design model presented in a pre-
vious chapter.

10.2.3.1 Initiating Processes
The initiating processes determine the nature and scope of the project. The main
purpose is understanding the situation of projects through analyzing the business
needs/requirements in measurable goals, reviewing the current operations, and
analyzing stakeholder input (including users and support personnel for the project).

10.2.3.2 Planning Processes
After the initiation stage, the project is planned to an appropriate level of detail. The
main purpose is to plan time, cost, and resources adequately to estimate the work