M-Learn

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April 1, 2007

M-Update

Taiwan University gives mobile info access

Tamkang University has launched a platform that will give students, faculty members and administrative staff access to the school's Web portal via heterogeneous mobile devices such as smartphones and wireless-enabled personal digital assistants (PDAs).

The school has three campus sites in the country. Tamkang University's portal, which went live in December last year, was conceived to provide a range of services for the school's patrons and employees. Students can go to the portal to manage class messages, monitor student club activity updates as well as to check for test results and reserve library books. Despite the availability of wireless coverage at all three premises, the university said that it only recently made its portal compatible with a range of smartphone devices, using technology supplied by software vendor Sybase.

Tamkang University's portal can be accessed via smartphone handsets based on Palm, Symbian and Windows CE mobile operating environments.

M-Project

MobilED: Cellphones as an educational tool

The Meraka Institute, the Helsinki University of Art and Design in Finland and the University of Pretoria in South Africa have, over the past 18 months, been working on a project dubbed MobilED, where they are investigating the use of mobile technologies and services for formal and informal learning.

The first module that has been developed is the audio-Wikipedia – an online encyclopaedia – from which anyone can receive and upload information. Children send an SMS with a key word. In response, they receive a callback and a speech synthesiser reads the contents of the requested Wikipedia entry. A fast forward and rewind function has been added to make listening to the entry easier.

In the pilot projects kits have been supplied, which include a cell phone and speakers, so that it can be used in the classroom. Piloting has so far taken place at Cornwall Hill College and Irene Middle School, both in the Centurion area, where the project will run for a further two years. Further pilots are planned for more rural areas, possibly in the Northern Cape.

As with Wikipedia, there is an interactive element whereby entries can be added to. At the end of each section there is a prompt, giving the option to either continue or to add to the entry. Should the user opt to add to the entry, the system records comments and saves them as a wav file. The additions are then added to the downloaded version of wikipedia, which the project uses.

Currently all call costs for the pilot are being covered by the CSIR project. The next step that is being worked on is to use MMS. This would greatly reduce costs and add to the functionality of the system. Another area currently being researched is the incorporation of an instant messaging service such as MXit, which is already highly popular amongst South Africa's teenagers. Doctor Maths is a MXit project that offers high school learners support with their maths syllabus.

MobilED has proven that cell phones can be very useful where there's no other access to information sources. Libraries or Internet connections no longer need to be the sole access point for educational information for children.

For more on the project, Merryl Ford can be contacted at mford@csir.co.za.

Engaging Students for Quality in Higher Education

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digitalLEARNING Network

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April 1, 2007

Dr. Jagannath Patil

Deputy Adviser
National Assessment and Accreditation Council, India
jp)nath@rediffmail.com

“I tell my students to get two plants, one alive and one plastic. As time goes on, the students tell me that the plastic plant is pretty but that ‘It doesn’t call to me, it doesn’t say “Water me.” or “See if I’ve changed since last night – see if I have a new leaf.” The students become involved with the living plant. It keeps pulling to them, and they care about it. They nurture it, but they don’t want to force it. I think we have lost our sense of involvement and that we’re cheating ourselves. What would life be like if there were only plastic flowers?”

This quote by a distinguished professor aptly narrates the rationale behind involving the students in the higher education processess.

The students are, unarguably, the most important stakeholders of Higher Education systems and also that of quality assurance mechanisms therein. The interest and participation of students at all levels in both internal and external quality assurance has to play a central role.

Involvinge and empowering the students in quality- The International Experience

Even as the central role of student in Higher Education System is agreed in principle by the policy makers and decision makers, the experience of actual involvement of students vary to a large extent from one country to another. A commendable work in this regard has been done by European National Students Union (ESIB) – The national Unions of Students of Europe. The ESIB has taken up the cause of advancing student involvement in QA in a systematic manner and has completed a detailed project on this issue.

Besides the exemplary work done by the ESIB, the initiatives in Scotland and South Africa are quite noteworthy. Sparqs (Student Participation In Quality Scotland), a unique body in Scotland, assists and supports students, students’ associations and institutions to improve the effectiveness of student engagement in quality processes, also provides advice to the funding councils on good practice in the engagement of students in institutions’ quality processes.

Taking cue from Sparqs, Higher Education Quality Committee of South Africa has recently initiated a Student Quality Literacy Project.

Efforts at NAAC

The assessment and accreditation instrument of National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) in Bangalore, India is sensitive to take note of student aspirations and goals in a fast-changing world. The NAAC is an autonomous body established by the University Grants Commission (UGC) of India to assess and accredit institutions of higher education in the country. It is an outcome of the recommendations of the National Policy in Education (1986) that laid special emphasis on the quality of higher education in India. NAAC believes that the system of higher education, which is ready to appreciate students’ aspirations and shape its curricular performance accordingly, is primarily relevant.

The NAAC has emphasised the importance of making institutional assessment of quality depend substantially on student interests. Forming an essential part of the assessment, the criteria of assessment for curricular planning and development insist on providing adequate course options, strategies for meeting differential needs of mixed-ability groups and on student feedback, student progression and the support systems which enable it. “Student Support and Progression” is one of the seven criteria identified by the NAAC. Interaction with students is a vital element of site visits that validates institutional self-study report. Student participation is encouraged in all internal arrangements for quality assurance including the Internal Quality Assurance Cell (IQAC).

A large number of institutions in this country have their own success stories concerning students partnership in quality assurance. While these are sporadic and need closer structuring and co-ordination, newer initiatives are necessary to make students active in responsible functional roles so that they can set their agenda within the policy of governance of the institution.

To facilitate initiatives in this direction, the NAAC launched the campaign by declaring the year 2006 as Year of Student Participation.

A large number of institutions in this country have their own success stories to share concerning students partnership in quality assurance. Some have actively involved them in academic planning through representation of academic decision-making bodies. Others have made them effective partners with the institution in extension work. Many personality development programmes are student planned, funded and monitored. A few have involved them in the highest administrative bodies. While these are sporadic and need closer structuring and co-ordination, newer initiatives are necessary to make students active partners in responsible functional roles so that they can set their agenda within the policy of governance of the institution. To facilitate initiatives in this direction, the NAAC launched the campaign by declaring the year 2006 as Year of Student Participation.

NAAC’s appeal to institutional stakeholders

The NAAC appealed to all stakeholders to take up various activities such as.
• Development of student feedback on teaching learning and other related activities
• Development of a mechanism for follow-up action on student feedback
• Pro-active role of IQAC in promoting student participation
• Greater role in Institutional affairs by the Alumni
• Adoption of student charter by all institutions
• Introducing formal mechanisms to redress grievances
• Encouraging student councils for active participation in all academic decision making.

Asia Pacific Quality Network (APQN) Project

Taking note of the worldwide initiatives, NAAC thought of initiating such project for student participation in quality assurance at the international level as well. A project proposal on Student Participation in Quality Improvement was submitted to APQN. APQN has been developed with the purpose of serving the needs of quality assurance agencies in higher education in Asia, a region that contains over half the world’s population. The APQN is already helping to build alliances between agencies, and assisting countries that do not have a quality assurance agency of their own.

The APQN board approved the proposal on student participation in quality improvement and now NAAC is working on this international project group on “Student Participation In Quality Assurance”. NAAC representatives also attended Student Participation in Quality Assurance workshops organised by HEQC, South Africa. The present series of activities by NAAC is informed by the experiences gained from such international initiatives.

The project aims at fulfilling the following key objectives:

1. To collect, analyse and disseminate theory, good practices and experiences of student participation in quality assurance in Asia Pacific Region.

2. To promote exchange of good practices in student participation in quality assurance between different countries

The BITS Connect Project funded by the Alumni of BITS Pilani, provided Internet connectivity to to classrooms, all the rooms of the hostels, chambers and residences of faculty members, has the new online 24 x 7 feedback system, completely designed by the institute. Even regional universities like Shivaji University in Maharashtra are now using e-Assessment methodologies.

Website on student participation
In addition to the continuation of above said steps the proposed activities of the group include- focus group discussions with student bodies and HEIs; Workshops and small group meeting and a post conference publication on Student Participation in Quality Enhancement. The most important and ambitious plan under the project is to launch a dedicated website for promoting Student Participation in quality Assurance. Promoting use of ICT and web based mechanisms for effective student engagement tops the agenda of the international project group. Learning from global practices There are very important lessions to be learnt from global practices. Though there will be uniqueness due to the cultural context, there are commonalities that can be extended to other countries. The practices at USA, UK and other European countries are well known to many but a very few people may be aware of some vital initiatives that were reported in the study by this author undertaken for APQN. Future is e-Connect A noteworthy feature about student feedback and participation practices is increased reliance on computerised processes. In USA, Europe, Russia and Australia several advances have been made to integrate student campus learning experiences and feedback mechanisms for quality improvements. It is quite interesting to note that global education brands of India like IITs, IIMs and Law schools, besides some noted accredited institutions have been following a set of good practices of involving students with extensive use of digital technology. A case in point is the BITS Connect Project funded by its Alumni of BITS Pilani, which provided internet connectivity to classrooms, all the rooms of the hostels, chambers and residences of faculty members, and the new online 24 x 7 feedback system, completely desig-ned by the institute. Even regional universities like that of Shivaji University in Maharashtra are now using e-Assessment methodologies.
It cannot be a mere co-incidence that institutes known for excellence do have very strong student involvement in campus life. It is high time for the academic fraternity of India to wake up to the realities of the new world where the students and teachers are partners learning together to make a difference in the world. The world is shrinking and getting flatter with advances of digital technology. The only way to remain relevant to present and to the future is to keep engaged with students and there is no better way to do that than being e-Connected. Website on student participation In addition to the continuation of above said steps the proposed activities of the group include- focus group discussions with student bodies and HEIs; Workshops and small group meeting and a post conference publication on Student Participation in Quality Enhancement. The most important and ambitious plan under the project is to launch a dedicated website for promoting Student Participation in quality Assurance. Promoting use of ICT and web based mechanisms for effective student engagement tops the agenda of the international project group. Learning from global practices There are very important lessions to be learnt from global practices. Though there will be uniqueness due to the cultural context, there are commonalities that can be extended to other countries. The practices at USA, UK and other European countries are well known to many but a very few people may be aware of some vital initiatives that were reported in the study by this author undertaken for APQN. Future is e-Connect A noteworthy feature about student feedback and participation practices is increased reliance on computerised processes. In USA, Europe, Russia and Australia several advances have been made to integrate student campus learning experiences and feedback mechanisms for quality improvements. It is quite interesting to note that global education brands of India like IITs, IIMs and Law schools, besides some noted accredited institutions have been following a set of good practices of involving students with extensive use of digital technology. A case in point is the BITS Connect Project funded by its Alumni of BITS Pilani, which provided internet connectivity to classrooms, all the rooms of the hostels, chambers and residences of faculty members, and the new online 24 x 7 feedback system, completely desig-ned by the institute. Even regional universities like that of Shivaji University in Maharashtra are now using e-Assessment methodologies. It cannot be a mere co-incidence that institutes known for excellence do have very strong student involvement in campus life. It is high time for the academic fraternity of India to wake up to the realities of the new world where the students and teachers are partners learning together to make a difference in the world. The world is shrinking and getting flatter with advances of digital technology. The only way to remain relevant to present and to the future is to keep engaged with students and there is no better way to do that than being e-Connected.

India

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digitalLEARNING Network

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April 1, 2007

National Knowledge Network gets nod

The Central government has accorded in-principle approval to the establishment of a National Knowledge Network to connect libraries, hospitals, scientific and research institutions, universities and agricultural institutions across the country.

The network, comprising 5,000 nodes with one gigabyte facility to interconnect the institutions, is expected to cost around one billion dollars. The idea behind this network, expected to fructify within the next year, is to create “an infrastructure of tomorrow” to ensure maximum use of convergence of technology.

Global introduces India’s first web-based cross-cultural educational portal

Global Adjustments, a cross-cultural education and India destination services company, has announced an e-learning portal, www.globalindian.com, which is claimed to be the India’s first web-based cross-cultural educational portal, designed specifically for professionals seeking to function effectively in a global environment.

Dayanidhi Maran, union minister for communications and information technology formally launched the e-learning portal with David T Hopper, US consul general and Lakshmi Narayanan, vice chairman, Cognizant Technology Solutions Pvt Ltd at a function in Chennai. The e-learning portal is designed in such a way that it offers the learner ample space and time using innovative multimedia technology.

‘E-GURUKUL’ : Distance learning for the army

One of the greatest challenges of the Armed Forces is to keep their manpower up to date with the latest in technology. However, commitments in the form of peace time duties, exercise and large scale deployments in Counter Insurgency operations both in the North and Northern Eastern states, leave very little time for training. The new distance learning programme, e-Gurukul comes as a solution in this direction.

For e-Gurukul, the Corps of Signals of the Indian Army has embraced technology to overcome this problem. By using available commercially available equipment, an interactive video and web based virtual classroom has been created for the first time in the Army. Instructors based in a central location can run classes on the backbone communication network of the Indian Army with students being in remote far-flung areas. To add the element of “human touch”, the video images of the instructor will be streamed live to all the students. The students in turn can interact with the instructor either via a chat facility or through an embedded voice application. An online test feature allows the assessment to be carried out individually.

Vadekakara first e-learning constituency

Vadakkekara in Ernakulam district in southern India became the first e-learning constituency in the state Kerala with Chief Minister V S Achutanandan formally inaugurating the project.

As part of the INR one crore project, computers would be provided in all schools. Edusat Receive Only Terminal (ROT) would be set up in all high schools and higher secondary sections in aided and government schools with the help of KELTRON and IT@School programme. Over 100 schools will get the facilities. Computers would be provided in all lower primary and upper primary schools in the constituency free of cost. A kit containing 50 CDs would be distributed in all schools in the constituency.

Policy for setting up of a NRI / PIO University in India

The Union Cabinet has given its approval to a policy framework for establishing a NRI/PIO University in India in the Special Economic Zone (SEZ) as a Deemed University de-novo under Section 3 of the UGC Act as an Institution of Excellence. The university will be set up by Overseas Indian Trusts or Societies with credible standing and experience in the field of education under the overall supervision of the Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs.

In developed countries like USA and UK, higher education is expensive and increasingly overseas Indians do look to their country of origin for meeting the higher educational needs of their children. Setting up of NRI/PIO University in India will cater to the needs of the PIOs/NRIs in sought after disciplines as well as impart educational standards at part with the best Universities in the world in one campus. There are around 25 million people of Indian origin living abroad in nearly 130 countries.

World Bank funds USD 74.34 million by March ’07 for primary schools in rural areas

The World Bank had funded the District Primary Education Programme (DPEP) and the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) as an ongoing programme, the assistance of which is provided on reimbursement basis, when Central Government funds provided for these programmes are first utilised.

The World Bank had provided for US $ 500 million between 2004-05 to 2006-07, for the SSA programme. Under the SSA, 2.4 lakh schools have been sanctioned upto 2006-07. The DPEP programme is only functional in 9 districts of Rajasthan presently, with World Bank funding tied up for US $ 74.34 million over the period 2001 to March 2007. 729 primary school buildings have been sanctioned under this programme.

ICSI, India plans for e-learning initiative for students

The Institute of Company Secretaries of India (ICSI) will be introducing e-learning initiative for students in a couple of months.

The ICSI is also setting up career awareness programmes to bring more students into the course. The demand for company secretaries is huge. Even the salaries have now doubled for the company secretaries who start somewhere around INR 25,000 to INR 30,000 and can even go upto INR 50 lakh and INR one crore, as they progress in their career. ICSI is in the process of rationalising its syllabus and is constantly updating their members on the various amendments and changes brought in by the regulators.

Indians don’t get drawn to online education

Indian universities are reluctant to go in for research collaborations though the quality of state-run institutions in the country is better than in many Southeast Asian nations, education experts from Britain say.

Although India is an IT giant, there is still a great reluctance towards online education in this country, say London Metropolitan University educationists, Robert Aylett and Mark Bickerton. In India, there is a tendency to look down upon distance education as the second best. LondonMet is in the process of developing a curriculum for delivering lessons in higher education courses through mobile phones, said Robert Aylett, deputy vice-chancellor (academic).

A virtual business school

International College of Financial Planning has tied up with the New Zealand Institute of Online Learning to offer two courses in business and management to students.

This collaboration provides an exclusive licence to ICFP to use the two-year Diploma in Business and one-year Certificate in Management online courseware that will be available to learners – both students and working professionals at affordable prices. One can pursue them from home or work and study whenever it is suitable.

IIM-A receives Skoch Challenger Award for Academic Excellence

Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A) has been awarded the Skoch Challanger Award 2007 for Academic Excellence. Neelam Dhawan of Microsoft was honoured as Person of the Year. For exemplary usage of ICT in education Soochna Shakti Yojana of Chhattisgarh was also honored.
While IIM-Ahmedabad is known to be the region’s leading business school, it has done some incredible work in sectors like agriculture, health, e-governance and rural intellectual property development and protection. Skoch Challenger Awards are independently instituted by Skoch Consultancy Services and adjudged to salute best practices since 2002. In India, Skoch actively works towards ICT led improvement of citizen

asia

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digitalLEARNING Network

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April 1, 2007

Pakistan Govt. to introduce education through computers in primary schools

Pakistan Government is planning to introduce education through computers in all government primary schools in a period of five years.

IT Department of Sindh and MCB Bank has signed Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with Intel Pakistan to provide computers at all primary-level schools. Government has already provided computer labs in 60 percent of government high schools. This MoU will increase the ICT skills among students.

Malaysian ministry launching programme to turn schools smart

The Education Ministry will launch efforts to strengthen national schools focusing on the programme to make them smart with information and communication technology (ICT) initiatives.

Minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Tun Hussein said the programme, the third thrust of the Education Development Masterplan, would also pay attention to the strengthening and rebranding of all 88 smart schools. It involved efforts to equip all schools with the infrastructure, tools, software and applications, teachers’ training, and a suitable and sufficient transformation programme.

Six schools to be chosen for FutureSchools@Singapore initiative

By June this year, six schools will be selected in Singapore to be pioneering models of how information and communication technology (ICT), can make for an engaging digital learning environment.

This is under the Education Ministry’s FutureSchools@Singapore initiative which aims to help students learn through creative and innovative ways in a world dominated by information technology.

Malaysia-Indonesia pact in higher education

Malaysia and Indonesia agreed to set up a joint committee involving Malaysian university vice-chancellors and the rectors of major Indonesian universities as a first step in enhancing cooperation in tertiary education.

The committee would meet once a year in arranging the pact, which would include exchange programmes involving students and lecturers, joint research and training at the doctorate level for Indonesian lecturers in Malaysia. Indonesia plans to raise the academic qualifications of 138,000 of its lecturers to the Master’s and Ph.D levels in the next 10 years, and Malaysia has been identified as one such place for the purpose.

Philippines, the first country in Intel’s e-learning project

Philippines will become the first recipient country for multi-million dollar Intel Microelectronics’e-learning project, which is aimed to provide a holistic learning environment in public high schools.

Intel’s ICT for Education project would be in partnership with the Department of Education (DEPED), Gearing Up Internet Literacy and Access for Students (GILAS) and the Foundation for IT Education and Development (FIT-ED). The ICT for Education project will be under the Intel World Ahead programme, which is designed to provide computers, Internet access and educational content to schools worldwide. Specific programs will be the Intel’s ‘Teach to the Future Programme’, DEPED’s PCs for Public Schools and GILAS’s donation of Internet connectivity to public schools. Teach to the Future Programme has already trained 74,000 teachers in the Philippines with another 7,000 to be trained by the end of the year, while GILAS has provided Internet connection to over 1,000 high schools.

All public schools in Kenya to embrace ICT by 2008

The Government says it has spent over 200 million shillings for Information Communication Technology programmes in 142 secondary schools in Kenya in this financial year, and expects to bring in ICT in all public schools by 2008.

The money was used to buy ICT equipment for selected schools in 71 districts. All the 4,000 public schools are expected to join the information technology by the end of next year. Of the 400 secondary schools that have been equipped, 39 have wireless Internet access.

Collaborative Creation of Free Software in African Universities

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digitalLEARNING Network

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April 1, 2007

Paul Scott

Chief Software Architect
University of the Western Cape, Cape Town, South Africa
pscott@uwc.ac.za

The African Virtual Open Initiatives and Resources (AVOIR) project, initiated by the University of the Western Cape (UWC), is a collaborative effort of several African higher education institutions. It attempts to create educational and business opportunities that contribute towards the development of Africa through Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) development activities. It has taken an existing e-Learning platform application, Knowledge Environment for Web-based Learning (KEWL) that was developed at UWC, and rebuilt it to run on a FOSS platform. The new version of the software, KEWL.NextGen, and then the Chisimba Framework is based entirely on FOSS. An innovative modular architecture is implemented using a model view controller (MVC) design pattern and offers great flexibility to adapt the framework for any purpose. It also has unique features such as the support of offline authoring of content, Active Dynamic Mirroring, and instructional design capabilities.

AVOIR can be seen as an inclusive collaborative network. This means that anyone is welcome to join the network and start contributing to the projects at any time. There are very few stipulations for new members of the network:

1. All code submitted to the project(s) should be GPL licensed
2. All documentation and subsidiary files should be CCBYSA licensed
3. All communications should be open and transparent for the entire network to see
4. Collaboration should be fostered at all times.
It can be said that there are four cornerstones of the AVOIR project. To ensure the success of any AVOIR node, these four cornerstones should be addressed as much as possible in equal amounts.

• Collaborating
• Coding
• Connecting
• Implementing

Collaborating

Collaborating is the process in which individuals or nodes communicate with each other using the Free Software tools at their disposal. This is one key area where all nodes should be quite active in. Collaboration enhances productivity through communication in the classic Free Software development model, where all parties communicate with each other in a peer to peer type asynchronous or synchronous environment, such as can be achieved through the use of developer mailing lists, forums and chat sessions.

Coding

Code that is produced through the collaborative development process is checked into a central repository for peer review and approval. This ensures that the entire project is improved iteratively through normal development process at all times, according to institutional needs and requirements. All code is required to be configurable, so that any module can be used in almost any circumstance, as well as offer a number of options to the end user or administrator to modify the module to suit institutional needs.

The AVOIR network consists of:
• Catholic University of Mozambique
• Eduardo Mondlane University (Mozambique)
• Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology (Kenya)
• Makarere University (Uganda)
• National University of Rwanda
• Uganda Martyrs University
• University Cheikh Ante Diop (Senegal)
• University of Dar Es Salaam (Tanzania)
• University of Ghana Legon
• University of Jos (Nigeria)
• University of Nairobi (Kenya)
• and the University of the Western Cape (South Africa)

along with some additional partners.

Connecting

Connecting refers to the process in which AVOIR nodes are able, and encouraged, to create networks external to AVOIR within their own communities and environments. This can be in the form of a small business that offers support for AVOIR products to local businesses, or the marketing of AVOIR products to small businesses around the nodes or the network as a whole.

Implementing

Implementing refers to the process of deploying AVOIR products within the institutions that have AVOIR nodes embedded in them. This has been greatly realised by the deployment of e-Learning systems throughout the continent, as well as a marked increase in use of the alumni portal system, committee administration system, and many other products built with the framework.

Challenges and successes

AVOIR has had some remarkable challenges to overcome, as well as a number of shining success stories. The most challenging aspect of building the network and maintaining viable communication is bandwidth. Africa has a very limited amount of bandwidth available, and due to the extreme expense of buying the bandwidth, it is a very limiting factor. Bandwidth problems contribute to communication problems, and due to the nature of collaboration, this is a major inhibitor to the success of any network in Africa. Only through additional funding and pressure from the international community can these issues be addressed.

In other areas, AVOIR has been a resounding success. At the University of the Western Cape, the AVOIR products are used on a daily basis, and provide education, support and job opportunities for thousands of students. A dedicated e-Learning team has been formed to support the staff and students, and all University processes are facilitated in some way or another by the tools provided by the overall AVOIR network. This includes, a new student enrollment and management system, committee administration system, faculty web sites and research project sites, as well as collaborative groupware sites that have created many opportunities to the institution as a whole. All of the above have been created and dep-loyed using the toolset (framework) that the AVOIR network has provided.

AVOIR has been a resounding success. At the University of the Western Cape, the AVOIR products are used on a daily basis, and provide education, support and job opportunities for thousands of students. A dedicated e-Learning team has been formed to support the staff and students, and all University processes are facilitated in some way or another by the tools provided by the overall AVOIR network. This includes, a new student enrollment and management system, committee administration system, faculty web sites and research project sites, as well as collaborative groupware sites that have created many opportunities for the institution as a whole.

AVOIR and e-Learning

The first product of the AVOIR network and collaborative network is KEWL.NextGen (KNG). KNG is a full featured e-Learning system and Learning Management System (LMS) that can be quickly and easily deployed on a minimal specification server or desktop machine in a very short period of time.

It has been demonstrated a number of times, that a fully featured and working LMS can be set up and deployed in under 15 minutes by an experienced system administrator. The LMS is written in PHP version 4, and uses a MySQL back end database for storing the data. The application has been written in such a way that the administrator is able to take advantage of distributed or federated file systems, separate database servers and load balancing scenarios where the user load is increased. This makes for an extremely robust application, with much redundancy built into it from the start. It can easily support a user base of up to 14 000 students from a single application server, served by a single database server. The follow on product of KEWL.NextGen is called KEWL3.0.
It has been built on a greatly improved framework called Chisimba, that takes advantage of the object orientated features of PHP version 5 and above.
It can make use of a number of different database back ends, including PostgreSQL, MySQL and a number of proprietary database servers such as MSSQL as well.
This makes for even greater flexibility in installation and deployment on both Free Software based servers using Apache, or Windows based servers using IIS. At the time of writing, most of the e-Learning based modules available in the PHP4 version are available for this platform too, and work is being done on a daily basis throughout the AVOIR network to create new and more exciting
modules for it.
e-Learning tools available for the system make use of many different pedagogies, and include a specific module for instructional design. In this way, the course administrator is not tied to a single specific pedagogy for online teaching and learning, but has the choice to create and deliver courses in the pedagogy of choice for the institution. This creates an extremely flexible and unique environment for the delivery of course materials to students and learners
that is unique amongst online e-Learning systems. Most LMS will focus on a single pedagogical pathway that users are forced to adhere to in order to effectively use the system.
e-Learning is achieved through a number of modules ranging from simple assignment uploads and dictionary look ups to fully fledged survey tools and problem based learning modules. There are a number of summative and assessment tools available to the lecturer, including a large scale multiple choice questionnaire module that regularly facilitates learners in excess of 700 students simultaneously doing the examination at UWC. Other important tools include Rubrics, Wiki, mailing lists, Groupware suite, events calendar and many more (more than 200 modules are available).

e-Learning tools available for the system make use of many different pedagogies, and include a specific module for instructional design. In this way, the course administrator is not tied to a single specific pedagogy for online teaching and learning, but has the choice to create and deliver courses in the pedagogy of choice for the institution.

All in all, the AVOIR products (KEWL.NextGen and Chisimba) make a number of options available to users, administrators, lecturers and students alike. They are robust, well tested and extremely reliable applications and application frameworks that can be used to deploy fully fledged e-Learning or any other conceivable system type within an institution quickly and easily, using minimal hardware and bandwidth to the internet. Every part of the application is abstracted, multilingual and tested in very poor bandwidth conditions to ensure that all of these circumstances are taken into account at all times and that the user is left with a positive experience, no matter what. The code is GPL licensed free software, and is available from http://avoir.uwc.ac.za/ as well as links to supporting mailing lists (both user lists as well as developer lists).
Demonstrations can be arranged, as well as test servers and installations on request.

Recommendations of National Knowledge Commission, India on Higher Education

1. Create many more universities. The higher education system needs a massive expansion of opportunities, to around 1500 universities nationwide, that would enable India to attain a gross enrolment ratio of at least 15 per cent by 2015.

2. Change the system of regulation for higher education. There is a clear need to establish an Inde-pendent Regulatory Authority for Higher Education (IRAHE).

3. Increase public spending and diversify sources of financing. Government support for higher education should increase to at least 1.5 per cent of GDP, out of a total of at least 6 per cent of GDP for education.

4. Establish 50 National Universities. There is need of the creation of 50 National Universities that can provide education of the highest standard.

5. Reform existing universities. Universities should be required to revise or restructure curricula at least once in three years.

6. Restructure undergraduate colleges. A Central Board of Undergraduate Education should be established, along with State Boards of Undergraduate Education, which would set curricula and conduct examinations for undergraduate colleges that choose to be affiliated with them.

7. Promote enhanced quality. It is particularly important to enhance the ICT infrastructure. Websites and webbased services would improve transparency and accountability. A portal on higher education and research would increase interaction and accessibility. A knowledge network would connect all universities and colleges for online open resources.

8. Ensure access for all deserving students.

Source: National Knowledge Commission Report submitted to Government of India

The e-Learning Wave in Higher Education

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digitalLEARNING Network

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April 1, 2007

Peter Drucker made a statement in his article The Death of the University that: “Thirty years from now the big university campuses will be relics. Universities won't survive….” so that higher educational institutes shake off their inertia and utilise ICT to its best. The Indian institutes of higher education should also critically appraise what he meant to say as educational institutions in the western world and think of making the best use of ICT for their respective institutions.

Technology coordinators view the problems of insufficient hardware, software, and training as major obstacles. Teachers consider the lack of time to develop technology-based lesson a concern. Administrators identify teachers' lack of experience using technology in instruction as yet another challenge. Traditional institutions offering higher education in India need to become more customer-centered and take a lesson from businesses, which regard customer to be the king. Focusing on blended learning, rather than insisting on teaching students at my place at my pace using an industrial model that is now becoming obsolete is what they need to look at. Universities need to leverage their competitive advantage in term of the ICT revolution and the new model of e-education has to be relied upon in the future.

Academic bodies in India and e-Learning

Talking of e-Learning and academic bodies in India it is imperative to mention the UGC-INFONET. The chairman of the University Grants Commission (UGC) in 2002 decided that the universities and colleges should also reap the benefits, which ICT had in store for them. The deliberations of the various committees led to the setting up of the UGC-INFONET towards the end of 2004. UGC also joined this crusade of introducing e-Learning. Wholly funded by UGC, UGC-INFONET provides electronic access to scholarly literature available over the Internet in all areas of learning to the university sector in India.

In the United States, ASTD (American Society for Training & Development), the world's largest association dedicated to workplace learning offers various courses in e-Learning such as e-Learning Courseware Certification along with CEC, an inter university centre of UGC is offering scripting, an e-course in scriptwriting for films and television. For enhancing the ICT skills of teachers' organisations like the NCERT (National Council of Educational Research and Training), and NCTE (National Council for Teacher Education) etc. has been launching schemes from time to time. UGC too conducts IT / ICT orientation programmes for university and college teachers through Academic Staff Colleges.

e-Learning initiatives in India

Forays have been made in the field of e-Learning in form of Brihaspati, an e-Learning platform developed as open source freeware which IIT, Kanpur has developed and is using since January 2003 supported by Ministry of Communication and Information Technology, Govt. of India. Faculties are using this platform to post the lecture notes, handouts, and reference material on the Intranet for supporting the classroom teaching, benefiting over 75 Universities / Institutes across India, and the list is growing.

Yet another project to provide web based training is the National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning (NPTEL), which is being funded by the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) and was first conceived in 1999 to pave the way for introducing multimedia and web technology to enhance learning of basic science and engineering concepts, was launched in September 2006. Significant infrastructure has been set up for production of video-based teaching material by the Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT), Bangalore based Indian Institutes of Sciences (IISc) and Technical Teacher Training Institutes (TTTI).

The Oversight Committee on the Implementation of the New Reservation Policy in higher educational institutions has chosen this model to emulate. Sharing resources from NPTEL, in the South, the Kerala Education Grid (www.edugrid.ac.in) portal has been designed to increase and facilitate access to education resources by the educational community and to facilitate collaboration, sharing of knowledge and best practices to improve the quality of education and learning. Also worth mentioning is Vartalaap, a computer-based solution over a computer network that creates an environment modeled closely on a real-world classroom.

In early 1999, the Tamil Nadu State Government announced its intention to establish a Tamil Virtual University designed to promote Tamil language, literature and culture internationally through the medium of Internet-linked computers. The University has come into existence and is offering quality Tamil education over the web. CDAC (Centre for Development of Advanced Computing) a Scientific Society of the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, Government of India has launched eSikshak, an e-Learning framework and is offering free computer courses in Telegu, a regional language over its portal.

Gyan Darshan which was launched on January 26, 2000 as an exclusive higher education TV channel on Doordarshan to provide quality distance education can be considered as an effective effort in India.

State wise list of Universities/Institutes approved by Distance Education Council India
Andhra Pradesh
1. Sri Padmavati Mahila Vishwavidyalam, Tirupati.
2. Central Institute of English and Foreign Languages, Hyderabad.
3. Maulana Azad National Urdu University Hyderabad.
4. Dr. B.R. Ambedkar Open University, Hyderabad.
5. S.V. University Triputi.
Assam
6. Guwahati University, Guwahati.
Arunachal Pradesh
7. Rajiv Gandhi University, Itanagar,
Bihar
8. Magadh University, Bodhgaya,
Chhatisgarh
9. Pt. Sundarlal Sharma Open University, Chandigarh (UT)
10. Punjab University, Chandigarh
Delhi
11. DOEACC Society, New Delhi
12. Indira Gandhi National Open University New Delhi
Gujarat
13. Babasaheb Ambedkar Open University, Ahmedabad.
Karnataka
14. Karnataka State Open University, Mysore,
Madhya Pradesh
15. M.P Bhoj Open University, Bhopal.
16. Rani Durgawati University, Jabalpur
17. Dr. Hari Singh Gaur Vishvavidyalaya, Sagar
Maharastra
18. Symbiosis Institute of Distance Learning Pune,
19. Narsee Monjee Institute of Management
20. Yashwantrao Chavan Maharashtra Open University, Orissa
21. Fakir Mohan University, Balasore.
Rajasthan
22. Vardhman Mahaveer Open University, Kota, Tripura
23. Tripura University, Tripura.
Tamil Nadu
24. Annamalai University, Annamalainagar
25 Tamil Nadu Open University Chennai
26. Vinayaka Missions University, Salem All Programmes.
Uttar Pradesh
27. Indian Institute of Carpet Technology, Bhadohi, International Distance Learning ProProgramme in Carpet, Wool and Textile.
28. UP Rajarshi Tandan Open University Allahabad
29. Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh. PGDJMC
Uttarakhand
30. Uttaranchal Open University, Haldwani

Vartalaap, a computer-based solution over a computer network that creates an environment modeled closely on a real-world classroom.
In early 1999, the Tamil Nadu State Government announced its intention to establish a Tamil Virtual University designed to promote Tamil language, literature and culture internationally through the medium of Internet-linked computers. The University has come into existence and is offering quality Tamil education over the web. CDAC (Centre for Development of Advanced Computing) a Scientific Society of the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, Government of India has launched eSikshak, an e-Learning framework and is offering free computer courses in Telegu, a regional language over its portal.
Gyan Darshan which was launched on January 26, 2000 as an exclusive higher education TV channel on Doordarshan to provide quality distance education can be considered as an effective effort in India.
At the institutional level many institutes, mainly private as of now have entered into online distance education and the much talked about NIIT Varsity offers training to 500,000 students annually across 33 countries. One of the world's leading management schools IIM Calcutta amongst others entered into a strategic alliance with NIIT, to offer executive development programmes through virtual classrooms. Researchers, academics, teachers, and students worldwide are excitedly embracing blogs (web logs). Chennai, capital of Tamil Nadu, a state in South India played host to the Bloggers' conference held at the TIDEL Park. CDAC and IGNOU are two of the India's most esteemed organisations in their respective fields, which have held conferences in the field of
e-Learning. Online Education is coming up as the biggest challenge to distance education in the near future.
An overview of the institutions / organisations offering online educa-tion and the courses is as below:

Jadavpur University

In the 2000-01 session, the School of Education Technology, Jadavpur University has started a new interdisciplinary 3-Semester (1

The need for speed

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digitalLEARNING Network

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April 1, 2007

The President of India Dr APJ Abdul Kalam recently announced a vision plan that envisaged an empowered science and technology base by 2015 saying that there is a need to energise our university system and enable it to respond to the pressures of the market, so that it can retain and attract talent. A proposal of the government too was announced to set up several institutes of science, technology and IT in various parts of the country as part of its efforts to revitalise the higher education system. The National Knowledge Commission has also in its first report laid emphasis on the need to invest in education at this level of the knowledge pyramid. Although elearning has all potential in Indian higher education sector, adoption has been slow and will need major awareness and marketing efforts.

The interest in distance education is growing very rapidly in India and is expected to double up in the next decade. In the last decade the number of open universities have gone up to 12 and the institutions providing correspondence courses crossed 100 mark. Indira Gandhi national Open University, New Delhi, the apex body to coordinate and monitor the distance education system in India has more than 7,50,000 students with extremely varied profiles, spread throughout the country.

There exists an immense opportunity for institutions to establish new forms of electronic collaborations. The emergence of Internet and its combination with EDUSAT and communication and computer technology has opened opportunities to provide learning on demand and learner centred. The emergence of broadband and mobile Internet service in India makes it feasible to create a cluster of an institution with study center located in far flung areas which can further be connected in the another cluster to form a grid. In addition Wireless in Local Loop,Direct to Home satellite communication technologies are also becoming available.A combination of satellite communication technologies and grid Internet connectivity can be used by the institution for effective delivery system.

Distance education is still a new phenomenon in the newly transitioned economies like Mongolia, Cambodia, Lao PDR and Vietnam. Due to reverse economic and social conditions of developed countries, countries like Bangladesh are yet to establish a reliable e-Learning system or institution. There needs to be a supporting mindset for the adoption of e-Learning as well as keep up with the global trend.

This issue examines e-Learning as a tool for promotion of higher education in Indian as well as in the global context. We are glad to introduce a dedicated space for the higher education community every month, with this special edition on e-Learning in higher education.

Corporate Diary: April 2007

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digitalLEARNING Network

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April 1, 2007

E-learning company offers course for medicos

MEdRC EduTech, a Hyderabad (India) based e-learning company has signed up a Memorandum of Understanding with Mediciti Institute of Medical Sciences and Hospital in order to provide e-learning solutions for MBBS students who want to be doctors.

MEdRC EduTech is planning to tie up with 20 more colleges, including colleges from Pune to provide these solutions by August 2007. MEdRC EduTech has also designed a solution for the five-year MBBS course on the basis of guidelines of the Medical Council of India (MCI), consisting of 6,000 lectures.

Oracle accelerates for SMBs

Oracle has launched a portfolio of over 80 industry-specific’ application solutions to address the needs of companies in 30 industry segments including industrial manufacturing, retail, life sciences, engineering, construction, professional services, financial services, government, education and health care.

The company worked with 50 partners to design, package and price the new products. The move is a part of Oracle’s global Accelerate programme to meet diverse IT requirements of SMBs by combining partner expertise with Oracle’s applications and technology solutions.

India Inc doing its bit of social service
Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), the commitment of businesses to contribute to sustainable economic development by working with employees, their families, the local community and the society at large has gathered an interesting momentum in last two decades. While the origins of CSR activities can be traced back to the early 1930s, the concept of CSR interventions began to take proper shape only from the 1960s.

A survey on CSR Monitor 2001: Global Public opinion on the changing role of companies, conducted by Environics International, which interviewed around 1,000 people from both developed and developing countries like USA, Canada, Mexico, Britain, France, Germany, Japan, India, Russia and Nigeria, revealed that:

A recent study by Nottingham University Business School, covering seven developing countries in Asia (including India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, South Korea and Thailand) to assess the state of CSR interventions in these countries, revealed that although India is poorer than the other countries covered under the study and had the lowest GNP per capita among the countries, it ranked number one in terms of CSR penetration. About 72% of India’s top 50 companies undertake CSR initiatives supported by well-defined CSR policies. Countries like South Korea (52%), Thailand (42%) and Singapore (38%) were behind India in CSR penetration levels.

Most CSR interventions have been targeted at sectors like health & education, with interventions ranging from adoption of public health facilities by corporates, supplementing existing government programmes like the midday meal programme, assessing & improving learning outcomes in primary education through teacher training, leveraging ICT for improving learning outcomes, etc.

TIS and BT break new ground in child protection training

The global e-learning producer, Tata Interactive Systems, and BT, one of the UK’s largest providers of learning services to government are collaborating to produce a five module programme to enable those working within ‘children’s services’ to understand such concepts as the basics of child protection, how to identify a child at risk and how to develop the skills needed to help each child.

With input from a number of councils, the child protection e-learning modules have been designed by Tata Interactive Systems (TIS) and are delivered by BT’s Flexible Learning service, which provides managed learning services to over 600,000 public sector learners in the UK. The modules comprise of Safeguarding Young People and Children, a ‘basic’ awareness level module, which is intended for all local authority employees.

Mysore gets first IT-finishing School

Mysore will be getting its first IT-Finishing School shortly. New 12-month course by Raman International Institute of Information Technology, PG Diploma in Software Programming, is aimed at producing graduates who are trained up in soft-skills and technical skills.

India produces nearly 4,00,000 engineers every year, but only one in four is employable. Lakhs of graduates come out every year, but only 10% of them are fit to be employed in the IT sector. The trend is that software companies today look for fresh graduates who are trained up in industry culture, and are well-versed with soft-skills and communication skills, along with technical knowledge. The students who want to get trained up in soft-skills and technical skills now have this option, with the new course to be launched by Raman International Institute of Information Technology (www.riit.com).

The course is accredited at the professional level, with the certification from University of Mysore (UOM). Graduate with any degree can apply to the course, and selection will be done through entrance test.

The course is divided into four sections – Foundation track, Tech-track, Project track and Internship track, all with duration of 3 months each. Bank loan facilities are made available by RiiiT to students with financial difficulties. Laptops are provided for every student. The Faculty with corporate exposure helps in shaping the soft-skills of students.

MSC Software Provides Global University Program

MSC.Software Corp., a leading provider of enterprise simulation solutions to include simulation software and services, has detailed its Global University Programme, a multi-dimensional offering to complement introductions of MSC.Software’s SimEnterprise solutions.

The MSC.Software University Programme provides software bundles as well as curriculum development and teaching assistance and an online community to make principles and theory understandable, enjoyable and relevant for engineering students.

Available as an online resource at http://www.mscsoftware.com/university/ and with online forums at http://forums.mscsoftware.com/universities/, the program delivers gold-standard software and resources for today’s engineering institutions.

Auralog: Innovation for language learning

GurukulOnline Learning Solutions has now tied up with Auralog, leaders in foreign language learning solutions, to offer their entire range of learning solutions on an e-learning platform.

Auralog, the first multimedia publisher in the world to apply speech-recognition technology to language learning software, and publisher of the award-winning language software TELL ME MORE, is now the global leader in its field. Equally effective for the beginning learner or the advanced speaker, TELL ME MORE promotes advancement at all stages of language learning. Auralog’s language learning methods are recognised the world over, and its products are utilised in 65 countries in Asia, Australia, Europe, Latin America and the Middle East. Some of the languages offered: French, German, Spanish, Dutch, Italian, American English, and British English.

Microsoft and Unesco recognise creative use of technology in education

Unesco and Microsoft have joined forces to recognise and reward teachers from Europe, West Asia and Africa for new uses of Information and Communications Technology (ICT) at the Innovative Teachers Forum 2007 taking place at Unesco Headquarters and the Louvre Museum in Paris.

The Innovative Teachers Forum supports the 2015 UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) for literacy and digital inclusion by helping to build a global community of educators that share ideas, classroom practices using ICT, and above all a common passion for learning. The 200 participants from 40 countries qualified for the event in national competitions that were held to recognise innovative teaching. Teachers’ initiatives range from incorporating the internet and online courses in curricula, to interactive classroom exercises, through the use of blogs and digital portals for teachers, students and parents for interactive coursework, evaluation, feedback and dialogue.

The Innovative Teachers Programme is part of Microsoft’s worldwide Partners in Learning initiative.

BT launches partnership with UNICEF

BT, one of the world’s leading providers of communications solutions and services operating in 170 countries launched a three-year global development partnership with UNICEF which will include investing $3 million into bringing education, technology and communications skills to children from poor socio-economic backgrounds in South Africa, Brazil and China.
In the first year, the BT and UNICEF partnership will reach over 18,000 children in some of the most economically deprived communities in South Africa. In addition to installing 250 computers, 150 head teachers and administrators will also be trained in effective school management and leadership skills.
This partnership builds on three community initiatives that BT is currently involved with in India. Through the Katha Information Technology and e-Commerce School (KITES), more than 9,000 children have already been equipped.

Introducing Technology Based Higher Education in Bangladesh

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digitalLEARNING Network

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April 1, 2007

What one needs for creating Technology Based Higher Education (TBHE) -environment in Higher Educational Institutions (HEI) are necessary logistics like multimedia projectors, computers, Internet connectivity with necessary bandwidth, skilled e-content development group, technology-friendly HEI administration, adaptability of the learners to TBHE environment, etc. In Bangladesh, many of these conditions do not persist at a satisfactory level. Besides, it is difficult for a particular HEI to incorporate all of them. Feeling the requirement of an implementation-friendly framework for TBHE, the authors propose a framework for promoting TBHE-environment in HEIs of Bangladesh, perhaps suitable for other developing nations also. The methodology of the framework was incepted from the National ICT Policy of Bangladesh and the feedback of the expert-group working on ICT and Higher Education in Bangladesh. For this, the authors used the data of the survey conducted by the Expert Group responsible for preparing report on “Strategic Planning for ICT in Higher Education”, of which one of the authors is an expert member. The TBHE-environment for dissemination of information in limited form in most of the public universities in Bangladesh. However, a few private universities are promoting TBHE-environment exists for authentic delivery of learning-contents in electronic form through web and other media. The authors studied their approaches and compared it with the proposed framework.

Educational institutes, particularly the Higher Education Institutions, are the largest stakeholders to adapt to the technological advancement for better and efficient rendering of education to the mass learning community including regular classroom based as well as distant student via online and offline e-Learning. Though in recent years, HEIs in Bangladesh are using ICT in learning and teaching processes in order to increase the quality, efficiency, and dissemination of education, but not many of them could siege the opportunity and leverage significant benefits by adapting themselves to Technology based Higher education environment.

Current status of TBHE in Bangladesh

Status of public sector HEIs

Most of the public sector HEIs did not adopt technology for the improvement of imparting quality education. The major technology medicated activities performed by them are typical in nature that includes: uses of web sites for disseminating general information to the visitors, whereas no learning contents are disseminated; content delivery using overhead and multimedia projectors.

Status of private sector HEIs

Most of the private sector HEIs represent the similar scenario like public sector HEIs. However, few selected HEIs are more aware about the necessity of TBHE environment and striving to provide more technology mediated services to their students. They have their own units of content development activities under different names and responsibilities. The TBHE support provided to their students are: authentic access to course material within and outside the campus, online submission of assignments and term papers, access of online transcript to the student and respective advisor, using log to monitor online activities of students, online discussion forum, providing digital library (own and professional like IEEExplore, ACM digital library), etc.

Usage of TBHE in distance education

In Bangladesh, the only public sector university offering distance education is the Bangladesh Open University (BOU). Facilities provided are: maintaining website; established Media Center responsible for content development (CD based; non-interactive) for secondary, higher secondary and postgraduate courses; broadcasting recorded lectures through television and radio; etc. Learners still need to go to the tutoring/resource centers to give examination. Integration of remote and virtual lab is totally absent and the relevant lab courses are seldom conducted.

Usage of TBHE environment in research and development

In most of the countries such as India, Pakistan, England etc. there exist special ICT facilities to extend helps to people engaged in research and development activities in its HEIs. There is one such network infrastructure in Bangladesh in the name BERNET (Bangladesh Education and Research NETwork: www.ugc.org/bernet.htm). This is the monitoring unit, which provides a quality assurance role to JISC (Joint Information Systems Committee) in monitoring its network infrastructure and network content services to the researchers in different HEIs.

Status of TBHE friendly administration

Though the University Grants Commission (UGC) of Bangladesh regulates and approves the syllabuses of the private sector HEIs, there exists no monitoring body to oversee the separate ICT unit, if any, within the HEIs. Most of the public sector HEIs have independent ICT divisions doing typical ICT chores such as proper functioning of email, etc. However, they do not provide technology-supportive quality education due to the lack of TBHE friendly administration, policy framework and skilled human resources.

Necessity of TBHE framework

Within an HEI, the successful establishment of TBHE environment largely depends not only on the friendly administration and fund, but also on an approved framework. The framework helps in streamlining the quality of education, research and other services provided by various HEIs and eventually increases their competitiveness. Based on the learners’ needs (regular or distant), the framework helps the HEIs in designing their learning system, which is crucial for the development of the TBHE environment. Development of massive and costly system May not be useful due to socio-economic and cultural background of the learners. The framework can help HEIs in this regard.

Components of the proposed TBHE Framework

Establishment of content development centers

As acquired material (books, periodicals, journals, off-the-shelf educational software, etc) does not meet all the needs of an HEI, it is necessary to establish its own CDC. While establishing a CDC, the following issues need to be taken care of, such as: using cutting-edge technology, creative design modules for course content development as well as assessment through online exam, and seamless implementation of services and its maintenance.

Adaptive standard of disseminating learning content

The most commonly used mechanisms for the dissemination of course material and other resources are email, shared-folder through intranet, Internet, etc. These are standard means used by the HEIs (not all of them follow all). School of Engineering & Computer Science of Independent University IUB), Bangladesh; delivery of course contents and interactions are supported by configurable e-learning system called CMOS (Course Management & Operation System) within and outside of campus. However, different systems are used by different schools of the university. CMOS offers easy upload/download of course documents, file sharing, chat, discussion forums. Online quizzes and exams are in the pipeline for implementation. These are supported by a campus wide optical fiber backbone. The framework also suggests various content-delivery modes usin content-delivery modes using: direct delivery of the contents (white-board); indirect delivery through web-enabled computers, CD with computer and CD with television and DVD player. Technology-mediated services for assessment of students The following services need to be incorporated in the learning system to assist the teachers:

ICT @ RDPS

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digitalLEARNING Network

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April 1, 2007

In keeping pace with the latest trends, Rukmini Devi Public School in Delhi, India has been steadily adopting and implementing the latest technological developments not only for the betterment of its students, but also for enhancing the teaching process. As a learning resource, ICT is used for accessing contextual and referential information beyond the textbook and library, through the Internet and Intranet. Students acquire wide and in-depth conceptual understanding through audiovisual presentations on a regular basis. To further enhance skills to comprehend, analyse and interpret the information gathered, students are allotted IT projects for which they actively construct knowledge by exploring information through various ICTs, interacting with simulation and finally presenting their projects for evaluation. Similarly group project work promotes collaborative learning amongst school students and their contemporaries across global boundaries and caters to an understanding of complex issues belonging to different realms.

Learning being an eternal process, ICT has opened up several avenues to enrich and update teaching competence of the school faculty. They are able to train themselves in new pedagogical practices and are motivated to share perspectives through video conferencing, websites and other ICT inspired vistas. The school marked its imprint in 1998 on the Internet through its interactive website 'www.rdpschool.com'. It developed further adding up new sections and now has features to support a virtual school. At a micro level teachers are able to structure effective lesson plans after browsing through model teaching resources available on websites which brings a novelty to their teaching and takes them closer to their objectives.

Besides this, ICT is also being used in the school for ensuring efficiency and accuracy at all levels of administrative work. Statistical data is collected and managed with more precision for planning purposes in various departments like examination, accounts and the library which aids in monitoring results, assessing needs, allocating resources, etc in optimum time with no error.

Basic ICT skills are developed among the Rukminians from a young age itself by giving them initial training through multimedia and audio-visual labs. The skills are further polished in senior classes, where they are given knowledge of networking, progra-mming, latest application software and operating systems essential to them under expert guidance.

The school has a history of conducting several successful Multi cultural education programmes for enhancing children's understanding and appreciation for the world and its people. These exchange programmes, collaborative projects and other such activities are the efforts of the school to promote internationalism in school curriculum, which are facilitated by various ICT tools like e-mails, videoconferencing etc. In year 2006, British Council, India has recognised the incorporation of the international dimension in RDPS curriculum, by accrediting it with the 'International School Award'.

The school is poised to revolutionalise the face of education through ICT. Its steady but assured progress has enabled the Rukminians to compete with the rest of the world on equal terms by blending the power of technology with their cognitive power.

The Innovative Teachers Network Connecting Educators

The Innovative Teachers Network (http://apac.innovativete achers.com/default.aspx) connects a global community of educators who share a common interest in enhancing teaching and learning through the use of technology. ITN for Asia Pacific is part of Microsoft's initiative to build and support a global network of teachers and educators in discussing and sharing resources with each other. This site is developed for teachers who are both experienced in the use of ICT in their learning and teaching as well as teachers who would like to find out more about using ICT in their classroom.

The ITN Asia Pacific hopes to work with educators within the region as well as outside of the region to provide interesting content and information that will be used by teachers and schools. Registration is free and open to all in order to be part of the network.

The network offers services like creating communities, which allows registered educators to create either open or restricted virtual communities online. The creators of these communities are then able to invite other educators to participate in specific projects or programmes that they are initiating.

Educators can create their discussions and see what their peers think of the various issues regarding education. This is a great tool to seek support from others who might have more experience.Resources are typically contributed by educators and their partners on the network and Microsoft. Teachers would be able to make use of these resources to make classes more interesting!

The professional learning section of the ITN is the place where Microsoft and partners post articles, white papers and other interesting research papers relating to teacher training, professional development, research in education and other interesting papers that are of interest to educators.

Technology in the classroom has the power to transform the way you teach, and the way students learn. It can extend the walls of the classroom to the four corners of the globe. The Innovative Teachers Network delivers professional learning resources that engages the educators intellectually, to help meet today's teaching challenges, and encourage them to become an active stakeholder in the teaching profession.

Info-centre

Digital Learning Power School Award 2007
Do you know a bright and prospering school having the power of innovation technology and brilliance that take the teachers, students, parents, administrators and others in the community to the level of excellence?

If you do, take a moment to nominate this school for the Digital Learning Power School Award 2007.

Nominations
due by
30 May, 2007

Learning Curves

New ICT service for primary schools cuts costs and boosts access
SchoolTerm is not only a cost effective ICT system in British education, but it also helps schools save money. It saves teaching time, allows teachers and pupils to access their work from home and outlaws the annoying wait for a technician to arrive to sort out problems as they are resolved remotely.

Designed by Gloucestershire based company School-Tech (www.school-tech.co.uk) after two of its directors looked into the provision of ICT at their local schools, it is an innovative system based on a simple per user per month pricing model. It gives schools the latest desktops, software and servers, allowing them to run the latest educational applications and cut admin costs without busting their budget.

One of the major ways of cutting costs is by using School-Tech's datacentre. Although schools share the datacentre and its resources each school has its own separate application environment and data. This means faster access time, no more cranking up the computers first thing in the morning, and less downtime. The technology works within the curriculum, in particular in developing personalised learning spaces and even allows pupils and teachers to log on from home. It also makes report writing and lesson preparation easier.

In some schools the most important thing is being first in the technology race. First fibered district. First laptop school. First laptop state. First handheld school. First virtual school. First digital school. First paperless, bookless, unlibraried school. In the rush to be first to use a particular tool, sensible planning tends to be an after thought. “Ready, shoot, aim!”

Intel to introduce low-end 'Classmate' PCs in India

Leading processor maker Intel will soon introduce 'Classmate', a portable computer for children priced between INR 9,000-11,000, in India under its World Ahead programme, aimed at adding a billion new global computer users.

Two pilot projects with Classmate have been undertaken at Delhi Public School, Delhi and Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti (NVS), Faridabad near Delhi, India. Intel donated 60 PCs to Class VII students of these schools along with three laptops for teachers for the pilot project. The schools have been provided wi-fi connectivity to enable learning outside classroom.

Classmate has 512 MB RAM and 2GB storage and operates on Windows XP, targeting an age group of 12-15 years. It will also have three security features, parental control on Internet usage, monitoring of machine by teacher PCs in the classroom and the kill switch to disable the machine in case of theft. Through Intel Foundation, the company will also run a training programme for teachers.

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