Technology Mediated Support for the Life-Long Education Students in the National Open University of Nigeria

Technology mediated support is very crucial for the lifelong education students in the National Open University of Nigeria. This paper is therefore focused on giving account of the concept of lifelong education in this university and how technology is being used to transmit knowledge, reduce distance between learners and the facilitators, support the learners academically and psychologically and ensure that there is quality in all her provisions as an ODL institution. Some challenges were identified in the area of epileptic supply of electricity in Nigeria, very high cost of procuring and maintaining computers and telephone services particularly for telephone interactive discussion between the learners and the university staff and on the issue of effective use of the available array of technological options to provide support for the learners. It is recommended that television and teleconferencing programmes should be organized regularly to support the learners while the academic and non academic staff at the study centre need to be constantly trained on the availability and use of the modern technology in order for them to improve the quality of support rendered to the life long learners and that live teleconferencing facilities must be available in all the study Centers and must be connected to the university headquarters just as more information and communication technology experts must be employed to work particularly at the study centers.