UNESCO and the Education Minister of Iraq yesterday launched the Iraqi Educational TV Channel, IRAQI EDU. The channel is a response to the difficult security conditions in the country that keep many children away from school, and will provide support to students through distance learning.
A $ 6.5 million project, financed by the European Union as part of their overall support for the Sector in Iraq, is being implemented by UNESCO in cooperation with the Iraqi Ministry of Education. The channel will broadcast 24 hours a day educational episodes based on the Iraqi school curricula. The project is designed particularly for primary and secondary school students both within and outside of Iraq.The new television channel allows teachers and pupils to follow the school curriculum through distance learning tools.
It is mainly a response to security risks that result in a high rate of absenteeism and the closing of schools.
UNESCO launches educational TV channel IRAQI EDU
ITWorx launches new version of its e-learning solution ‘EducationCatalyst’
ITWorxITWorx one of the Middle East's leading software professional services firms and a global leader in e-Learning solutions based on the Microsoft Learning Gateway (MLG), has today announced the launch of its newest version of Education CatalystTM for schools and higher-education.
Catalyst is a pioneering product suite equipped with advanced tools that have been specifically designed to enable academic institutions to create their own websites, user data, user groups, and site memberships. Education Catalyst product suite is intuitive, user-friendly and demonstrates endless benefits to academic institutions; furthermore its ease and speed of deployment has so far encouraged
many schools within the Middle East, and even internationally, to adopt e-learning solutions.
In the United Arab Emirates, ITWorx is currently engaging with 50 schools in the Ministry of Education. Internationally, 25 schools in County Durham, England, are reaping the many benefits of education offerings and tools, and extending into an additional 60 schools.
Virtual classroom becomes reality in UP
Uttar Pradesh Technical University (UPTU) is trying to make virtual classroom as reality in UP. The university has embarked to create an information technology hub at Noida. Initially, the hub will cater to ten nodal centres and will be made accessible to 50 other colleges in the state.
Through this initiation, UPTU aims to bring experts from various fields across the globe to deliver lectures and interact with the students. It will create a model, under which a single teacher can connect through video conferencing to all students in various engineering colleges across UP. The move is expected to help reach more students with fewer teachers.
NComputing to deploy solutions at 5,000 schools in Andhra Pradesh (India)
A US based provider of low-cost shared computing technology, NComputing has won the bid to provide 50,000 seats for computer learning in 5,000 secondary schools across Andhra Pradesh.
The ICT school learning programme is initiated by the Central Government. The contract is worth of INR 4000 million which is expected to benefit 10 million students across the country and 1.8 million students in Andhra. NIIT Limited will be responsible for managing 2,005 of these schools in eight districts. The Rs 173-crore order bagged by NIIT includes installing desktop PCs and NComputing's low-cost shared computer systems, training the faculty and managing the learning labs for five years on a build, operate and transfer (BOT) model. The remaining schools will be operated by three other partners including Educomm.
Maltese schools gives prominence music, drama, art and dance
A recently released document analysing arts and cultural education in schools across Europe praises Malta's curricula and initiatives when it comes to promoting the arts among the up and coming generation. The study was conducted by the EU's Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency. In March 2009, the European Parliament passed a resolution on Artistic Studies. Among the key recommendations are that artistic education should be compulsory at all school levels, arts teaching should use the latest information and communications technologies and the teaching of art history must involve meetings with artists and visits to places of culture. In several European countries, including Malta, cross-curricular links between the arts and other subjects may be established. Malta has also recently launched the 'National e-Learning Strategy', the underlying principles of which ensure that educators and administrators have the necessary skills and support for the use of ICT in their work, as well as to support their own career development. As part of the strategy, free laptops were also given to teachers.
The study reports that Maltese pupils frequently make visits to artists' workshops, organised by their art teachers, as part of the school's visual arts programme. Children are also encouraged to participate in arts-related competitions at national and international levels. The study also highlighted the fact that, from September 2008, the schools of art and music on the island, together with the Malta Drama Centre, merged into a College of Arts, allowing for cross-disciplinary interaction and further development of cross-disciplinary courses. The government also intends to encourage further networking between these schools and other artistic and cultural entities such as the National Orchestra, the Manoel Theatre, the St James Cavalier Centre for Creativity, the University of Malta and MCAST. In the long run, says the report, the long-term goal in Malta is to have schools where teaching is based on the general curriculum with a special focus on music, drama, art and dance.
NIIT launches comprehensive
NIIT has launched a wide range of products and solutions for the Schools under the aegis of 'NIIT eGURU'. The futuristic NIIT eGURU range for schools, comprises of 'Interactive Classrooms' for teachers, 'Math lab' and 'IT Wizard' for students, and 'Quick School' an Education Resource Planning solution for school management.
The NIIT eGuru 'Interactive Classroom' solution is based on Intel technologies and architecture, NIIT eGuru 'IT Wizard' curriculum is based on Microsoft's Windows Vista and Office 2007 suite. The company has partnered with Intel to give support in its World Ahead Program. Under the programme, NIIT will improve the overall quality of education by providing schools access to technology through PCs, and creating learning platforms designed with relevant content and technologies to empower students and teachers. This is also in line with a collaborative movement Intel recently facilitated, called 'Connected Indian', where government, industry associations and private enterprise have come together for the common cause of connecting a billion Indians. The curriculum of NIIT eGURU IT Wizard is a pioneering school learning solution, which comprehensively integrates Microsoft Windows Vista for the students. The launch of 'Interactive Classrooms' as part of the NIIT eGURU portfolio will help bring latest tools and resources to schools across the country.
India one of the research partners of Big Bang Experiment
Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR) is housing a computer that is part of the Worldwide LHC Computing Grid (WLCG, the system that will allow scientists to understand and analyse the data from the big bang experiment ongoing in Europe.
In India, Mumbai's Tata Institute of Fundamental Research and the Variable Energy Cyclotron Centre, Kolkata, have tier 2 systems. The Baba Atomic Research Centre (BARC), too, has contributed to the software used in the grid technology. BARC's contribution has been towards making software tools, problem-solving tools, and monitoring tools. The main aim is to see that smooth operations go on, since it is a wide network of countries from over the world.
Pune to become a research hub
President Pratibha Patil while addressing the 10th convocation ceremony of the Bharati Vidyapeeth University (BVU) envisioned Pune
as the next centre for excellence and emphasised the need to focus on innovative approaches and research practices at Universities.The BVU became a deemed university in April 1996 and runs a network of 185 institutions across Pune, Navi Mumbai, Sangli, Solapur, Kolhapur, Karad and Delhi.
Pune is home to the largest state university, besides six deemed universities, which collectively account for over 40 engineering, two medical colleges and a vast network of other institutions offering education in pharmacy, management and law, among others.
With a student population of over five lakh, the city also has a large network of nationally and internationally recognised research laboratories such as the NCL, NIV, NCCS, ARI and DRDO establishments. Of late, there has been a growing emphasis on greater interaction between the institutions and research facilities.
Everonn Systems India to provide computer education in Nagpur Municipal Schools
Everonn Systems India and Computer Business Management (CBM) will collaborate for imparting free computer education to over 54,000 students of Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) schools. Of the 220 corporation schools, Everonn Systems India would impart computer education in 84 schools while CBM would conduct computers classes in the remaining schools.
NMC has committed to provide quality education under special training programme, it has decided to make computer education compulsory for students of NMC schools and will impart computer training to around 100 NMC teachers. The Coprporation is also planning to outsource the computer education programme for students from class first to tenth to Everonn Systems India and CBM. The companies are also ready to set up digital library for NMC school students.
Kerala ranks first on primary education index
The latest analytical report on District Information School Education (DISE) released shows that Kerala is ranked No. 1 among the 21 major states (large in geographical area) in the latest composite Education Development Index (EDI) prepared for the primary and upper primary levels of schooling for 2006-07.
The EDI rank list is topped by Kerala (0.772), followed by Delhi 0.757), and Tamil Nadu (0.741).The report on the EDI was prepared by the National University of Educational Planning and Administration (NUEPA) based on the District Information System for Education (DISE), a comprehensive database on elementary education in India, which is had created in recent years.
The EDI is a comprehensive index computed based on 23 indicators classified broadly under 4 categories – Access, Infrastructure, Teachers and Outcomes.
















