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Students to use mobile phones for e-learning

More than nine hundred students in the north of England are about to take part in a project, which uses mobile phone to learn and be accessed on their network.

The Assessment and Learning in Practice Settings (ALPS), a collaborative programme between five higher education institutions, is running the first major project to use mobile technology to improve higher education assessment techniques and student skills. T-Mobile MDA Varios would be given to the 900 health and social care students for mobile learning and assessments during work placements. Using T-Mobile's Web'n'walk service, students can also use the mobile to access learning resources from a central virtual learning repository and can reflect on their work experience on a blog built into the assessment programme. Assessors will use the system to log in to a secure area, connected to the university's virtual learning environment teaching and business systems, to record and store the student's assessment.

Microsoft’s offers low-cost PC to Indian students

Microsoft is planning to sell PCs for kids and launch an educational channel on its MSN portal in India in a worldwide “Unlimited Potential” program.

Microsoft's new IQ PC will be built on AMD hardware and vended by Zenith Computers. Microsoft has also launched MSN IQ Beta Education Channel, which provides tutoring, exam coaching, and other educational tools to students. Microsoft plans to test the waters for IQ at 10 retail outlets in Bangalore and Pune for three months beginning in July, 2007 based on market response. Microsoft will hoping to bring down the prices. Microsoft's Unlimited Potential campaign aims to get PC access for 1 billion people worldwide by 2015.

Blue Coat to support Singapore University ICT program

Blue Coat Systems has confirmed the company will support the Singapore-based SIM University's (UniSIM) ICT program through its distributor, Transition Systems Asia Pte Ltd.

Through this project, undergraduates will enjoy enhanced employability while they pursue their studies, through industry certifications offered as part of their degree programs. UniSIM is the first university in Singapore to offer such IT skills certification courses in its ICT degrees. Transition Systems is giving full support in delivering ndustry IT certification programs to UniSIM's ICT undergraduates.

CII ties with Oxford for to set up business centre in India

Oxford University has signed an agreement with the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) to set up India Business Centre to be located in India and the UK.

The centre will address major business policy questions through collaborative research between academicians in Oxford and India. The centre in India could be located either in New Delhi or Mumbai and at Oxford University in the UK. According to John Hood, Vice Chancellor, University of Oxford, the primary objective of this research centre is to learn from India’s business success.

UNESCO’s launches model curricula for journalism

United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has launched 'Model Curricula for Journalism Education for Developing Countries and Emerging Democracies', which reflects the “universal principles revolving around freedom of expression.

UNESCO's Model Curriculum Programme was formally launched at a joint plenary session organised by the World Journalism Education Congress and the Singapore-based Asian Media Information and Communication Centre (AMIC). UNESCO has decided to organize the journalism programmes around three curricula axes: professional skills; social, cultural, political, economic, legal, and practical aspects of journalism practice; knowledge of the world. Journalism programme should prepare students to adapt themselves to technological change and would require them to take a course in online and multimedia journalism.

India joins Washington Accord

India has recently taken a big leap forward in the area of engineering by becoming a member of the Washington Accord, a 10-member apex global organisation that determines standards of engineering education.

The Washington Accord has admitted India as a provisional member for two years after which it will become a full member. India's candidature had been proposed by UK, Australia and Canada, with a generous recommendation by the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE). Getting the membership of Washington Accord means that Indian undergraduate engineering degrees will ultimately be given “equivalency” in all member countries. This means that Indian degrees will be recognised as engineering degrees of high international standard. However, it means only the elite IITs (Indian Institutes of Technologies) or BITS Pilani-type institutes qualify.

India had applied for membership to the accord in 2005, but had missed it by a margin. The Indian problem is that while Indian engineers have a better theoretical grounding than many other countries, their applications knowledge or abilities to work in cross-cultural ambience is poor. The Washington Accord currently has 10 members

DepEd, Philippines launches Cyber Ed Project for public schools

The Education Department of Philippines (DepEd) has launched Cyber Ed Project that uses satellite technology to provide an efficient and cost-effective solutions to the delivery of educational services in public elementary and secondary schools nationwide.

Cyber Ed links schools to a nationwide network, which provides 12 video channels, wireless wide area networking, local area networking and wireless Internet connectivity. The project aims to significantly increase the DepEd's capacity to achieve quality education reform. Under this project, a total of 37,794 schools or 90 percent of all public schools nationwide will be connected in the next three years. These schools will receive live broadcasts featuring lectures and presentations from master teachers as well as course wares on demand and other valuable resource materials. DepEd's Cyber Ed Project is based on China's e-Education Project which covers some 500,000 schools and universities.

Sri Lanka to discuss open source on Windows

The Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) community in Sri Lanka will gather on June 26 to June 28, 2007 and discuss open source applications for Windows, in a bid to curb software piracy in the country.

The FOSS, Sri Lanka local advocacy group will organize the conference, entitled FOSS-ed for Windows, which will cover various topics relating to FOSS applications for the Microsoft platform. These topics will also cover issues related from web-browsers and email clients to graphics software and content management systems. The event is sponsored by Google, Intel, Microsoft, Ceylon Linux, eBuilder, ThinkCube and Virtusa. American Chamber of Commerce, Sri Lanka's ICT Agency, the National Intellectual Property Office and University of Colombo School of Computing will support the event.

XIMB, India to provide courses nationwide via satellite

Xavier Institute of Management, Bhubaneswar (XIMB), India has tied up with Reliance ADAG company NIS Sparta to launch its first satellite-based training programmes in India.

The institute will offer various programmes like Post Graduate Certificate in Business Management (PGCBM) in the V-SAT mode. Through this programme working executives located all over the country will be able to attend classes 'live' in their respective cities. XIMB will use NIS Sparta's infrastructural training facilities to provide the programme across 28 cities and 30 centres in India. The NIS Academy a division of NIS Sparta will implement the scheme. XIMB has also collaborated with Bharti group to provide the V-SAT services. XIMB has partnered with an Israeli company, ROBO Group for providing Live Class Room.

Melaka and Venezuela cooperates on ICT development

    Melaka and Venezuela have agreed to collaborate in several areas to develop ICT and biotechnology.

    The Melaka Government has signed several agreements with universities and biotechnology institutes of Venezuela for the exchange of scientists to share their experience in several fields including health. Venezuela will also Melaka ICT Holding (MICTH) to develop the software, especially for the geography information system, as well as help Melaka in its e-Directory and e-Learning programmes.

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