editorial
> Welcoming the digital future Dear Readers, Warm welcome to the 75th issue of digitalLEARNING. Looking back, I can say that digitalLEARNING began its journey at a crucial point of time, because it was about 75 months ago that digital teaching tools began making deeper inroads into our system of education. To mark the 75th month of its publication, digitalLEARNING interacted with a galaxy of stakeholders, to find out the most compelling issues being faced in education. We have reached out to the schools and higher education institutes located in all parts of the country to get an overview of the digital technologies that have been deployed and the systems they would like to have in future. The overwhelming view from the academia is that the digital push is set to go far beyond gadgets. It will transform the very nature of pedagogy; it aims to turn the teacher into a guide instead of a lecturer. The government too has warmed up to the idea of using ICT to expand the reach of education in the country. But this is not the whole story. At best, the digital technologies have met with mixed results. Many of our schools located in far-flung areas are lacking in basic infrastructure like electricity, so they are not in position to use modern technological tools. The future of education in the digital age will mostly be determined by our ability to improve the overall infrastructure in the country. Lot of work has been done by digital learning organisations, but much more work needs to be done. By diligently reporting on the successes and the struggles of different sections of the industry, digitalLEARNING has helped in strengthening the foundations of the educational system in our country and beyond.
It is possible that in times to come we may have educational approaches that will be more appropriate to the digital era than what we have now. This is the view of many stakeholders in education. Today companies in the digital learning space are doing well. But the leading members of the industry, whose views we have covered in this issue, are forthcoming about the challenges that lie ahead. We would like to thank all the co-travellers who have shared our vision during the magazine’s journey of 75 months. We hope you will find the 75th issue of digitalLEARNING informative and enjoyable.
Dr. Ravi Gupta Editor-in-Chief Ravi.Gupta@elets.in
FEBRUARY / 2012 www.digitallearning.in
digitalLEARNING
5