“Edtechs & education institutes need to rethink to address the need to weave technology into education”

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June 3, 2022

In the times of Instant Gratification and ‘On demand’ purchases, one may wonder how this will play up in the education sector that has largely been a brick-and-mortar system. Education is influenced by superior classroom teaching pedagogy and largely a multi step, long process of learning, application and milestone-based growth.

As the consumption patterns are changing with a stronger appetite to consume more content in less span of time, education institutes and ed-tech companies surely have a huge process of thinking to do. A casual conversation with a professor of a premier B-School in India brought out a powerful depiction on post-COVID times and the dependence on technology. He said, “We need to rethink the way higher education is delivered. The technology has shrunk boundaries and students are finding value in being at home and getting degrees along with picking up work experience through projects. Even though we are amongst the top 5 B-Schools in the country, we need to develop new ways of providing content to students that will bring them closer to actual learning despite shorter attention spans.”

In such a backdrop, daunting challenges are staring at India’s education model. From inefficiencies in basic education that existed even before the pandemic, where one in two children lacked basic reading proficiency at the age of 10, to a staggering 46% unemployment rates reported at graduation and post-graduation levels, there has to be technological intervention at a massive scale to repair the current problems.

Coinciding with the learning crisis is the Fourth Industrial Revolution which demands a skilled workforce that is ready to deliver and adapt as fast as they can with a stronger and deeper understanding of emerging business models. Thus, the new imperative now is to reimagine education and align it with the unprecedented technological transformation. While critics may have a view on the service delivery models of new age companies, ED-tech companies as well as education institutes will need to rethink on new ways to deliver education to address the impending need to weave technology into education.

Educational institutes can bring about this change strategically and in a phased manner:

• Start with the basic premise that technology doesn’t replace teachers. Teachers must co-exist for better learning of students. The tech solutions are impactful only when complemented by teachers whose training and continuous professional development is the mainframe agenda of the institutes.

• Leverage the digital boost provided by the Government of India in form of tech infrastructure, internet connectivity and programmes such as Digital India, open-source learning and the new education policy that urges integration of technology at each level.

• Improve governance systems, including learner feedback processes, ability to innovate on the learning design, establishing correlation between skills taught and skills imparted, and leveraging matrices such as improvement in employability at the core of each intervention.

• Collaborate with Industry and ensure there is meaningful participation beyond campus for familiarisation with corporate formats.

Intervention of technology at the higher education level should improve multiple matrices that have been a cause of concern and has proven to be an opportunity for a comprehensive solution. These matrices could include:

• Engaging learners in formats that help impart essential skill sets and thus, improve employability

• Curation and integration of solutions through enhanced corporate – academia partnerships

• Incorporating the voices of each stakeholder have been considered – teachers, learners, academic institutes and corporates at large.

Delhi University receives AICTE approval for MBA programme in ODL mode

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digitalLEARNING Network

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June 2, 2022

The University of Delhi has received the approval from the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) for the Master of Business Administration (MBA) Programme in Open and Distance Learning (ODL) mode from academic session 2022-23. “Now, the approval of the Distance Education Bureau, University Grant Commission is awaited. As soon as the DEB-UGC approval is received, the programme will be started,” DU statement mentioned.

Meanwhile, the application process deadline for the postgraduate (PG) admission 2022 has been extended. The last date to apply for DU PG admission 2022 is now June 10. Candidates can apply for PG courses at Delhi University through the official website- pgadmission.uod.ac.in.

The candidates belonging to the general, OBC, and EWS categories can pay and an application fee of Rs 750, while the registration fee for the students belonging to the SC and ST, and PwBD categories is Rs 300.

Technology: the pen and paper of our times

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digitalLEARNING Network

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June 2, 2022

Technology has revolutionised the field of education. Education as a social collective has moved away from just being discussed and debated within the classrooms through blackboards and chalks to an increasing use of technology in schools and colleges across the world. Even ten years ago, teachers and students might not have imagined the degree to which technology would impact education. In fact, with the onset of computers in education, it has become easier for teachers to impart knowledge and for students to acquire it. The use of technology has made the process of teaching and learning all the more enjoyable.

Over the past decade, technology has changed the way we looked at education or its outreach capabilities. It goes without saying that technology has widened the most important aspect of education access. Technology engages students to often retain more information. It also provides meaningful learning experiences by providing hands-on learning opportunities that can be integrated into all school curricular areas, including mathematics, reading, science, and social studies as well as other academic subjects.

Students these days are smarter, faster on the uptake and better-placed to understand the world they live in. It is that bigger picture, or the external stimulus, technology brings to both learning and teaching. And we are not talking about just cellphones and smart boards here.

What’s more, technology has created greater opportunities for collaboration among students, and among students and teachers. Not too long back, exchange of ideas, lessons, assessing effective information and perceptive behavior were confined to classrooms. Against this backdrop, technology arrived as an enabler, bringing the whole world into the segmented domain of education. Today, through the use of technology, students can give feedback to their teachers about the progress they are making and at the same time, cross-pollinate minds with peers who don’t sit in the same classroom.

A paradigm shift has taken place in the roles of teachers and learners in smart classrooms. Although in some traditional institutions passive learning is still continuing, wherein a teacher speaks and students listen without any heightened sense of curiosity, many schools and colleges are using technology in assisting teachers to be an able guide to enhance learning skills.

One of the greatest source of information are search engines which have been used as an effective tool for searching information where both teachers and students are benefited. In case if a student or teacher wants to search for an information online, google has been able to drive the optimatisation by showing up relevant information through various websites. The application of technology has made education more collaborative. There are online forums where subject experts can meet and discuss subject specific topics, review the syllabus and plan assessments to enhance the process of teaching. Teachers can impart customised education to cater different learning abilities and needs of the students.

There are different online education programs available which has given a new dimension to education. The students and teachers can be a part of one virtual classroom, even if they are physically far away from each other. There are online libraries with books, journals, encyclopedias, etc. where students can access various resources, highlight, save and use the soft copies.

Technology is also solving immediate-world problems in classrooms, the ease of research being a downright benefit. Even though Internet is parallel intelligence, it is making students aware that what they are learning are about real-world problems, real people, real places and evolving thought processes of the humanity.

Although technology’s presence in education has been penetrating for over a decade now, there was no better a time than in the recent past to acknowledge its sheer benefits keeping teachers and students connected with reality. During the lockdown period after the outbreak of COVID, students at random created online groups, web pages and virtual communities to share concerns, participated in debates, learnt and gave feedback to teachers by enriching and comprehending the bigger picture of learning.

At the other side of the spectrum, teachers are turning into trainers as they have begun to feel that enhancing their learning skills through a variety of online tools and making students understand has proved too be a rich repository of knowledge education will be accessing in the years to come. The internet is being used as a source of providing information where students will play a more active role, which will help them retain more information.

In today’s fast changing world, most of the jobs involve the use of computers and advanced technologies. We all need to be computer savvy to keep in pace with the moving world. We live in a technologically advanced world where it has become necessary for us to be familiar with the latest technologies and inventions. So, computer technology has become an integral part of school and college curriculum.

Edtech startup Udayy shuts down; to return about $8.5 mn to investors

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June 2, 2022

Gurugram-based edtech startup Udayy shut down its operations in April, three years after its inauguration in 2019 and Udayy will now be returning around $8.5 Mn to a few of its investors.

According to the CEO, Saumya Yadav, Udayy was a pandemic baby and had not witnessed the world without the pandemic before. While it was doing well during the peak months of the pandemic, its business decelerated after the schools started reopening.

Started by Yadav, Mahak Garg, and Karan Varshney in 2019, the core business of Udayy was offering live learning courses for children in grades between 1 and 5. Last year, the startup claimed it had users from over 45 cities and towns across India, with more than 400 classrooms being run on a daily basis. Once the schools reopened and parents started spending money there, they had less willingness to pay for the online edtech platform. Besides, the students also didn’t have time or energy for online classes, Yadav said. Udayy started seeing signs of impending troubles from July last year and tested several other models to sustain its operations. The startup explored opportunities in offline education centres, but later realised they were very expensive.

Besides, Udayy also launched a free app. It aimed to first scale the app and then monetise it. While the app saw a lot of traction, it was difficult to monetise it as people mostly spent time on it as it was free, said Yadav

Towards Nipun Haryana and Nipun Bharat

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digitalLEARNING Network

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June 2, 2022

When New Education Policy 2020 focuses on foundational learning as the bedrock for all future learning. It puts a spotlight on the gravity of the issue at hand – that over 5 crore elementary level students (pg 8, NEP 2020) have not attained foundational literacy and numeracy (FLN). A deficiency of FLN skills leads to a learning gap in such students, resulting in their dropouts in later stages of schooling. To address this, the Government of India launched the NIPUN Bharat Mission on 5th July 2021, with the aim of attaining foundational literacy and numeracy for all children. The Mission advocates that students, along with their schools, teachers, parents, and communities, must be urgently supported and encouraged in every way possible to help carry out this all-important target and mission, which forms the basis of all future learning.

Haryana is duly committed to achieve the objectives of the NIPUN Bharat Mission for foundational literacy (Hindi and English) and numeracy for grades 1-3. Accordingly, Government of Haryana launched the NIPUN Haryana Mission on 30th July 2021. Under the mission, Haryana is undertaking various academic and governance initiatives to ensure that all students of grades 1 to 3 become grade-level FLN competent. These initiatives will be supported by a robust tech-enabled monitoring system to track all the factors inside and outside of a classroom that affect the learning outcomes of children.

The most critical of these factors is the making available the teaching-learning materials (TLM), teaching-learning equipment (TLE), and teacher resource materials that leverage innovative competency-based pedagogy to create a joyful learning environment in a classroom. We have conducted research on best practices on pedagogy 1 which has been customized as per local context in partnership with our foundation partners. As a result, our government schools have appropriate TLM, TLE and activity based pedagogy for joyful learning. Lesson Plans and Teacher Guides have been created to help teachers plan their teaching and incorporate best practices of classroom management and timetable management. All materials have been designed keeping in mind a shift towards competency-based learning. Competency based learning is focused on student learning outcomes (LOs). It divides competencies into explicit and measurable learning outcomes. It further aims to focus on the learning needs of each child instead of a one-size-fits-all approach. Providing instructions at each child’s levels of readiness is critical to make students fall in love with the learning process.

Special attention has been given to Teacher Professional Development (TPD) or the capacity-building of our primary teachers. A 3-day teacher training has been conducted in the State for all ~36,000 primary teachers. They have been oriented on the NIPUN Bharat and NIPUN Haryana Mission, and have been introduced to innovative pedagogical interventions in the teaching of Hindi, Mathematics, and English. Further blended trainings have been planned with the aim to empower teachers to create an engaging and stress-free learning environment for their students.

With regards to assessing the learning levels, the aim of assessments is to be independent, periodic and holistic. There are two types of assessments – school-based assessments and large scale assessments.

We are strengthening school-based assessments to decentralize the approach and make regular monitoring of student learning possible without the stress usually observed in high-stakes onetime exams. Teachers will use the state’s skill passbook to assess students on 2 grade-level competencies. Large-scale assessments will be sample-based and conducted at a lower frequency. These include the National Achievement Survey (once every three years) and baseline/endline exams (annual).

With regards to assessing the learning levels, the aim of assessments is to be independent, periodic and holistic. There are two types of assessments – school-based assessments and large scale assessments. We are strengthening school-based assessments to decentralize the approach and make regular monitoring of student learning possible without the stress usually observed in high-stakes one-time exams. Teachers will use the state’s skill passbook to assess students on 2 grade-level competencies. Large-scale assessments will be sample-based and conducted at a lower frequency. These include the National Achievement Survey (once every three years) and baseline/endline exams (annual).

IEC (Information, Education, Communication) is another critical aspect of the mission. An IEC campaign has been developed keeping all stakeholders in mind including teachers, parents, academic mentors, administration such as DEEOs, BEOs, and the general public, leveraging materials like infographics, school-to-parent communication material, letters, and channels like social media, radio, print and TV. Various community level events including school readiness melas, book fairs, reading events, gunot savas etc. will also be conducted. We have made a special effort to include parents as the key enablers in the mission. Research has shown that whenever parents are involved in their child’s learning process, the learning outcomes usually improve. We have created provisions to ensure daily interaction with parents about their child’s learning. Through WhatsApp groups, we share updates with parents about daily activities conducted and skills taught to their children. They are encouraged to take a regular interest in their child’s learning and take part in home-based activities.

Technology will play a key role in implementation and monitoring of all these initiatives. For NIPUN Haryana Mission, we have planned for a robust all-comprehensive integration of technology that makes dissemination of content, information, monitoring, evaluation and decision-making efficient and effective. The plan includes development of an FLN mobile application, a web application, NIPUN Haryana Mission website, and other tools. The FLN mobile application is a key highlight of the plan. It will be a multi-stakeholder solution, bringing all the key stakeholders including teachers, parents, mentors, officials together at one platform. Each stakeholder will have access to their own interface in the application according to their roles and responsibilities. This will ensure better communication, easy access of information, reporting, and monitoring of the critical KPIs of the mission.

Haryana has been leading the way among all the states in implementation of NEP 2020 imperatives and lays paramount importance on achieving the goals of foundational learning. Ensuring quality education at foundational levels will go a long way in providing equitable access to quality education at higher levels, later on leading to a better standard of life. Thus, we are determined to make certain that under the NIPUN Haryana Mission, each child in Haryana achieves grade-level competencies required under foundational literacy and numeracy and play our part in making the NIPUN Bharat Mission a success.

Overcoming covid challenges with it initiatives

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digitalLEARNING Network

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June 2, 2022

The nationwide lockdowns imposed due to the COVID pandemic brought forth multifold challenges for the state governments and the citizens. Munish Chandan, Head – State eGovernnance Mission, Department of IT, Electronics and Communication, Government of Haryana, while addressing the Education Innovation Summit, highlighted how the Government of Haryana leveraged IT solutions to overcome the challenges and ensure a smooth delivery of services to the citizens.

When the lockdowns were imposed, the only sector that was functional was the government sector, especially the IT department. The government was tirelessly working day and night to ensure that services are delivered seamlessly to the last citizen.

Citizen mobilisation

Speaking of innovative measures taken by the Government of Haryana, Chandan said, “As soon as the lockdowns were announced, we started a ‘Sangharsh Senani’ concept. The Chief Minister came up with the idea that the government could call for volunteers – Sangharsh Senanisto help the people as well as the government. For this, we invited applications from people from numerous domains including doctors, nurses, grocery store owners, etc. and their availability was informed to the district officers, deputy commissioners and the Chief Minister’s Office (CMO). Within three days of the launch of the online portal for Sangharsh Senani, we received nearly 60,000-70,000 people who volunteered. In the later phase, during the second wave, we utilised this portal to rope in people who had recovered from COVID and were ready to donate their blood plasma.” All the efforts made by the government were to facilitate the citizens and ensure that none of them face any issues due to the lockdowns, he added.

Streamlining service delivery

Another innovative step that the Government of Haryana took was the launch of the Aatmanirbhar Portal. Previously, this was launched as Bank slot & Bank cash delivery at home portal – an initiative of the Finance department. Lockdown posed as a challenge for the people to reach out to their nearest banks and withdraw cash for their everyday needs. Therefore, through this portal people could book a slot at their nearest bank within 15 minutes. For small banks, five slots were earmarked in a day while for medium banks eight slots, and 10-12 slots for large banks. People were allowed to book a slot. Once a citizen books a slot, an e-pass is generated. The concerned person can show that at the branch and utilise the slot for the banking operations.

Further, he said, “Also, we started a unique concept of ‘Cash Delivery at Home’ with the Department of Posts. Under this, a postman could deliver a cash sum up to Rs 10,000 to the people at their doorstep. This was one-of-a-kind initiative, where the postman within a time frame of one working day could reach to any person residing in the state and deliver the cash amount. Later on, the Finance department introduced interest on pension scheme on this portal and renamed it as the Aatmnirbhar Portal.” All these initiatives are live at present and are available at atmanirbhar.haryana.gov.in, he added.

Managing the pandemic

The state government also came up with the Covid Sample portal and roped in all the government and private laboratories. The labs were asked to enter and update the details of the COVID patients on their health status and condition. As per the details, SMS and alerts were sent to the district administration and CMO along with the concerned person. Further, based on the alerts, actions were taken if there is a need to declare an area a containment zone or a buffer zone, or in case the person needs to be home isolated.

Apart from these initiatives, the government also came up with Healthy Haryana portal. Chandan said, “The Healthy Haryana portal was launched alongside its mobile application. This was an effective search engine designed to carry out surveys and identify the COVID hotspots. Through this, as many as seven lakh families were surveyed and COVID patients were identified and further actions were taken based on the data collected. The survey also came in handy to detect people with co-morbidities.

In an effort to prevent overcrowding at the mandis, the government prepared schedules for the farmers and asked them to visit the mandis accordingly to sell their farm produce. The schedules were handed over to the farmers beforehand and based on that the mandis operated while keeping social distancing in check.

UGC declares Periyar University’s online distance education programmes invalid

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June 1, 2022

After Annamalai University, the University Grants Commission (UGC) declared the online, distance learning (ODL) programmes offered by the Periyar University invalid. The UGC also warned students not to take admission at Periyar University.

According to the UGC notice, “It has come to the notice of the Commission through various communications received in UGC office that Periyar University, Tamil Nadu is functioning without a full time Director, inadequate full-time faculty, inadequate non-teaching staff, not yet established centre.”

“Running ODL programmes without prior approval of UGC in gross violation of conditions laid down under UGC (Open and Distance learning Programmes and Online Programmes) Regulations, 2020 and its amendments from time to time,” it said. “Taking admission in such programmes may endanger the career of the students, in view of the absence of recognition of the programmes by the UGC,” it added.

Digital divide in education need to reboot our government & public schools

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digitalLEARNING Network

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June 1, 2022

The Education sector in India has evolved massively with the adoption of technology tools. However, there is a digital divide that persists among the student population attending government schools and private schools. Highlighting the disparity and how the digital solutions and the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 is addressing these woes, Dr Avantika Tomar, Executive Director, EY-Parthenon shared at the Elets Education Innovation Summit – Haryana Edition.

Dr Tomar was of the view that the digital learning divide in the country has become more prominent after the COVID pandemic. She gave a presentation highlighting how this digital divide translated on the ground and impacted the public education system in the country, especially the government school students.

She said, “One should first understand the public education system in the country before assessing the impact of the pandemic and digital learning divide in the country.” Presenting a few facts about the public education system, Dr Tomar highlighted that India has over 1.5 million schools, more than 50,000 educational institutions, and nearly 37 million students taking admissions each year. There are about 124 million students attending government schools and nearly 129 million students going to private and other schools.

The statistics: “Before we talk about actions taken by the Centre or the State governments to augment the school education system in the country, we need to consider these mammoth numbers. Any initiative taken needs to address 124 million students attending government schools and 1.08 million government schools where these actions will be implemented,” she pointed out. Though there are remote areas where connectivity is poor, there is a digital divide that exists, there are people who are unaware of the benefits of the government but to reach out to address the sheer numbers and this scale of implementation of any corrective measure is itself a major challenge, she added.

Looking at the statistics for fiscal 2016, 2018, and 2020, the number of admissions in public schools has witnessed a decline when compared with the admissions in private schools. The major reasons reflecting the downward trend spotted by the parents were – the overall quality of education and the quality of pedagogical methods used for delivering pre-primary education at nascent stages. On the contrary, the factors that back the upward trend of admission in private schools are – focus on the quality of education and learning; and focus on a child’s holistic development and the provision of better facilities. Another trend observed was the increasing number of enrollments in secondary and senior secondary grades.

Speaking of the fundamental and digital challenges that the government or public schools face, Dr Tomar mentioned:

• Rote learning methods of teaching create gaps in curriculum expectation and current learning.

• Lack of system or processes to identify and help children who are not making adequate progress in the early grades.

• Lack of properly trained and skilled teachers.

• Lack of accountability of teachers and school authorities.

• Limited internet penetration and poor connectivity.

• Vernacular interface to operate the digital content.

• Limited digital literacy among the teachers.

• Presence of only basic infrastructural support in government schools.

• Co-ordinated planning and implementation supporting digital intervention in the nascent stage

The role of NEP: Calling the National Education Policy 2020 (NEP 2020) a big step towards reshaping the future of school education in the country, she said, “The NEP 2020 has given the impetus to the use of technology in education and named digital tools as key enablers in meeting learning objectives and supporting fundamental challenges.”

In the previous year, the Government of India brought out the NEP 2020 which focuses on the extensive use of technology in teaching and learning, removing language barriers, increasing access for students, and educational planning and management. This clearly highlights that the future of education in India is going to be digital-driven and enabled by technology, she added.

Impact of pandemic: Addressing the impact of the COVID pandemic on schools and students, she highlighted that the pandemic has adversely affected not only the Indian school education system but the lives of students, and their physical, emotional, and social development. In addition, the pandemic also impacted the administration affecting the payroll system, mid-day meal scheme, monitoring and capacity building, shutting down of schools, and more.

However, the silver lining in this crisis situation was that State governments like the Government of Haryana came up with innovative interventions to ensure continuity of education. From initiatives like satellite streaming and digital classrooms to e-content repositories or e-learning portals, the state government has been proactive in taking technology-led initiatives and transforming the education system.

The way forward: A well-thought and structured approach has ignited the possibilities of overcoming the gaps and challenges. However, there is still a long way to go to make it mainstream and impactful. Dr Tomar, while citing the example of Singapore, said that the South Asian country adopted a systematic and systemic approach to the introduction and adoption of technology for teaching and learning to combat gaps and was better positioned to tackle the pandemic crisis.

“Singapore started technology-enabled education and digital learning practices way back in 1997. They’re still developing on the approach and growing better by the day. Taking this in consideration, we need to have a master plan when it comes to the way forward for the digital transformation of education in India. We need to pivot to areas where we are not leveraging technology and develop on those to match the global pace of development and overcome the pandemic crisis,” she concluded.

Technology transforming education- Globus Infocom Limited

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digitalLEARNING Network

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June 1, 2022

Incepted in year 2001 with an aim to provide advanced technology and learning solutions to our users, Globus Infocom forayed into the market with a few products and solutions in the Education Technology domain. Within few years of its inception, the brand became trustworthy and one of the most sought-after technology solutions providers in India.The company houses one of the most elaborate ranges of technology solutions ranging from Smart Classroom Solutions, Digital Board Solution, Online learning solutions, Digital Language Lab, Interactive Displays, to Video conferencing solutions, AI-based advanced bio metric & surveillance solutions like Classroom Monitoring Solution, Facial Recognition Attendance Solution, Student Behaviour Analysis Solution etc equipped with unparalleled technology and highly advanced features.

Apart from Education technology, we have also forayed into Collaborative Conferencing & professional Displays, Security & Surveillance Solutions & Healthcare & Wellness range of solutions. We have the widest and the most comprehensive product/solution basket for the entire range of our verticals.

We strongly believe that technology has the power to transform education and we hope to create a digitally enabled& easily accessible education environment across the country with a range of technologically advanced, meaningful yet cost-effective solutions. The journey has been full of learning and challenges at the same time wherein we have learned through the challenges and evolved ourselves as one of the leading technology solution providers of the EdTech industry.

Digital solutions: advancing learning requirements

We believe education should be a mix of academic & practical learning methodologies. Only academic learning can develop the information but what matters is the implication & utility on the practical grounds. The need to redesign education and sync it up with digital transformation has emerged at the forefront of the education industry.

From the career perspective, academic education should be empowered with the right skills & practical knowledge to grow and succeed in the professional world.

Education should encourage the curiosity, engagement & collaboration among the students & it should empower the teachers to equip the learners with best of the learning pedagogies. We have been developing such technology solutions which on one hand are tailor made to suit the advanced learning methodologies also, on the other hand, create an accessible, engaging & highly user friendly education scenario. The implementation of technology in the classroom also offers a personalized approach to learning based on their individual skills & abilities.

Revolutionising India’s education system

With the development of technology, there is an even greater need for it to be exploited in India’s educational systems.Children from India’s public school educational systems will be prepared for a world outside the four walls of their free and obligatory education as a result of the digital revolution in public education. It will assist them in progressively recovering from their learning lags and instill a sense of confidence that will allow them to dream beyond their current reality. It will also help the teachers in easing out their heavy load of preparation & assessment work. They can remediate instead of spending time in instructions& paperwork. By going digital, they can also upskill themselves to tackle the current dynamic learning scenario. Digital classroom solutions also provide access to unlimited knowledge resources to teachers & students both which allows them to explore out of the limited option of books & notes.

Bridging gap between technology and government schools

Globus Infocom is bridging the gap between technology and government schools by making quality education accessible even in the remotest part of India. Our cost effective, highly user-friendly solutions address beautifully the needs of rural education scenario providing the teachers ample training, counseling to remove the technology usage barrier for their minds. For learners our solution consists of interactive tools & resources including engaging academic content which not only generates student’s interest in attending classes but also creates a sustainable yet effective learning ecosystem. Our Virtual classroom solution has connected learners from the remotest part of India with the best of the education par geographical barriers.

Apart from the academic learning content, we also focus on developing their language skills which play a major role in bringing them into mainstream education & prepare them for better career opportunities. We offer Language content in three languages – English, Hindi, and Sanskrit to enable enhancement in communication and help develop language as a skill. So far, we have proudly implemented our digital solutions in no. of prestigious Government schools like under the Department of School Education, Govt. of Haryana, the Government of Gujrat, the Government of Goa, Kendriya Vidyalaya Schools pan India, Kashi Vidyapeeth, Varanasi and many more…

Empowering teachers in integrating technology

Initially, many schools specifically in rural India had a difficult time in accepting technology as part of their regular pedagogy. Teachers were not comfortable enough given the complex nature of technology. But we have started providing training &counseling sessions to the teachers to make them comfortable with the technology in classrooms & empower them enough to optimally utilize the power of technology in order to bring the desired change in the learning ecosystem.

Teachers are getting trained to enhance the key skill sets, such as communication, creative & critical thinking, and problem solving, which are enhanced through advanced technical tools and resources. The non-traditional ways of teaching allow teachers to teach via interesting & engaging methods which opens a world of opportunities for learners to gain experience practically. The ease of creating effective content, evaluating students & generating reports eases out teachers to focus more on learners’ need for attention. Our in-house training department deeply focuses on providing comprehensive training to the teachers which help them in using digital solutions with great ease and confidence. We focus on instilling the impact technology implementation can make and how easy it is to embrace it once you are open to the changes. This has helped us tremendously in changing the age-old mind set & limitations they had about technology & digital changes in pedagogy. Today, we have come a long way & we are proud to see teachers being the torchbearer of the digital revolution.

Though we have come a long way from where we started, we still have a long way to go. From implementing technology in the classroom to making quality education accessible for one and all, we are moving step by step. Today, proudly we can state that our solutions are creating a bridge for learners who are not able to access quality education and enabling them to stand up to their abilities. In the future also, looking at the post-pandemic scenario, we will be introducing more solutions in our kitty creating a safe yet quality learning environment. We look forward to bringing in more solutions that could drive innovation & open doors of opportunities for learners.

Throughout this journey, we are focused on creating a learning environment that could bridge the digital divide spread across the rural areas of the country. We have not only broadened our range of offerings but also widened our family with 260 team members that work together tirelessly to take this company to even greater heights. With a few customers in the beginning, we have now amassed 30,000+ customers from educational establishments, Government organizations, Training centres & many others due to the exceptional services and customer experience we offer.

Haryana’s e-Adhigam: A comprehensive tablet based learning program

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digitalLEARNING Network

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June 1, 2022

Though the importance of technology in education was realized early in India, successive governments have had limited success in implementing Ed-Tech programs that could positively impact learning. The pandemic has disrupted the traditional teaching- learning space and has further emphasized the relevance and urgency for Ed-Tech. It is in this context that I intend to share Haryana’s experience of rolling out “e-Adhigam”, the comprehensive tablet-based learning program.

The Covid-19 pandemic apart from causing a world-wide public health havoc, has unsettled every aspect of human existence. Teaching and learning were not immune to it and underwent major disruptions. As an UNESCO report points out, 1.6 billion learners in more than 190 countries were rendered out of school and over 100 million teachers and school personnel were impacted by the closure of learning institutions. The school closure put 24 million children and youth at risk of dropping out and over 100 million children falling below the minimum proficiency level in reading. It also points out that apart from learning, the shutting down of schools also impended the progress made towards gender equality and exposed girls to gender-based violence, sexual exploitation, adolescent pregnancy and forced marriage. The access to quality teaching and learning resources by learners was threatened by the pandemic, which brought back focus on adoption of digital technology in education.

The Government of India responded by launching the PM e-vidya initiative on May17, 2020 which unified all efforts relating to digital, online and on-air education. The DIKSHA (Digital Infrastructure for Knowledge Sharing) platform which can be accessed through a web portal and mobile application was developed as a national repository for e-content. The Swayam Prabha TV channels reached homes which did not have access to the internet. Radio broadcasting was used for children in remote areas who were not online. Even community radio stations and podcasts (Shiksha Vani) were used to transmit learning content.

The Government of Haryana also responded with its own set of unique initiatives that catered to local needs. The focus was on creating e-learning content and ensuring its access through mobile phones (mainly WhatsApp) and TV channels.

The mobile application AVSAR proved to be an effective tool that teamed the teachers and students in a virtual mode and facilitated in assessing student behaviour and performance. While in the rest of the country, student assessment was given a pass in view of school closures, Haryana gained the distinction of not only regularly conducting assessment tests through the AVSAR application but even issuing e- report cards to the children. The application was regularly accessed by close to 95 percent of the students and 98 percent of the teachers indicating very good user acceptability giving us the confidence of introducing further ambitious technology solutions. However, sincere efforts notwithstanding, there were learning losses which was clearly attributable to lack of computing devices with the children. Since, most of the government school children came from a poor socioeconomic background, the screen time available to them was very limited as they were dependent upon their parents and relatives for the device. It was at this stage that a decision was taken to provide computing tablets free of cost to the 500,000 children of classes 9th to 12th.

The school education department had for some time been pre-emptively researching and drudging upon an implementation strategy.Having a young and dedicated team surely did help in sifting through scores of research papers and arriving at a feasible disposition. Experience from other states in India in implementing similar projects revealed limited success, since the program was restricted to mere distribution of devices. The states that had distributed laptops to school children saw these devices end-up in the grey market in record time and being sold at throw away prices. Research revealed that the laptop was alien to the teacher-student learning interface and neither knew what to do with it. Also, the high cost of servicing and lack of internet connectivity worked to its detriment. A holistic approach with a clear understanding of current practices and barriers to adoption of technology with inputs incorporated from a range of stake holders including teachers, parents and students, was necessary for a successful roll-out. Our team devised a comprehensive strategy learning from such experiences. A three-pronged strategy of providing a durable secure device equipped with academic content delivered through an adaptive system and internet data to access content was subsequently worked out.

Apart from procuring a durable device, it was important to ensure after sale maintenance and service and provide on-ground support by deploying adequate field management staff. Hence, the service level agreements were designed accordingly.

Preventing the misuse of the device was an area of concern that was addressed with the induction of the mobile device management software that hardwired the device into accessing only whitelisted content. Providing good quality academic content aligned with the school curriculum and a software that allows both navigation and access in the vernacular language was a specific requirement. It was also necessary to ensure that the software includes interactive features such as quizzes, games, discussion prompts and a repository of practice questions. Our team worked around this problem by seeking out vendors who could curate content already available free of cost on various platforms and deliver it through a Personalised and Adaptive Learning (PAL) algorithm. The Personalised and Adaptive Learning (PAL) is the new frontier in education technology in India and across the world that allows every student to chart their own unique learning path. The dynamic software adapts content as per real time student performance and provides data on his/her progress. Though the Government of India had issued detailed guidelines on PAL in 2018, experience in implementing it at scale was very limited. It is here that the “Edtech Tulna” framework developed by IIT Bombay came to our rescue. An across-the-board scaffold to evaluate PAL vendors was established after multiple rounds of discussion with experts from IIT Bombay. The evaluation criterion was diverse and drew upon scores obtained in the pilot studies conducted in schools to PAL specific product and process features. A wide melange of subject and technical experts were deployed to evaluate the product. Resultantly, academic content through PAL for the subjects Hindi, English and Social Science has been developed at very competitive prices. The process of identifying vendors for other subjects is in progress. The third leg of the program was to ensure adequate data connectivity along with the hardware and software. A credible data plan of 2GB per day per student has been ensured as a part of this program.

Haryana’s e-Adhigam also makes sure that the role of the teacher is not forgotten in this milieu. Ed-Tech interventions that minimize the role of the teacher or have poor training modules built- in or that lack an incentive structure have shown low student engagement. Care is being taken to ensure that teachers are properly trained till they become comfortable in navigating and using the basic features of the product (including student features) and understand the connect with the curriculum. All the Post Graduate teachers numbering 33,000 have been given a computing tablet with a built-in specialised teacher module enabling them to connect with their students in a virtual mode. The service level agreements with the vendor provide for periodic and systematic teacher training.

A robust grievance redressal module which brings together the users, vendors and the education department is being developed that would enable time bound redressal of issues. An MIS based dashboard is also in the offing that would facilitate data collection and analytics.

The 5th of May 2022 which saw the state-wide launch of “e-Adhigam” would be permanently etched in the memory of the school education department, not only for the fact that it marked the fruition of a yearlong effort but also for the tectonic shift it signals in the teaching-learning sphere. The students demand that the learning experience must meet their interests, time constraints and academic needs and “e-Adhigam” is a definitive step towards this front.

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