GH
Sibal to revamp country’s education system
The country's education system is set for a total revamp with the new HRD minister, Kapil Sibal, planning to put in place a process to bring in transparency and accountability in institutions and curb unethical practices, including capitation fees. 'I am going to restructure the complete education system in the country. We need to restructure the system so that we do not need to go through the punitive routes,' told HRD Minister Kapil Sibal. There has to be 'corrective steps with human face,' he said against the backdrop of a raging controversy over huge capitation fees being demanded by professional colleges from students, including one medical college said to be run by a Union Minister from Tamil Nadu.
The measures under the revamping process will include expansion, access to quality education for all sections of society and review of the procedure for grant of 'Deemed-to-be -University' status. The new mechanism will also have steps to check capitation fees by professional colleges and setting up of a national council for higher education as a regulatory body. On reports of two Tamil Nadu-based institutions allegedly demanding huge capitation fees, Sibal said the ministry will 'rethink' the process under which institutions are given the 'Deemed-to-be-University' status and will set up a committee to review the functioning of the existing ones.
Technology, Learning integration though Online Quiz for students
The National Education Network has collaborated with the Government agency for technology in education, Becta to integrate technology across the entire curriculum of learning and launched the first ever nationwide online schools quiz. Becta seeks participation of thousands of primary school children up and down the country, to compete simultaneously in this interactive online competition to become the 'Brainiest school in Britain.'
The Next Generation Learning National Schools Quiz aims Key Stage 2 and is open to students, aged eight and nine years. The online competition will be taking place at 11 a.m. on Friday, March 12. The winning pupil's school will be awarded with up to $4,736.34 worth of ICT equipment or training. This nationwide knowledge quiz launched by Becta is an exclusively online competition, via the National Education Network The quiz will be wide in scope and varied, covering curriculum areas such as history, science, citizenship, numeracy and literacy.
6 months at IGNOU for BPO training
For an aspirant who is dreaming of a well-paying job in India's big BPO industry, here's something to give you a head start. IGNOU, a popular distance learning university, is offering a six-month online course to train aspirants for BPO industry. The Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) claims to have got a good response to the 'Business Process Outsourcing-finance and accounts' course, and feel the BPO industry in India will welcome the trained lot. Most of those enrolling for the course are students of commerce and accountancy. R. Krishna Prasad is pursuing his bachelor's degree in commerce from Bangalore.
The diploma course that has an intake of 50 students is structured in such a way that apart from the classes conducted on weekends, the students are exposed to an 'online lab' which will simulate the working environment of a BPO. According to the National Association of Software and Service Companies (Nasscom), over 1.1 million people are employed in the BPO industry in India. A significant number are below the age of 30. The industry is expected to employ 2.5-3 million professionals by 2010, contributing 7-8 % of the national GDP. India, which has a large English-speaking work force, has seen BPOs and call centers mushroom, particularly in major metropolitan cities. Nanda Gopal, another student pursuing the course, finds the weekend classes convenient and plans to shift to a BPO firm from his current job as an accountant. The course was launched in January this year, in collaboration with IT firm Accenture Services Pvt Ltd. IGNOU invested INR 4 million to set up the course while Accenture invested INR 1 million.
Joint working group of India and US to boost education
India and the US will set up a joint working group to boost bilateral relation in the field of education, it was announced on Thursday after a meeting between Human Resource Development (HRD) Minister Kapil Sibal and the US Under Secretary William J. Burns. The group will be headed by Sibal and US Secretary of Education, and it will meet once a year alternately in India and the US. The group will focus on institutional linkages in the field of secondary education, higher education and vocational education.
'The US side expressed keen interest in pursuing a Bilateral Education Dialogue with India for fruitful cooperation in the field of education,' said HRD ministry in a statement. Sibal, while interacting with a US delegation stated that the 21st century will be a Knowledge Century and India, with its young population, will be a major provider of trained workforce to the entire world. The minister underlined that one of his focus areas would be to better the gross enrollment ratio. India tops the list of countries sending students to the US and nearly 90,000 Indian students annually go to that country to pursue higher studies.
FOGSI launches satellite based education programme for Indian medical colleges
< ?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />
The Federation of Obstetric and Gynaecological Societies of India has collaborated with the Indian Space Research Organisation for the satellite based education programme for medical students.
Indian Space Research Organisation has launched the satellite based education programme for medical students and doctors to update their latest information. According to the FOGSI president Duru Shah, FOGSI has launched satellite based education programme for doctors and medical students in over 100 municipal and government medical colleges of the country. Initially, Cosme Farma Laboratories Limited (CFLL) will install satellite dishes with technical support from ISRO. FOGSI doctors will develop the course content and distributed live through satellite to over 100 municipal and government medical colleges of < ?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />
TIME selects Karnataka based Excelsoft to deliver online mock CAT exams
Mysore (Karnataka) based Excelsoft, an e-learning and e-assessments technology company, has announced that it was selected by T.I.M.E., India's largest training institute for CAT preparation, to deliver over 3.5 lakhs fault-free online mock CAT exams in a span of about 20 weeks. With CAT going online, T.I.M.E offered a comprehensive series of mock tests online during the run up to CAT 2009 for all their students using Excelsoft's flagship product SARAS (for the Test and Assessment sector). Said D. Sudhanva, Managing Director of Excelsoft, 'T.I.M.E, India's biggest management entrance training institute, evaluated several online assessment engines before finalizing on Excelsoft's SARAS due to configurability of the application and reputation of our organization. The tests were delivered through 195 franchise centers of T.I.M.E spread across the country. SARAS's capabilities of delivering tests in online and mixed modes ensured that T.I.M.E was able to meet their requirement of conducting online/computer based tests even in remote areas with unreliable internet connectivity.'
'Excelsoft solution has inbuilt mechanisms to handle loss of power, loss of network, low bandwidth and combinations of such operational scenario. In all these situations, the end user's test-taking experience is unaffected. Tests were delivered with minimal disruptions in all locations' added D. Sudhanva. The number of test takers on weekends was almost 8 times that on week days which would result in high deployment infrastructure costs to meet the peak load requirement. Excelsoft hosted the platform on Amazon Cloud Computing infrastructure that provided flexibility to scale up/down the hardware infrastructure depending on the expected load. This took care of the variability in load without having to spend on dedicated servers for peak load. Excelsoft's award winning technology for Test & Assessments has been used to deliver over 15 million online & computer based tests and exams in leading organizations worldwide. These comprise of a wide gamut of tests such as entrance exams, education assessments, certification and promotional exams, skill based assessments and Test preparatory including diagnostic, practice and mock tests.
Prometric strives on improvement
The company making news lines across country for the technical bumps during the Indian Institutes of Management's (IIMs) Common Admission Test (CAT) in 2009, Prometric Testing Pvt. Limited, has recently strived to improve upon its application and delivery fronts, announced its CEO Charles Kernan on Monday. The CAT 2009 faux pas was a significant phase that dented the image of IIM with major glitches.
Kernan mentioned that 13% of networks went kaput during the first three days of the examination, with smooth sailing otherwise, with no displacements during re-testing conducted in January for some students. Further, Kernan mentioned that over nine million tests were conducted annuallly by Prometric, including Graduate Record Examination (GRE) and Test Of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) in India. It has been a pathbreaker in tranforming the way in which eams are conducted from traditional paper-pencil format to computer based format.
ICT certification of teachers Under ELearning Jamaica
Certification of recently, received by a total of 580 teachers for basic computer skills under the e-Learning Jamaica Project. The project aimed to enable them to integrate information and communication technologies in their lesson plans. At a graduation ceremony held recently at the Manchester High School, the teachers, who have gained competences in operating a personal computer, word processing, spreadsheet elements, database management, power-point presentations, among other areas, were presented with their certificates at a graduation ceremony.
The keynote address was given by Minister of Finance and the Public Service, and Member of Parliament for North East Manchester, Hon. Audley Shaw, at the occassion. The minister stated that the computer is an important tool in the teaching and learning processes, and in building a more prosperous society. Chief Executive Officer of e-Learning Jamaica Project, Avril Crawford, in the meantime, informed that the initiative is succeeding in its mission to equip high schools with the necessary technology to enhance learning.
Promoting ICT in Education
To enable students of Ghana to enter and fit into the modern employment market, the Deputy Minister for Communication, Gideon Kwaku has reiterated government's commitment to promoting ICT education in the country. The same was announced by Kwaku at a ceremony for the construction of an Information Centre for the Women Training Institute (WTI) in Ho. The centre will be named after the mother of a philanthropist, Dr. ken Kwaku who is building it in collaboration with Intercom Programme and Manufacturing Company.
