digital LEARNING Magazine July August Issue 2016

Discover better ways to teach and learn.

With a large, immersive Retina display and intuitive interface, front and back cameras, interactive texts and amazing educational apps and content, iPad is transforming how teachers teach and students learn.

WES Special VOLUME06 11 JULY ISSUE- AUGUST 04 APRIL 2016 2015 VOLUME 12 ISSUE

Cover Story

08 LE MERIDIEN, NEW DELHI

Setting the Course of Education

Interviews

32 Dr. Chhaya Shastri

Director, MT Educare, New Dimensions in Education

Stories

12 - School Education ICT Overhauls School Education 16 - Higher Education ICT Prompts Advancements in Higher Education 22 - Education Policy Nonproﬁt Policy Mandate in Education Deters Private Investments

Director, Infoplus Technologies Ltd, LearnEngg Provides e-Learning Solution

Industry Speak

38 CRM Simpliﬁed eduTech

Case Study

40 Technology in Exams Scaling

Special Feature

42 Video-enabled Learning

26 - Tech Solutions that Enhance Efﬁciency 28 - Student Data Augments School Teaching

Innovative Education 30 - Global Discovery Academy

Turning Students into Future Leaders

34 Dr. S. M. Nabi

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New Frontiers

Management Solutions

43 Partners’ Directory

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July - August 2016

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Editorial

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Promoting the Cause of Education Inspirited by the ‘Digital India’ initiative of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, India stands committed to promoting the spread of Information & Communication Technologies (ICT). The ICT is infusing various systems with new vitality, thus playing a crucial and beneficial role in advancing the wellbeing of all sections of our society. Education is one sector that has realised the benefits of technology, perhaps, ahead of several others. The adoption of ICT here has been fast, leading to delivery of stunning results even faster. It goes to the credit of educational institutions in India, which are adopting high-tech methods of teaching-learning at the global pace, so as to stay relevant in times of neck-and-neck competition. At a time when the Government of India is going whole hog towards implementing the ambitious Digital India project in the country, the “World Education Summit – Delhi” Special Issue of DigitalLEARNING highlights the positive implications of technology that are very much relevant and timely in the present context of educational transformation the world is witness to. The convenience of online courses with the advent of new technologies has caught the attention of professionals and students across the nation, furthering the idea of technology-led learning. All this has led to entrepreneurs tapping into the Indian eduTech space. This issue contains various sections, including the Cover Story on WES that aims to discuss, deliberate and set the future course of education in India. Besides, well-researched articles on ICT initiatives in schools and higher educational institutions bring in opinionated viewpoints from thought leaders and educationists across the globe. Moreover, case studies, features and the comprehensive ‘Jnana Sangama Report’ are undoubtedly interesting reads. The Education sector being one of the fastest developing sectors worldwide and the second-largest industry in India clearly invites opportunities of investments but, sadly though, it stands a victim of the restrictive regulatory environment that forces out the potential speculation of private players exploring and entering this sector. The business story in this issue carefully lays down consolidated perspectives of big private players in the segment, analysing the ‘whys’ and ‘hows’ of the policy syndrome. In view of the paradigm shift taking place in the Indian educational sector, the need for its skillful management and faculties to adapt to the changes is imperative. This will provide the much-needed impetus to the undercurrents of technology finding their way into the education domain.

Dr Ravi Gupta Editor-in-Chief Ravi.Gupta@elets.in

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Cover Story

Le Meridien, New Delhi

Setting the

Course of Education

Moving on from the traditional ways of teaching, imparting education is a hightech business today. In line with the global trend, Indian schools and institutions of higher education are fast adopting technologyaided teaching that facilitates greater access to knowledge and the pass-outs are better prepared to face the market. Participants at Elets Technomediaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s legacy event - 7th World Education Summit, New Delhi - will discuss, deliberate and set the future course of education in India

Honâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ble late Dr APJ Abdul Kalam, Former President of India, at World Education Summit, 2011

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Ms. Kalthoom Al Balooshi, Executive Director, Education Development, KHDA, Dubai (UAE) takes the dais at World Education Summit 2015, Dubai

echnological innovations, for long an emblem of academic research, may now be changing the very way the schools and higher educational institutions impart teaching and students learn. There has been no other generation more comfortable with online and collaborative technologies than today’s young people — the “digital natives”, who have grown up in an immersive computing environment. Where a notebook and pen may have formed the tool kit of prior generations, today’s students come to class armed with smartphones, laptops and iPods. In today’s technology-enabled knowledge economy, many schools and universities find themselves facing fresh challenges: how not only to equip students with adequate education in their respective fields of study, but also to arm them with the skills and knowledge required to leverage technology effectively in the workplace.

A shift in the way education has been imparted is necessary because this is the age of information technology — an age that requires that teachers facilitate aggregation of such information by students and not merely give them the bookish knowledge

Dr. Najma A Heptulla, Former Union Minister for Minority Affairs, Government of India, at World Education Summit, 2014 digitalLEARNING

July - August 2016

Cover Story Global researches have shown that Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) can lead to improved student learning and better teaching methods. A report prepared by the National Institute of Multimedia Education in Japan has proved that an increase in student exposure to educational ICT through curriculum integration has a significant and positive impact on student achievement, especially in terms of knowledge, comprehension, practical and presentation skills in subject areas such as mathematics, science and social study. Ever pondered why do

Elets Technomedia CEO Dr Ravi Gupta presents a memento to Dr. Antony David Miller, Faculty of Humanities & Business, Skyline University College, Sharjah (UAE) at World Education Summit 2016, Dubai

The past editions of the Summit, held majorly in New Delhi and Dubai, have visualised emergence of an interesting range of possibilities on how technology is likely to have its impact on the future academic offerings, spurred by innovative faculty research, student engagement and the pursuit of academic collaboration we need ICT in schools? Was education not happening before computers came into existence? Why is this paradigm shift necessary? Well, the shift is necessary because this is the age of information and technology â&#x20AC;&#x201D;an age that requires that teachers facilitate aggregation of such information by students and not merely give them the bookish knowledge. In view of the paradigm shift happening in the educational sector in India, the need for its management and faculties to adapt to the changes is imperative. Delving into this topic led to the launch of the World Education Summit (WES) by Elets Technomedia Pvt Ltd. Over the years, the Summit has served as platform where academicians, experts on education, edutech

Delegates all ears to speakers at World Education Summit, 2015

July - August 2016

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Dr Abdulla Al Karam Chairman of the Board of Directors & Director General Knowledge and Human Development Authority at World Education Summit, 2016 industry representatives, policymakers and other stakeholders share their ideas and deliberate on how the education sector in India can be made to keep pace with the global trends, so that the pass-outs are at par with that of any other institution, globally. The past editions of the Summit, held majorly in New Delhi and Dubai, have visualised emergence of an interesting range of possibilities on how technology is most likely to have its impact on the future academic offerings, spurred by innovative faculty research, student engagement and the pursuit of academic collaboration. The two-day 7th edition of the World Education Summit (WES) 2016, at New Delhi on 5th and 6th of August, will therefore introduce a platform for knowledge sharing amongst the thought leaders, educational experts and industry leaders to discuss and deliberate upon various aspects of education to create an holistic knowledge-based society. Besides, an exhibition running parallel to the Summit is set to attract more than 1,000 companies, government bodies and educational institutions touching upon topics like current trends in School Education, Higher Education, Vocational Education & Skill Development and ICT initiatives for education in the country.

Prof S S Mantha, Chairman, All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) at World Education Summit, 2012

An exhibition running parallel to the Summit is set to attract over 1,000 companies, government bodies and educational institutions touching upon topics like current trends in School Education, Higher Education, Vocational Education & Skill Development and ICT initiatives for education in the country

The exhibition will also push to limelight how the education sector is offering opportunities for Edupreneurs â&#x20AC;&#x201C; global or national â&#x20AC;&#x201C; to showcase their education technologies, new ideas & innovation and best teaching-learning practices. Not to mention, the WES is the only opportunity to meet 500+ global education leaders and connoisseurs from around the world to face to face, share best practices and discover the technology to fuel the vision of enriching the future of education. Amid the august presence of ministers and key policy-makers from all over the globe sharing their vision on Education for All, the Summit aims to create a unique platform of thought exchange. To top it all, it intends to build a strong community around it and offer scope for various business and networking opportunities for education industry professionals and experts. The dynamics of education sector is evolving and changing rapidly world over and WES 2016 is undeniably one of the best platforms for stakeholders to come together to deliberate, discuss and explore the horizon further.n

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July - August 2016

School Education

ICT Overhauls

SCHOOL EDUCATION Information and Communication Technology in school education is primarily associated with the use of computer and internet. Sadly, a few questions as to what one uses ICT for and how one uses it are addressed vaguely. Nikita Bothra from Elets News Network (ENN) delves deep into the topic, bringing forth consolidated opinions and viewpoints of school education leaders

1st century is marked with the emergence of knowledge based society wherein ICT plays a pivotal role. The National Curriculum Framework 2005 (NCF 2005) has also highlighted the importance of ICT in school education. With this backdrop, a major paradigm shift is indispensable in education characterised by imparting instructions, collaborative learning, multidisciplinary problem-solving and promoting critical thinking skills.

Why ICT in Schools?

In modern society, ICT plays a remarkable role in school education- provides endless opportunities for teachers to transform their practices while students get access to improved educational

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Dr Vandana Lulla Director- Podar Group of International Schools, Mumbai

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The early integration of ICT into primary and secondary curricula through formal recommendations is vital that acts as an important lever for ensuring the introduction of ICT into classrooms

Gustav Jacobus Gropp Principal - Oakridge International School, Hyderabad content along with effective learning methods. ICT improves the learning process through the provision of more interactive educational materials that increase learner’s motivation and facilitate the easy acquisition of basic skills. In primary and secondary level, the use of various multimedia devices such as computer application, OHP, videos, television and the like offer more challenging and engaging learning environment for students. In the twenty 21st century, teaching learning skills underscore the need to shift from traditional teacher centered pedagogy to more learner centered method. “Our school and students have always been ahead of times,” says Dr. Vandana Lulla-Director, Podar Group of International Schools, Mumbai. “ We use e-books and cup-my-bag software tool to reduce the burden of bags of the students. Besides, we also use Google classroom for higher grades where our teachers make all their lesson plans on Atlas software that can later be accessed from anywhere,” she added. Today’s students are surrounded with computers, game stations, smartphones, kindles and apps that have every possible activity and interest covered. Constant exposure to digital media had changed the way these students think and interact with reality. They are digital citizens. Intuned with modern global trends in the field of ICT, it is more than imperative to change the way teaching happens; learning needs to become more personalised and e-learning is the answer. On the same grounds, Gustav Jacobus Gropp - Principal, Oakridge International School, Hyderabad thinks, “Tech tools like Edmodo, EduBlogs, ePals, OpenStudy, Skype and Animoto pull together great lessons and helps design amazing and memorable student projects. While educational tools like Socrative, Carrot Sticks and FunBrain make lessons fun and exciting.”

gresses a teacher sees them asking better questions and thinking more deeply about the content. After flipping his classroom, the teacher can more easily query individual students, probe for misconceptions around scientific concepts, and clear up incorrect notions. On the same grounds, Jaydeb Kar - Principal, Vidya Bhavan Public School, Indore, responds, “There is no fixed formula for the flipped classroom. Every implementation will differ because of wide variables such as class size, discipline, teaching method, technology and resources. A general objective is that there is a better focus on students’ concept exploration, understanding and demonstration with more opportunities for discussion, formative appraisal and feedback.” Echoing the same, Dr. Lulla considers, “Flipped teaching as the ideal methodology for students in the 21st century.” The teacher should only help to facilitate their learning and let the students take centre stage. This will make them responsible for their own learning. However, there would be students who would need more of hand holding and scaffolding in flipped teaching. “This method itself allows the teacher to devote rough tube to such emerging learners and gives more scope to independent learners to research on their own,” she adds further.

Advantages of ICT in School Education Like other developing countries, India uses ICT as a teaching

Flipping the Instructional Approach

Scholars and practitioners have reported the positive outcomes of a flipped, or inverted, approach to instruction. Flipped classroom teachers almost universally agree that it’s not the instructional videos on their own, but how they are integrated into an overall approach, that makes the difference. Students can’t just “watch the video and be done with it.” It takes a little while for students to get used to the system, as the year pro-

Jaydev Kar Principal - Vidya Bhavan Public School, Indore

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School Education tool. Its potential for improving the quality and standards of pupils’ education is significant. Students using voice communication aids gain confidence and social credibility at school in their communities. Increased ICT confidence amongst students motivates them to use the internet at home for school work and make their curiosity fulfill. Besides, computer can improve independent access for students to education where the students with profound and multiple learning disabilities can easily communicate more. Further, visually impaired students using the internet can access information along with their sighted peers.

Government’s Nod to Technology in Schools

In India, various ICT tools have been employed over the years to promote primary and secondary education. These include radio, satellite-based one-way & interactive television and the internet. However, there have been enormous geographic and demographic disparities in their use. Some states in the country currently have an enabling environment in place that allows for a greater use of ICT tools for education, whereas other states lack such an environment making the use of ICT for this purpose very sporadic. The Government of India’s flagship education programme at the primary level - the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) - has streamlined its focus on quality.

Roadblocks in Implementation

In Indian school education system, ICT has a great role to enhance the quality of education. Out of 150 smart schools, 63 smart schools have so far been approved in 12 states and 3 UTs under ICT in Schools scheme. But, regrettably there are some barriers to make the school education completely ICT based.

ICT can be employed in formal and non-formal types of education and would eventually make the learners employable and socially useful part of the society The reasons being lack of teacher’s competency to handle ICT equipment’s and dearth of proper infrastructure further posing hurdles. Schools and colleges acquire computers, Internet connection, LCD projectors and then send their teachers for crash courses that supposedly teach them to use technology. The trouble is this whole approach is devoid of focus. But, until teachers are made to realize the need of ICT, no amount of computerization can help.

A Close Watch

Dr. Lulla states, “ Schools are here to stay and will not be replaced by online education or digital education but higher education may undergo transformation. Schools are not only developing students academically but also socially and culturally and thus the growing up formative years require the nurturing of a teacher. Contradicting her statements, Savita Venkat- Principal, Bombay Cambridge School, Mumbai says, “ Five years down the line, the teachers’ role in the classroom will not be for pedagogical learning but for values, humanisation, responsibility to society and creating change through pedagogy. This is because technically, pedagogy can be received by students from experts from everywhere within the comforts of home.” Nonetheless, as the integration of ICT in education rises and evolves with evermore sophisticated tools, and participation and transition rates to higher levels of education increase, children and adults will increasingly need to develop digital literacy, not only for life skills but also to support their education throughout the secondary, post-secondary and tertiary levels. The early integration of ICT into primary and secondary curricula through formal recommendations is therefore vital and moreover acts as an important lever for ensuring the introduction and implementation of ICT into educational institutions and classrooms.

Future Prospects

Savita Venkat Principal - Bompay Cambridge School, Mumbai

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Quality in education through ICT and its awareness among stakeholders will have positive impact on the society. ICT can be employed in formal and non-formal types of education and would eventually make the learners employable and socially useful part of the society. Employing ICT in teacher training can save a lot of money of the government. Moreover a lot of qualitative improvement can be seen as resource persons for the training can be best of the world. By employing ICT in administration, it can help in solving the problem of absenteeism of students and teachers. Good quality content is one of the major issues and directly affects the standards of education and quality. By overcoming the certain challenges involved in the process of education, it can help a lot in this side. Conclusively, a lot of quality improvement is possible after careful and planned implementation of ICT in school education by various stakeholders.■

Higher Education

ICT Prompts Advancements in

HIGHER EDUCATION The purpose of higher education is to push the frontiers of knowledge and it is here that ICT can play a critical role to accelerate the pace of creating new knowledge. Nikita Bothra from Elets News Network (ENN) digs deep to find out how technology is enabling leading universities and institutions to join hands and create opportunities of learning.

resently, higher education in India is experiencing a metamorphosis in terms of access, equity and quality. This transition is highly influenced by the swift developments in Information and Communication Technology (ICT) all over the world. The introduction of ICT in the higher education has profound implications for the whole education process, especially in dealing with key issues of access, equity, management, efficiency, pedagogy and quality. At the same time, the optimal utilisation of opportunities arising due to diffusion of ICTs in higher education system is a serious challenge for higher educational institutions. In this backdrop, the opportunities and challenges posed by integration of ICTs in various aspects of higher education has been summarised conclusively.

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The modern society to a large extent depends on the everyday use of internet, mobile phones and computer usage which makes the younger generation more adaptive to the explosive technology in the digital world

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An Apparatus of Change

The essence and core of education, higher education in particular, is to promote research and create the processes that inculcate the “problem solving” approach and it cannot be fuelled without having collaborations, joining hands with industry and other academic institutions to share and exchange knowledge and information. This helps in understanding the organisation’s needs, to discuss, deliberate and conceptualise a viable solution and implement so that real life issues can be optimally solved. Dr. Sunil Kumar Pandey-Professor & Director, Institute of Technology & Science, Ghaziabad points out, “ Technology has come to our rescue in a big way by connecting the missing dots towards collaboration and associations, creating strong connect among different organisations and institutes for academia to march ahead.” YVS Kumar-Dean, Academic Planning & Quality Assurance, Rayat-Bahra University, Punjab, says, “Technology can act as a catalyst of change and equaliser in the system by providing unbiased access to information to act and benefit without bureaucratic, corrupt, obstructive, judgmental or regressive mindsets intervening in the process.” However, setting up a technological interface with public-at-large or multitudes of stakeholders is prone to the above mentioned negative factors. “Hence, even more rigorous checks need to be in place to obviate such systematic biases in the design phase of the interface,” Dean Kumar addded.

Effects on Science & Engineering

ICT is a facilitative channel for an innovative, interesting and insightful perspective to visual, aural or conceptual understanding of fundamentals and practices in any field of education and endeavour. However, the costs and the efforts needed in establish-

Sunil Pandey, Professor & Director, Institute of Technology & Science, Ghaziabad

Dr. M Ramamoorty Chancellor, Kl University, Andra Pradesh

ing, developing and implementing ICT with the requisite burden in providing hardware, software and modules aren’t that viable in organisations with short- term planning. There are a fresh set of challenges of implementing ICT in higher learning which is clearly stated by Dr. M Ramamoorty - Chancellor, Kl University, Andra Pradesh, when he says, “The term “smart” has become a buzzword in every field of activity. The modern society to a large extent depends on the everyday use of internet, mobile phones and computer usage which makes the younger generation more adaptive to the explosive technology in the digital world. This has good and bad impacts on the education patterns both in engineering and in science.” The pedagogical teaching methods are forced to change in tune with the students’ interest. Video lectures, distance learning, digital libraries and search engines have enabled the students to have easy access to the required information. Commenting further, he says,“Computer aided system design using software packages like MATLAB and simulation packages like LABVIEW have made the students learning process move towards the results, and less towards the fundamentals.” Students in general have found computer-oriented courses much easier to follow because of their background. Thus,

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Higher Education students have preferred to take up computer science oriented subjects and are less disposed towards core engineering disciplines. The direct result of this mentality is that the conventional professional engineering courses have suffered in many universities, for departments like civil, mechanical or electrical are largely populated by such students who could not get seats in computer science. This “second choice method” of course selection means students who could not find jobs in IT industries find it extremely difficult to find jobs in the core industries due to their dearth of fundamental engineering knowledge and interest in the discipline. This Prof. Ramamoorty believes, “has created a large number of unemployable engineers- a huge burden to society. If this trend continues, the impact on engineering industry will be drastic in India. The same is also true for the science stream which is also affected by poor intake into the research laboratories. This trend may mean that engineers with good fundamental knowledge in engineering design may not be available in future.”

India vs International Rankings

India ranks 91 on the Networked Readiness Index 2016, a key component of the World Economic Forum’s The Global Information Technology Report 2016. The report assesses the state of networked readiness of 139 economies using the NRI and examines the role of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in driving innovation. The NRI is thus a key tool in assessing a country’s preparedness to reap the benefits of emerging technologies and capitalise on the opportunities presented by the digital transformation. The numbers in Indian higher education - 329 state universities, 46 central universities, 128 deemed to be universities, 205 state private universities and 74 institutes of national importance, with a Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER) of

Businesses done with global perspective are changing the nature of competition and establishing more rigorous standards of quality in products, services and solutions 23 per cent - fails to interpret the dilemma they represent. Huge vacancy in teaching positions; poor, unavailable and skewed funding for research; pathetic employability of graduates; money laundering in the name of capitation fees; vested interest and political interference in higher education are few of the major obstacles that plague the higher education sector.

Opportunities & Challenges

The challenges and opportunities in the higher education sector is diversified with its fair share of criticism. Echoing what has been said above, Dr.Rupa Vasudevan-Vice Chancellor, Rai Technological University, Karnataka asserts, “a challenging mismatch between our education systems and job skills required by the employers, such as critical problem solving, group ability and communication skills. To grow in the knowledge economy, investments in ICT techniques and new information sources in line with the industry skill/job requirements are crucial. More sophisticated technology driven strategic techniques, industry academia gap analysis, strengthening partnerships with industry at the university and institutional level can help bridge the gaps between degree, credential programs and jobs.” On the other hand, Dr. Ramamoorty maintains, “Businesses done with global perspective are changing the nature of competition and establishing more rigorous standards of quality in products, services and solutions.” The education sector has to keep pace with these changes and be aligned with these needs. It isn’t an easy task for education to accept and even welcome change, because of the sense of impermanence and discomfort which will naturally result. He continues, “Likewise marked changes in attitudes, life styles, healthcare, financial stability and marketplace behavior cannot be predicted by trends because these changes either create new trends or they alter trends already in place. These change agents serve an essential role in shifting outmoded educational paradigms to the ones that are truly appropriate for our times.”

Industry Standpoint

VYS Kumar, Dean, Academic Planning & Quality Assurance, Rayat-Bahra University, Punjab

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Dean Kumar puts it aptly, “The question whether education is for gaining knowledge, wisdom and professional respect or for just providing a livelihood lies at the crux of the matter. Students who are looking only for plum jobs are not really interested in the hard work that fetches a proportionately suitable position and standing in life. On the other hand, students who are looking for knowledge have aims that are not necessarily focused on certificates to serve only as an entry point. But then the latter can add to value to a modern society.” On the same terms, Dr.Ramamoorty stresses,“The lack of industry-academic dialogue and connect builds a gap, which is enlarging as a result of a disconnect between what is needed and

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what is taught.” He points out a few shortcomings of institutions lined up below: ● An industry-linked mechanism is needed that keeps close watch on developments, challenges and needs of the industry and suggests the probable inclusions in curriculum that addresses the issues of industry employing students. ● Identifying technology, concepts that needs to be incorporated to keep curriculum relevant. ● Some of the leading organisations have started some aca-

demic initiatives to train the students on latest technologies but after two to three years they too turn into a “paid business model” with high pricing which most of the institutes may not afford. ● Quality of faculty is a big challenge and to retain a good faculty is even a bigger task and needs to be addressed. ● The existing processes are more focused on documentation rather than quality of out coming product, i.e. the students. Conceding on Dr.Ramamoorty’s views, Dr. Aarti SrivastavaAssociate Professor, National University of Educational Planning & Administration, New Delhi says, “Education does not restrict itself to instrumentality. The link between industry and academia is very weak. Therefore, the ivory tower approach of the academia is not concurrent with the field realities. The “triple helix model” interface between academia, industry and government may be able to resolve this dissonance.”

A Close Watch

Computer systems and ICT are leading the changing paradigms from “manpower” to “mindpower” in the workplace around the globe. Teachers must be ready to accept the challenges of pedagogical changes, to keep close watch on developments and changing needs of industry to ensure that they are relevant, able to shape and produce competent students who are ready to deliver. Students must be prepared to accept, adapt to, and thrive upon change. The process of education must deal with the needs of students to develop both macro and micro strategies for dealing with their world. The higher education sector is facing a big challenge to maintain its relevance in terms of content, context and pedagogy. The conventional systems and processes are challenged for their preparedness and responsiveness. This needs to be countered by appropriate measures by improving and updating the contents to ensure it is relevant, globally acceptable while the ways and means of delivery of contents should be effective and productive with affordable cost.

The Roadmap

Dr. Rupa Vasudevan, Vice Chancellor, Rai Technological University, Karnataka

It isn’t an easy task for education to accept and even welcome change, because of the sense of impermanence and discomfort which will naturally result

Online mode of education is creating enormous opportunities for those who could not join the formal education system or those who wish to learn from the best of the institutions across the world without being physically present and on their own pace. The governments are also realising this and the National Programme of Technology Enhanced Learning (NPTEL) Phase II and III are focusing on the content generation activity. Besides, an amount of Rs. 4612 crore is expected to be incurred during the 11th Five Year Plan for the National Mission on Education through ICT. This mission is an opportunity as well as a challenge for the bright faculty members of Universities and Institutions of Excellence to invest their intellectual capital for the knowledge empowerment of all the learners of our country. ICT has created all the tools and technologies that can help us in addressing the above issues in a greater context. In fact, the availability of improved infrastructure, connectivity, reachability, accessibility and affordability has broken all geographical boundaries and opened the doors for sharing and collaborations to ensure that quality education is available to all who wish to learn. Of course there are many challenges including creating a reliable ICT infrastructure and seamless connectivity, improving bandwidth and creating awareness about the usage of technology. “Nonetheless, the Digital India Mission of Government of India is creating positive vibes and hopefully these issues will be addressed and resolved at a faster pace,” concludes Dr.Ramamoorty.n

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Education Policy

Nonprofit Policy Mandate in Education

DETERS PRIVATE INVESTMENTS Benjamin Franklin once said that investment in knowledge pays the best interest. Nikita Bothra from Elets News Network (ENN) finds out that the Indian government has to do away with several policy maladies that the education sector embodies while simultaneously opening up a freer market to make room for private investments. Read on...

he Education sector is one of the fastest developing sectors worldwide and the second largest industry in India. According to the India Ratings report, India boasts of an education sector market size of nearly $110 billion in 2015 inclusive of 1.4 million schools and over 36,000 higher education institutes. These numbers however don’t take into account India’s constantly growing demographic advantage. In order to accommodate the growing student class, there is clearly a need for opportune investments in this sector. However, rather than capitalising on this advantage, the restrictive regulatory environment that exists in the Indian education sector has been forcing out the potential speculation of private players exploring and entering this sector.

Not-for-profit Policy Outcomes

Anirudh Gupta, CEO, DCM Group of Schools

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The foremost cause that has restrained private entrepreneurs from investing in this sector is the not-for-profit policy. Furthermore, the policy mandates that 85 per cent of the profits earned are to be routed back into the sector. While, the very concept of entrepreneurship is to make money; questioning this philosophy will only likely keep investments away. Ironically, the not-for-profit rule has also been promoting immoral activities; as education institutes enjoy tax benefits that makes it easier to hoard money. In fact developed countries such as the US and the UK have commercialised their education sector, thereby enabling multiple educational institutes to sprout up and cater to the needs of a growing demand. In this regard, Dr. Chandrashekar D P -CEO, JGI Schools (The JGI Group) says, “In my view, it is a good thing that education is bracketed under the not-for-

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profit sector. India as a country is a different demography than many developing nations. The scale and the scope of education is so vast in our context and hence access to education is the primary step. This step can be accomplished by maintaining the focus on education as a national development issue rather than an economic issue.” On the other hand, Vinesh Menon- Dy Chief Executive Officer, Global Discovery Schools believes that “in an era where the education environment is changing by the minute and is evolving to suit next gen children, the emphasis has to move to service and delivery to prepare children for the globalised world”. He further said “that it can be possible only if the product undergoes constant upgrades and is tuned to cater to child’s needs and all this will call for a model that allows profitability to motivate the entrepreneur to eat, breathe & think about a child’s future and parents’ needs”.

Regulatory Challenges in Educational Institutions

India’s education policy has several impediments. There are layers of regulatory bodies mandating overlapping rules and regulations. As education is a subject on the concurrent list, policies at both the national and state level also don’t correspond with each other. For example, to set up a private state university, it first needs to be legislated by the state government. Educationalists across India have suggested that the government should work towards coming up with uniform and simple policies that can be comprehended by all. It is in this context that a suggestion was made that a national higher education regulatory board be set up. Lina Ashar- Founder, Kangaroo Kids Preschool & Billabong High International School remarks, “The need of a single window clearance is the solution. The RTE (Right to Education) is the main challenge in its current form as the implementation hurdles have not been well thought through.” On the same grounds, Chandrashekhar says, “Challenges vary for different segments in the educational enterprise. For schools, primarily it is clarity in implementation of RTE pan India, fee standardisation policies which are off-balanced and lack of a decentralised approach from the education departments.”

Chandrasekhar DP, CEO, The Jain Groups of Instituitions The process of setting up an institution is severely unbalanced. An institution cannot come into existence unless affiliated to an existing government university. This approval procedure requires over 30 different documents to be submitted to multiple departments at the state level. This sector also demands large land and capital requirements, which cannot be afforded by all. Land requirements vary between 3-5 acres from urban to rural areas. Additionally, the not-for-profit policy adds to the burden of all these financial outflows in the initial stages of setting up. Menon in this regard says that the “government schools seem to have an edge due to the perception that private schools have vested interests in starting a school. The inherent disconnect between the various Boards of Education would need to be ironed out so that we don’ t have differences in methodologies of teaching”. Further, he adds, “A better mechanism may need to be put up to assess the objective and purpose of setting up a private school than to paint everyone with the same brush of wanting to start a school for personal gains.” It is imperative that the state governments adopt a single window system to provide approvals and licenses to set up colleges in our country. Countries such as New Zealand and Singapore have topped the index in this context, as the entire approval process takes only 0.5 days in these countries and all the documents are submitted to a single government department. The Need for Policy Modifications

v Modifications in the policy desk could include v Clarity of regulations

The inherent disconnect between the various Boards of Education would need to be ironed out so that there aren’t differences in methodologies of teaching Lina Ashar, Founder, Kangaroo Kids Preschool & Billabong High International School digitalLEARNING

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Education Policy Opening up the sector for proprofit institutions would attract more domestic and foreign players to set up institutions in India

Prajodh Rajan Co-Founder, EuroKids International Limited v Constant updation of regulations and meetings of school

management to discuss the same twice a year

v Teacher Training Institutions to make teaching a glorified

career option rather than a default option

v School Rating agencies monitored by an independent regu-

lator and Controlled transition from nonprofit to for profit with multiple checks and balances to ensure nobility of the objective in imparting k 12 education On this note, Anirudh Gupta CEO, DCM Group of Schools says, “ The Schools should be given breathing space so that they can actually delve on the purpose for which they have been set up. The rules and regulations governing them should be simple and transparent to cut through the red tape and also the process of recognition and affiliation should be time bound.” Moreover, “The departments should not react on anonymous complaints and representations which at times are meant to garner publicity rather than intending something meaningful for the society. The Schools should be allowed to charge fees as per their facilities and requirements. The regulatory mechanism should not be such that the schools become a soft target in case they deny admission or do not toe the line of any individual/organization/party. In case, the salaries have to be hiked during mid-term, the commensurate fee hike should be allowed to balance the added burden,” he adds. Most of our regulations are centered around infrastructure, number of teaching staff and other inputs rather than the focus on output, i.e what the child is learning at school, there has to be a consistency in the input for all schools whether government or private and all of them must be evaluated by measuring the output- which is the learning output. Agrees, Prajodh Rajan-Co-Founder, EuroKids International

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Vinesh Menon Dy. Chief Executive Officer, Global Discovery Academy Limited when he says, “Most people will agree that education in India is over-regulated and under governed. We need better mechanisms, greater transparency for ease of operations. While the government thinks of its role as a provider what the sector needs is an enabler and the government of the day can use ‘the ease of doing business’ agenda in this sector as well.”

The Outlook

Alleviating barriers in this sector would help recover the sector’s growth rate and contribute to skilling India’s youth. Opening up the sector for pro-profit institutions would attract more domestic and foreign players to set up institutions in India. Reputed universities such as Yale University and Georgia Tech University are in talks to set up universities in our country. Clearly freeing up certain barriers would promote sectoral growth while further attracting other top colleges from around the globe. In addition, India, which has the world’s largest student population can directly benefit from such a move – from a restrictive to a more business friendly environment. Encouraging private players in this sector would also ultimately lead to stimulating employment and foster economic development of India.n

Company Proﬁle

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Reviving Childhood with

BULBUL APPS

Brainchild of Prakash Dantuluri (CEO) and Naveen Chintamaneni (CRO), the BulBul Apps is a uniﬁed collaborative platform for artists to come together to produce local content with global quality.

atering to a niche category, BulBul Apps has set for itself a goal to create world’s largest apps library for Preschoolers, focused on local content speciﬁc to each region, city and nation. “The good values learnt in our lives come from the stories told by our grandparents in our childhood. These stories taught us a lot about life and how one has to lead life amidst the odds. All of this gives us nostalgia about our childhood,” says BulBul Apps CEO Prakash. He realised that his children and his friends were hooked to gadgets and they loved discovering its features and gimmicks. However, what it lacked was the ‘Learning’ aspect and the kind of content

that parents can trust for enriching their children’s knowledge. Prakash recalls, “When I was a kid, my grandma used to tell me stories in bed. I still remember those stories. Her presence, her voice and her narration lead me to so many wonderful worlds. Then, I grew listening to stories that my father told, which were popular folk, mythological stories. As I began to consume these stories, it helped me share them with my friends in school and my friend circle. Some stories were interestingly made up and some stories were real. For me, it was quite an imaginative and wonderful experience that lacked visual appeal and it was one-on-one delivered orally.” He realised that as the complexities of the mediums of story narration increased, the complexity for the storyteller to create stories for those mediums also increased proportionately. It was important to connect the grandma and pop-and-mom stories to the digital world without losing its essence, innocence and inherent cultural aesthetics. The Birth of ‘BulBul’

Prakash Dantuluri, CEO, BulBul Apps

With the realisation of limitations of the content on the web for kids below 6 years, which could sparkle the eyes and young minds of children, the idea of ‘BulBul’ started taking shape. The bird BulBul, curious and constantly in pursuit of discovering new things, was his inspiration, truly matching a child’s flickering imagination and a relentless appetite to uncover curiosity. BulBul Apps began its journey some five months ago, with the core philosophy to first create a platform where story tellers, artists, animators and voice artists could collaborate to re-create age-old folk stories. They built a platform first to help these artists to present their content

As the complexities of the mediums of story narration increased, the complexity for the storyteller to create stories for those mediums also increased proportionately. BulBul Apps tries to connect the grandma and popand-mom stories to the digital world without losing its essence, innocence and inherent cultural aesthetics

without bothering about coding and software, which Prakash and his team would take care of. Their core principle is ‘think like a child’ for all the apps that is available for download from ‘BulBulapps’ library. ■ digitalLEARNING

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Case Study

Tech Solutions that

ENHANCE EFFICIENCY

Live Ink Character Recognition (Orion LICR) solution from Orion India Systems Pvt Ltd is a mark digitisation technology that enables faster publication of examination results, which helped the Council for Indian School Certificate Examinations (CISCE) publish the results of ICSE and ISC examinations much ahead of the traditional schedule

he Council for Indian School Certificate Examinations (CISCE) created history on May 6, 2016 by publishing the results of the ICSE and ISC Examinations full two weeks ahead of what had been its own standard practice, and way ahead of the CBSE and other state examination boards. What helped the council achieve this remarkable feat was its decision to go with the new “Orion LICR” technology developed by Orion India Systems Pvt Ltd (www.orioninc.com) for the first time in the world. Orion’s Live Ink Character Recognition (Orion LICR) solution is a patent-pending marks digitization technology that enables faster publication of examination results. The front-end of the solution consists of a repurposed digital pen, an accompanying tablet, and specially printed top sheets of answer booklets. Examiners use the pen to transcribe marks from the inner sheets (of the answer script) to the top sheet. The pen captures and digitises the marks in real time, and displays the data on the tablet. Examiners can view the marks in their own handwriting as well as the digitised version on the tablet at the same time, and validate each mark. Immediately the system applies question paper rubrics automatically and displays the total marks on the screen of the tab. A “submit button” on the tablet encrypts the data and transfers it instantly to the council’s cloud-based servers. This significantly reduces the time taken for compilation of results.

Effective communication

Running at the backend is a robust system called “Orion LICR Enterprise Web” that crunches massive amounts of data coming from various evaluation centers. It provides drilled down views on each evaluation center, right down to individual examiners and individual answer scripts. Live data synchronization with the evaluation centers enables council’s staff to have a real-time view of the progress of evaluation at various centers. An end-to-end

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logistics management tool takes care of device distribution planning, dispatch, and tracking based on when evaluation starts and ends at various centers. Another back-office tool which is integral to the enterprise web, remotely monitors the devices out in the evaluation centers and checks parameters such as signal strength, battery charge, and synchronization with the cloud based servers. A well-defined communication system triggers alerts to examiners and support staff via email and SMS. The council used “Orion LICR Solution” to evaluate more than 2.25 million answer scripts of the 2016 batch of ICSE and ISC students. The exercise saw 10,327 examiners spread over 907 evaluation centers across the length and breadth of India, using 3,236 digital pen and tablet sets to complete the evaluation in record time. In a press release a week prior to publication of the results, Gerry Arathoon, the council’s Chief Executive & Secretary said, “The council is the first examination board in the world to introduce this system. We are extremely happy with the outcome, because our students will now be able to have their results in hand much earlier. This will give them a head start while seeking admission to institutions for higher studies.”

Tracking evaluation

Apart from expediting publication of results, the solution brings several other benefits. It effectively masks student information, ensuring absolute impartiality in the evaluation process. By incorporating automatic totaling of marks and automatic application of question paper rubrics, it ensures accuracy of the marks awarded. It captures the attendance of examiners at various evaluation centers, making calculation and payment of remuneration to examiners easy. It enables the council to track the progress of evaluation at various centers and to take corrective action where necessary. By allowing examiners to continue with the pen and paper method of evaluation that they are famil-

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iar with, it eliminates the need for them to learn new skills and minimizes resistance to adoption. Examiners can overwrite if a mistake was made while transcribing the marks to the top sheet. There is no limit to the number of times they can over-write. The system reﬂects the last overwrite, while maintaining an audit trail of all previous overwrites. The LICR solution is more efficient than evaluation methods like On Screen Marking (OSM). The latter envisages scanning of all the pages of an answer script using high speed industrial scanners and presenting examiners with the scanned images for evaluation. While industrial scanners are capable of scanning hundreds of pages per minute, the solution suffers from some inherent drawbacks. About half-an-inch has to be guillotined off the left edge of the answer booklets and the additional sheets attached to them, prior to feeding into the scanner. This is to separate the individual sheets to enable simultaneous scanning of both sides. After scanning, the booklets have to be stitched back together. This is a labour-intensive procedure that slows down the scanning process significantly; not to mention the possibility of wrong-stitching by jumbling up pages from different answer scripts. The scanning and re-stitching process can also compromise security

Challenges

In “OSM Technology”, the storage of the scanned images is another problem that has to be addressed. For a large university or school education board, storing the scanned images for the mandatory retention period will require tens of terabytes of server space. In OSM technology, the evaluation centers will have to be equipped with computers and other necessary infrastructure for viewing the answer scripts. If the scanned images of the answer scripts are stored in a centralized location, evaluators will have to download the images for evaluation. At an evaluation camp where there can be a hundred or more evaluators working at a time, the internet bandwidth requirements will be huge. Dedicated power inverters or generators will have to be provided at the evaluation centers for the long duration power shedding which is common in summer. Over the long term, the cost involved while using LICR will be significantly lower than when using OSM. There is no dependency on high-bandwidth internet connection. There are no hassles associated with computers/laptops such as booting issues, virus attacks, hacking problems and power backup requirements. Since no scanning is involved, there is no additional manpower required. The LICR concept started to evolve in June 2014 when architects and engineers at Orion began thinking of streamlining the evaluation process and reducing the gestation period prior to publication of results. Supported by founder of Orion and visionary Sunil Mehta, Narendra Kumar who is the Director of Orion (India operations) and solutions architect Govind Rajulu with their team built this world class product. By November 2014, the company had a working prototype, which they presented at the 10th ‘e-India Innovation Summit’ held at Kovalam, Kerala, winning the National Award for Innovation in the Testing and Assessment category. In April 2015, Orion successfully convinced CISCE and conducted a pilot run using the solution to evaluate the Biology paper of the 2015 ISC batch and the Computer Applications paper of the 2015 ICSE batch at the evaluation centers at La Martiniere School for Girls, Kolkata. In July 2015, Orion signed a five year contract with the council for pan-India roll out of the

NARENDRA KUMAR, Director, Orion India Systems Pvt Ltd Today, education industry is rife with complex governance processes and dwindling budgets. Improving operational efficiency and streamlining outdated processes are emerging as a panacea for the long-term sustainability of school boards and universities alike. To this mission, Orion India Systems has reinvented the operational model for education industry with its “award winning” innovative educational solutions. While OLICR (Orion Live Ink Character Recognition) has successfully streamlined examination evaluation process for CISCE, one of India’s premier education boards, CAREEVS (modular automation solution) has spelt significant benefits for a wide range of educational institutions in terms of improving operational efficiency and service delivery. By virtue of OLICR solution, Orion has enabled boards and universities to publish results in almost real time. Devised with automation at the core, Orion works closely with educators and helps develop innovative solutions that help them become more nimble and respond to industry changes swiftly

solution for evaluation of the ICSE and ISC answer scripts from 2016 onwards. Feedback to the solution has been extremely overwhelming from the examiners both young and old. It is the simplicity and usability of the solution from the end-user perspective that has won the appreciation of the examiners.■

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Special Feature

DATA-WISE

Student Data Augments School Teaching Assessment has value worldwide as a means of generating data to support personalised learning, improvements in school teaching methodology and national reform programmes, and India is no exception, writes

James Neill, Director

GL Education

any leading educationists recognise how data from formative assessments can drive improvements in teaching and learning methods. Daisy Christodoulou, Head of Assessment at Ark Schools, who has recently opened the Ark Schools India’s SDMC Primary School in New Delhi, says, “We know from other walks of life that accurate data can be transformative.” Christodoulou adds, “Improvements in measurements brought about by microscopes and stethoscopes in the 19th century led to improvements in healthcare systems, while improvements in the measurements of smartphones can transform people’s lives. Spending time to ensure that our educational measurements are smart can help us work out what really works in the classroom and make sure that no student is left behind.” At GL Education, we take a ‘whole pupil’ view of a student by using assessments to look at each student’s ability and attitudes, as well as attainment and progress. In doing so, schools can build a complete picture of each student, enabling teachers to adapt to teaching and learning methods accordingly to realise every student’s potential. This helps understand whether or not students are gifted in a particular subject or they have special educational needs. This ‘whole pupil’ approach to assessment is being adopted by educational institutions across India. Urmila Chowdhury, Executive Principal at SDMC Primary School, explains, “At Ark Lajpat Nagar, we believe that all children, irrespective of background or ability, can succeed if taught well, and so it is really important for us to use benchmarked assessment data to ensure teaching is correctly targeted.” Recognising the importance of assessment data, Anne Waite – Senior Advisor for School Improvement at UK-based GEMS Education, opines, “With GEMS schools around the world educating 250,000 pupils, we are constantly identifying ways to support schools in recognising their strategic direction of journey when raising the performance standards of their students. We are also keen to ensure that our Indian schools in the UAE, which cater to over 74,000 students, have access to the same

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quality of assessment data to support learning and teaching that our NCfE (National Curriculum for England) schools beneﬁt from.”

Understanding the potential

GEMS Education uses our Cognitive Abilities Test (CAT4) to measure the four main types of reasoning ability that are known to make a difference to learning and achievement: verbal, non-verbal, quantitative and spatial ability. It is the most widely used test of reasoning ability in the UK and is now available for schools following CBSE curriculum in India and around the world. The new CBSE edition enables schools following the Indian curriculum to beneﬁt by obtaining valuable insights into a student’s potential, based on comparisons with other students of the same age, and indicators of students’ likely outcomes in future CBSE examinations. These compari-

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sons and indicators are based on data of over 12,800 students taking CAT4 and the CBSE curriculum. Anne maintains, “The data generated from the CAT4 CBSE edition has really helped our school leaders to understand the potential and learning preferences of their students. Schools have been able to use the data to further develop focussed feedback for learners and their parents. Therefore, together they are using the data to support the setting and discussing of target grades to ensure even greater results.” Indeed, it is the way in which assessments can be used to personalise learning and understand students’ potential that is driving the interest in formative assessments in India. Savita Venkat, Principal - Bombay Cambridge School, Mumbai, explains, “The use of data to inform teaching and learning is important. At Bombay Cambridge, we have now designed an internal assessment system that will allow our teachers to really understand individual learners at a greater depth. This will ensure that we can not only personalise teaching to a greater depth using the CAT4, but we will be able to measure students’ annual progress, supporting them to achieve their academic potential.”

Maximising achievement

A number of schools are using CAT4 alongside GL Education’s Progress Test Series; a suite of attainment tests in English and Maths. By comparing scores from both CAT4 and the Progress Test Series, schools can quickly and easily see the students that are not achieving their full potential and need additional support. Nahmiya Shajas, Primary Math Coordinator from GEMS New Millennium School, Al Khail, has been using CAT4 in this way. She explains, “CAT4 gives a comprehensive proﬁle of a child’s underlying ability, so by combining this with the scores from the Progress Tests in English and Maths, teachers are able to quickly ﬁnd which children are underperforming. This helps to plan intervention strategies for individual students. “The data will help us identify the areas for development,” Nahmiya adds. “We are also able to compare the children’s performance against national performance, which helps us keep their progress on track, to look at what targets we need to set, and what strategies need to be put in place to ensure these are met.

Now, teachers are able to draw up a list of topics to directly address any gaps in knowledge.” Helen L Sharrock, Principal - Primary, Mercedes Benz International School, Pune, adds, “Our school has been using a range of assessments from GL Education since August 2015 to enhance our teaching and learning. We are committed to providing a challenging, differentiated programme for all our students, and with the use of CAT4 tests, ‘Progress in English’ and ‘Progress in Maths’ assessments, we are able to gain a deeper understanding of our students’ strengths and areas for development. We use GL Education’s assessments as part of our data collection both formal and informal for bridging the gaps that could exist between attainment and aptitude. Besides, Helen says, “We are committed to helping our students reach their full potential and the assessments provide a strong set of data, with concrete suggestions as to how we can work to develop the students further. The assessments are skill and concept-based, so are suited to a range of National and International programmes and are not dependent on a speciﬁc knowledge base. We are looking forward to the new information that GL Education intends to provide shortly, regarding the CAT4 assessments and the correlation to predicted IBMYP and IBDP grades, in terms of aptitude.” World Education Summit - Delhi We are excited to be a part of the World Education Summit to be held in Delhi. As a speaker, and with the support of regional school leaders, I am looking forward to reinforcing the importance of

The use of data to inform teaching and learning is important. At Bombay Cambridge, we have now designed an internal assessment system that will allow our teachers to really understand individual learners at a greater depth. Savita Venkat, Principal - Bombay Cambridge School, Mumbai. assessments to a wider audience. I hope to ﬁnd new schools who wish to work with us to further develop their assessment mechanism. Most importantly, I am looking forward to meeting as many of the dedicated school leaders at the event as possible, so as to open a dialogue and explore how our assessments can contribute to your work giving each and every individual student the very best start in life we can. ■ www.gl-education.com digitalLEARNING

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Innovative Education

The vision of scaling Global Discovery Academy (GDA)’ network of schools across the length and breadth of India has been our prime motto, says Dy. Chief Executive Officer,

Vinesh Menon,

GDA, in an interaction with Elets News Network (ENN)

GLOBAL DISCOVERY ACADEMY Turning Students into Future Leaders What is the change that GDA has brought in the current education scenario? GDA is all about changing the way a child perceives a school – our objective is to help today’s generation children DISCOVER learning rather than be subjected to ROTE learning inside the class room. So what are the changes? ● We have brought in a platform that gives parents of Tier 2& 3 cities a chance to experience high-end education at an affordable price. ● Our approach around educator

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hiring, learning spaces inside the schools, the pedagogical content, use of technology, mapping children’s dominant strengths, our engagement with parents in our endeavour to facilitate the change in education delivery has shown results & has been acknowledged by parents as a big differentiator. ● We have an unlimited reservoir of innovation in line with futuristic trends that education in India will require – merely timing the opening of the tap that flows this out. Have you heard of Market Day, Entrepre-

neurship labs, Honouring National Heroes, Toastmasters program etc in K 12? Perhaps not. ● Finally, we are steadily creating a unique eco-system where parents, educators and students across unite under one platform , for sharing best practices, interact and converge towards one common goal dedicated to shape 16 years of a child’s development in a manner that prepares him to be confident and self sufficient in tomorrow’s globally shrinking world.

How has Global Discovery Academy schools seen growth in the last four years. How has the Journey been so far? 4 years back, our Co-Founder & Mg. Director Mr. Pankaj Bindra, relocated to India from USA with an idea, a vision and a clear blueprint. He established the first Global Discovery School in Sevasi, Gujarat which focussed on executing the GDA blue print around

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architecture, neo experiential applied learning practices, continuous innovation through technology, differentiated approach in talent management & training aimed at a paradigm shift in pedagogy delivery and mass perception - making education, interactive, engaging and enjoyable for the child. With the school in Sevasi being the countryâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Research , Development and Innovation Centre, we have 12 schools, now operational in association with far sighted visionary Education Partners who resonate with the new age education philosophy, technology and innovation. We have set a footprint in Punjab, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Telangana & Rajasthan and are proud to be adding value to nearly 4,000 students through a team of dedicated young qualified professionals supporting a team of energetic & excited educators. I have been around for the last 3 years and have no idea on the time that has whizzed by - the journey has been enriching to say the least. How has technology helped induce the change and facilitate learning outcomes? Just as how technology is an integral part of any system and industry, the education platform cannot ignore the power of technology. Global Discovery Academyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s objective is build efficiencies in all spheres of school operations through a well defined process and power the engine that drives the education delivery through technology BUT at the same time ensure that it does not dilute the emotional touch & human intervention that is essential in the formative years of a child. We have technology integrated into our curriculum, pedagogy delivery and assessments of both students & educators. Syllabi completion is also tracked on a technology enabled platform. Parent portals can be downloaded on IOS & Android phones and can be used to track progress, view the daily calendar online, register feedback & absorb psychometric evaluation reports and other assessments of the child. RFIDs and GPS chip enabled platforms are used to keep children secure. Discovery Launchpad is a technology and entrepreneurship platform exclusive to the GDA curriculum that helps children acquire skills in mobile app making & scratch programming. Our parent surveys are conducted online by independent survey agencies

We have brought in a platform that gives parents of Tier ii & iii cities a chance to experience highend education at an affordable price

and thus you can well appreciate how well embedded technology is into the GDA eco-system. Where do you see GDA, 3 years hence? We are in a constant state of evolution and maturity. Our vision is to have a school in every town of India and this calls for a very sure footed approach in associating with likeminded education partners and continually innovating

the differentiated delivery of our core product. Our innovation and ability to bring in a structured enhancement to education has also found favour with promising existing schools in India which perhaps may wish to use the services of organisations like ours to further add value to an already running school and enhance the learning experience for their students. Our strength lies in the ability to ensure standardised delivery across key operational functions that are critical to make a K12

school successful and foster a dynamic child-school-parent connect, despite diversity in the country. You will see us as a chain that continually innovates, builds deeper foundations into children, enhances confidence in them and readies them to face the dynamic globalisation in the years to come. Finally, we may wish to explore possibilities of setting up Educator Training Institutes & also venturing to serve the Indian diaspora outside the shores of India.n

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Interview

NEW DIMENSIONS in Education

MT Educare, a pioneer institution for education support and training services, has recently launched a new way of learning through an Online Education App (Robomate +) currently available on the Android platform where its HQ AV lectures are available free online. In an exclusive interview with Abhishek Singh and Nikita Bothra of Elets News Network (ENN), Dr. Chhaya Shastri, Director, MT Educare shares the challenges of her journey into making the Robomate+ app.

What triggered you to come up with an online tutorial app? This all began in 2007-2008 in our classroom where we replaced our classroom blackboard with an audio visual media. There is usually a retention level of 5060 per cent, but when a student interacts, the retention becomes 70- 80 per cent. A student will not have access to what was taught to him 5 month back at the time of his examination and has no access to

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what was learned. So we thought why not capture the lectures and give this as a revision tool. Following which we observed grade enhancement at the end of the day, week and so on. So there was a science to it and based on this science what we decided is that we should give access of this content to our own students. Later we saw our own students doing well, and thus struck the idea of making the content available for everybody. But as we know India is a country where so many apps are downloaded. Out of the World Statistics, only 9 per cent of the world app downloads is happening in India. Because our literacy level is so poor- only 71 per cent, we considered giving advantage of this medium to places with scarcity of teachers and schools like the villages where children could buy an internet connection in a local Gram Panchayat or Zillla Parshad and could hence study on this app. Besides, studying on ‘Robomate+’ is easy on pockets too at a price of Rs 3000- 4000 which is a miniscule amount compared to the subscription that will cost one in a month to see high deﬁnition videos. How is Robomate India’s largest video platform for students helping them prepare better for exams? Assessment is a very big part of Robomate. A child looks at a 5-7 mins learning module and immediately asks questions. Therefore it gives room to assess

the level of understanding of the child. It can also be ‘one- to -one’. For instance a child see the module and immediately sees the assessment. In institutions, we are recommending flip classroom which means that the child can see this module previous day at home, does the home test and comes to school and then the teacher teaches the same topic and he does another test. Then, all these tests sync on teacher's app which lets her grade student's performance. But if a child is studying one-to-one with Robomate home, he can access solutions of the wrong answers that get displayed on the app , thus allowing him to self-study. What were the challenges you faced while making this app? Firstly, curriculum wise we had to know the classroom experience, obstacles a child faces and what are his difficulties in learning. A lot of expert teachers sat down and exchanged each other’s experiences. So collectively the expertise of so many faculties teaching the respective subjects have gone into making Robomate+. Secondly the curriculum is dynamic. So it was necessary to have our own in-house teachers to immediately address the changing curriculum needs. Therefore I would say that this is not an IT based software which is a one time job: it is flowing in process and dynamic in nature. In what ways will you distinguish Robomate + from the already existing education apps in the market? Well, Robomate is not just an app. When one records lectures and they are available on google freely, it is in an app form. But Robomate is a component of Robo administration. It is an ERP (Enterprise resource planning) system that can collect data of an enrollment of a student, Unique ID number, students’ marks, and their attendance in an administrative wing. It also has ‘Robo Assessment’ which means that the exam papers can be generated as per chapters like simple, medium or difficulty level depending on a child’s ability. This is called adaptive learning. Thirdly in ‘Robo Analytics’ the marks that are scored in multiple choice questions of the same day and tomorrow will give him the information if he is good in one section like concept but not that apt in analytical ability, to help him understand his weak areas in studying and where he has to improve.■

Give your Students the brain-skill advantage 654 x24 In how many seconds can you calculate this ? Typically a child who has undergone training in Abacus or Vedic Math Techniques can solve Arithmetical problems like these in mere 5 to 10 seconds that too mentally. Abacus, a Chinese calculating tool, is well known, scientifically proved, and well established concept of learning Mental Arithmetic. The Principle of Abacus works on the fact that when the right and left brain function simultaneously, there is an overall improvement in the academic proficiency of a child. The Abacus and Vedic Math Programs can be implemented in one of the following two ways i.e.; •

Curriculum Mode : The BrianPro / VedicPro Program would become a part of the time table with minimum two periods being allotted per week per division for the same.

•

Centre Mode : Classes would be conducted for two hours after school on Saturdays or on Sundays, as may be decided by the school management.

Benefits Implementation of these programs in the curriculum mode acts as a big differentiating factor for schools • Plug & Play Program

• No Requirement for a Separate Room

• No Investment / Capital Expenditure

• Independent of Medium of Instruction

• No H/W, S/W, Electricity Requirement • Revenue Generation Option for Schools

• Faster Mental Calculations (Faster than a calculator) • Improves Concentration • Improves Memory & Speed • Improves Accuracy • Builds Overall Confidence

• Faster Mental Calculations (Including large numbers) • Increases Mental Agility • Promotes Creativity • Fun Way of Learning Math • Appeals to all Age Groups

Special Per Student Fee for Schools Opting for the Curriculum Mode.

EduPro Learning

108, Bhaveshwar Arcade, Opp. Shreeyash Theater, L.B.S. Marg, Ghatkopar (W), Mumbai - 400 086. www.eduprolearning.com | support@edurprolearning.com

For more information Call : +91 98200 25155

Interview

LearnEngg PROVIDES

e-Learning Solution The scenario of higher education in India fails to match global quality standards says Dr. S. M. Nabi, Director, Infoplus Technologies Ltd in a conversation with Elets News Network (ENN)

how your solution is going to address the current challenges? LearnEngg is a trade-name christened for our visual-rich accelerated e-Learning solution. Our immediate focus is on imparting highly effective technical education, namely, 4 year Graduate Engineering, 3 year Engineering Diploma, 2 year ITI Trades and skill development programs. LearnEngg conforms to the prescribed syllabus of the University/ Educational Agency, aptly crafted with relevant real-life demonstrations of appropriate 3D visuals, thus imparting highly effective and quality education. It provides nearly 250 visuals in 2D/3D formats to explain a typical 45 Lecture hours subject. Have you implemented your solutions in Universities or Technical Boards? We have implemented LearnEngg solution in 5 States, namely all Govt. ITIs in Kerala, Govt. Polytechnics in the states of Telangana, Andhra Pradesh and West Bengal for Diploma Engg, Visvesvaraya Technological University and its affiliated Engineering colleges in Karnataka; Our solution has earned the Chief Minister’s e-Governance Award of 2014 in Kerala, especially for the upliftment of Girl Students from Rural Environment.

What is the current situation of Higher Education system in India and how do you think your contribution envisages to over-come that? India's higher education system is the world's third largest in terms of students, next to China and the United States. Unlike China, however, India has the advantage of English being the primary language of higher education and research. The overall scenario of higher education in India does not match with the global quality standards mainly due to highly diversified nature in terms of cultures, languages, economic status and geographical locations, widening the gap between urban and rural areas. What is meant by LearnEngg and

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digitalLEARNING

Leveraging the technological developments, we provide the students to learn the subjects anywhere any time, offering a personalised learning environment

How can your contribution help in “Skilling India” and other policy frame works of Higher Education in India? LearnEngg, with visual-rich ICT based technology driven e-learning solution, facilitates developing world class skilled workforce. It virtually brings the industry to the student and thereby strengthen Industry Partnership, making the Students Industry-Ready and hence enhancing employability. Skill development needs to start within the formal courses not as a separate compartment. Hence, we have adapted mix of academic and industry requirements within our product. Leveraging the technological developments, we provide the students to learn the subjects anywhere any time, offering a personalised learning environment. Coupled with the emphasis of promoting Digital India by the Govt of India, our solution is the least-cost model towards capacity building of vital skilled resources, aiming at making India a knowledge super power in the global economy.n

WORLD‘s LARGEST VISUAL RICH e-CONTENT DATABASE for Technical Education

B.E / B.TECH

ITI

POLYTECHIC

SKILL COURSES

75000

VISUALS 2D/3D DEMONTRATIONS Exclusively Developed in last 7 Years

For

225

ENGINEERING COURSES 45 HOURS EACH Delivered by 5000 Learning Objects

CUSTOMIZED PRODUCTS DELIVERED FOR RESPECTIVE UNIVERSITY/BOARD SYLLABUS More than 100,000 user from Anna University, Andhra University, Visvesvaraya Technological University, Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University (Hyderabad, Kakinada & Anantapur), Kerala Technological University and other Technical Courses.

MODE OF DELIVERY On-line / Oﬀ-line

Lenovo 7 inch TAB & USB Disk UK : 6 Capital Business Park, Manor way, Borehamwood WD6 1GW. India : No 61, Developed Plot Estate, Perungudi, Chennai - 600096.

VISIT : WWW.LEARNENGG.COM

Technical Education

Echelon Institute of Technology

ENGINEERING INNOVATIONS The Echelon Institute of Technology, Faridabad, has carved out a niche for itself among the renowned technical institutions, thanks to its focused dedication towards creating a culture of inspiration, exploration and growth. An evaluation

ituated in Delhi’s National Capital Region (NCR), the Echelon Institute of Technology, Faridabad, is a brand name among the comity of technical institutes. Nestled in the sylvan surroundings on Kheri-Manjhawali Road, 20 km from South Delhi, the Institute is spread over a sprawling lush green campus of 17.5 acre. It was established with the vision of “technical leaders engaged in the evolution of life being at the frontiers of continuous technological breakthroughs inspired by ongoing exploration of self, society and nature” in 2007-08. It has scaled great heights both in terms of academics and integrated holistic growth of students with a commitment of being a cause in their evolution as leaders in the society making meaningful contributive creative free choices. The institute has carved out a niche for itself among the renowned technical institutions on account of its focused dedication towards creating a culture of inspiration, exploration and growth as the genesis of spurring hunger to continually delve into the scientific puzzles as the cornerstone of excellence in education. It is equipped with the state-of-the-art infrastructure, highly qualified and experienced faculty, full scale training and placement departments, including in its ambit an Entrepreneurship Cell and a specialised Industry-Institute Partnership Cell and deep mentoring relationship with each and every student. The Institute, with its fundamental tenet of evolutionary partnerships and collaborative creation at its core, with all the stakeholders including faculty, staff, students and the general community around, works through 15 clubs covering all facets of being human to continually explore the world within and without.

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The Institute, with its fundamental tenet of evolutionary partnerships and collaborative creation at its core, works through 15 clubs covering all facets of being human to continually explore the world within and without

It strongly believes that technical breakthroughs in the world outside are only possible with simultaneous evolution as human beings within, altering the very culture we live in. The Echelon Institute was the first institute in Haryana to have been accorded Outcome-based Accreditation by the National Board of Accreditation (NBA) as per Washington Accord & ABET norms. The institute is managed by the community of “The Last Centre”. The Last Centre is a community of spiritual seekers dedicated to “unparalleled service to humanity” through social entrepreneurship. At Echelon, the main focus is on Active and Experiential Learning. The Institute is pioneering the Experiential Engineering Education in the country. It believes that creation is possible only in an impersonalised coming together of all the individuals, with undivided focus on dissolving the challenges and generating the wellbeing of the whole community. n

Echelon Institute of Technology, Faridabad E-mail: eitadmission@gmail.com

Industry Speak Customer Relationship Management or CRM is an indispensable factor for any organisation across any industry which aims to last long and strong to which it caters to. Unfortunately there are not many organisations in the country that caters to this service in a manner which is local in nature in terms of both cost and application. How Simple CRM intends to change the entire landscape of CRM across industries is narrated by

Indraneel Fuke,

founder-director of the company in an exclusive interview with Elets News Network (ENN)

CRM

Simpliﬁed 38

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Tell us about SimpleCRM beyond the information provided in your website. SimpleCRM founders have been involved in global CRM project implementations since 2004. Over the years it became increasingly clear that organisations in Asia require an Enterprise grade CRM at a price point that factored in local economic realities. This led us to launch SimpleCRM product, specifically targeted towards Asian customers. SimpleCRM is a comprehensive, highlyscalable, flexible and cost effective CRM solution for small, medium and large organisations in Asia. What were the hurdles involved while setting up your company? Developing a product that matched the features and benefits of top-tier enterprise CRM solutions like Salesforce. com and Microsoft Dynamics, but at

digitallearning.eletsonline.com

Who are your target consumers? What is your strategy to reach them? SimpleCRM modules are applicable to all sizes of businesses in a variety of industrial sectors. That said, we do have developed verticalized solutions for certain industries, shown as follows: Helpdesk Support Centre CRM

Lead Management CRM CRM

Conﬁgure Price Quote (CPQ) Module

Mobile CRM

Insurance & Banking

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Professional Services

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E-Commerce

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Real Estate

√

Dealers

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Telecom

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SMBs

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Education

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a far lower price point, was both our main value proposition and a challenge. However, we were able to overcome this challenge by tapping into our 15+ years of experience in developing enterprise software for global organisations and leveraging open source technologies to build SimpleCRM product line. This helped us deliver our value proposition, which means we achieved Enterprise grade CRM at a highly attractive price point for Asian organisations.

leads through a wide variety of sources such as, website, social media, calls, chats, emails and others. It also helps run email and SMS campaigns and provide campaign analytics. Mobile CRM App - Mobile app is a great way to be in touch with your customers on the go, even when you do not have net connectivity. It allows easy access to customer data and the ability to make updates which are later synchronised with the main CRM.

What are the major beneﬁts for institutions and individuals adopting your solutions? At a high level, SimpleCRM solution consists of following key modules: Comprehensive Lead Management System - This module allows organisations to track and manage leads, opportunities, accounts, contacts, create quotations and invoices and many other sales related aspects; basically the entire lead to cash cycle. Case Management (Help Desk CRM) System - This module enables an organisation to capture customer complaints, feedback from a variety of sources such as, calls, emails, website and even social media. It also helps manage case escalations and workﬂows. Basically, this empowers the organisations to serve better to their customers resulting in higher customer delight and retention. Partner and Customer Portal Framework - This module extends the reach of traditional CRM and allows other important stakeholders like reseller partners or customers to share information and collaborate with internal teams of an organisation. Marketing Automation System This module helps organisations capture

Who are your competitors?Any strategy to stay ahead in the market? There is competition for all promising business opportunities. Most Indian organisations still do not have a proper CRM system in place and that presents a big opportunity for solution providers, so there is bound to be competition for us as well. However, we believe no other CRM provider is able to match the combination of our Asia market focus, high expertise in delivering CRM projects and a great product at an attractive pricepoint. At this stage of our growth, we do not have any big hurdles as such, but recruitment and retention of good talent continues to be something we need to keep working on. Where do you see your company in the next ﬁve years? SimpleCRM initially began as a customised solution on open source platform for one of the largest ﬁnancial services organisations in Asia. After delivering a successful and scalable solution for 1200+ bank users, SimpleCRM founders decided to further build the product and deliver an enterprise grade, highlyscalable, comprehensive and affordable

—

√

Over the years it became increasingly clear that organisations in Asia require an Enterprise grade CRM at a price point that factored in local economic realities CRM for Asian organisations. Over the last few years, SimpleCRM team has successfully delivered several large-scale deployments in Asia. For example, ecommerce companies like askme.com have 4,500+ of users managing sales, support and operations on SimpleCRM. NGOs like Reliance Foundation are using SimpleCRM for running their PAN India Toll Free Helpline for more than two million rural audience. Life Insurance companies like Union Assurance have decided to roll out SimpleCRM Lead Management System for 4,000+ advisors. On the Education front, SimpleCRM has been selected for providing lead management and help desk solution by premium institutes such as ITM University, Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIM-A) and Orchid International School. Over the next few years, we expect to continue to grow at a fast pace and become number one CRM alternative to salesforce.com or Microsoft CRM for the mid-enterprise & large enterprise market segments in the Asia Paciﬁc.■

digitalLEARNING

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eduTech

Technology in Exams

SCALING NEW FRONTIERS

One of the first instances of high-stake Computer Based Tests (CBT) in the country was seen in 2003 and since then, various exams boards have adopted CBT mainly for their entrance examinations, writes Ravi Panchanadan, Chief Executive Officer, MeritTrac Services

uring the last couple of decades, the world has undergone a massive transformation with increasing impact of technology in almost every aspect of life. The practices we adopted in our lives previously have become obsolete. We are witnessing new methods becoming the norm. In these changing times, education has witnessed a massive transformation in most parts of the world and India is no exception. Universities delivering classes online, thereby negating the limitation of time and space in education delivery, has been a paradigm shift leading to introduction of new scalable models. The evolution of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) is democratising high quality education and making knowledge available for masses. Examinations, a critical aspect determining success of education, have also undergone transformation. One of the first instances of high-stake Computer Based Tests (CBT) in the country was witnessed in 2003 and since then, various exams boards have adopted CBT mainly for their entrance examinations. IIM CAT entrance exam is the one of the first national level high-stake exam that went online in the country. Its initial hiccups had almost stalled the progress made in adoption of Computer Based Tests in India, but the successful comeback it made in 2010 gave confidence for more and more examination boards in the country to adopt Computer Based Tests. In 2010, MeritTrac, along with EDGE and Value Notes organised a study designed to learn views on introduction of technology in examinations. With less than 10 examination bodies having embarked on transformation using technology, it was important to understand the industry’s views on leveraging

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digitalLEARNING

technology in future. The study was administered on the key stakeholders in the education system – exam authorities and students. The study revealed that around 68% of Indian examination bodies had concrete plans to leverage technology in examinations, with specific reference to Computer Based Examinations. The key priorities for these universities were the need to increase the speed of result processing, transparency and security of high-stake examinations whileover 75% student’s perceived transparency as a major benefit. Over 68% of them also believed that computer based tests will offer accurate and timely results. While the major stakeholders were looking forward to the migration, 62% of the respondents had concerns over the availability and quality of infrastructure. Changes over last 5 years Since this research, Indian education system has witnessed a massive migration from paper-based test to CBT. Transformations embarked by some of the large exam bodies have offered confidence for others to follow. Today over 100 examination bodies have migrated their entrance examinations to CBT. While the 2010 MeritTrac research predicted a massive shift, we are all ‘stumped’ by the pace of this transformation. With the recent UGC directive mandating universities to adopt technology for admissions, this number is expected to be increase further. A few factors have led to this fast paced migration: l Changing mind-set – Openness to leverage technology for several high-stake initiatives have given education administrators the confidence todeliver various facets of education also using technology. Examinations was only a logical extension to this.

digitallearning.eletsonline.com

l Improved infrastructure – Today, India is one of the

fastest growing internet markets. The expanse of computer infrastructure to the last mile – villages and other rural areas has fostered the possibility of making computer based exams inclusive. Gone are the days when technology was limited to the geographical boundaries that divided cities from villages. Government’s emphasis on reaching broadband into villages will further enhance the possibilities of computer based exams. l Rise of ‘Digital Natives’ – It is understood that digital natives are natural adopters of technology. The increasing use of mobiles and access to internet have extended the possibilities of computer based exams in the country. Candidates have greater understanding of technology and hence are not flustered in computer labs. l Growing need for transparency & security – With increasing population and stakes, there is a greater demand for improving transparency and security of examinations. It is well accepted that technology could play a critical role in assisting examination bodies in achieving its goal of secure, transparent and high quality examinations. l Technology advancement and reduction in IT costs– Technology is today designed for greater scale and operational efficiencies.With it CBT has become viable for most examination boards. Moreover, its benefits easily outweigh the cost and technology implications. Yet, the use of technology in examinations have till been limited to entrance examinations. Most of the vast majority of other examinations – summative / term-end examinations are still following traditional models exposing itself to inefficiencies and security threats.

Technology for Summative Exams

The next big technology revolution in examinations is OnScreen Marking (OSM), also referred to as ‘Digital Evaluation’. A few large examination boards in the country have already adopted this technology and reaped rich benefits. OSM has allowed examination bodies to enhance quality of evaluation of descriptive answer scripts while making it transparent and secure. They have also succeeded in publishing results faster. Ability of this technology to allow evaluators to evaluate from home also leads to greater convenience for the examination body and its evaluators. This is a technology that has been widely used in most developed countries. The initial success of OSM in India will definitely have a ripple effect in the country. Large and prestigious examination bodies have been looking for solutions that can help make their exams secure, transparent and efficient. One of the biggest challenges with these high-stake exams is that they are vulnerable to risks and frauds. Ensuring security of question paper has been a priority for these examination bodies. Question paper printing, transit and storage

Ravi Panchanadan, Chief Executive Officer, MeritTrac Services

Today over 100 examination bodies have migrated their entrance examinations to Computer Based Tests (CBT). With the recent UGC directive mandating universities to adopt technology for admissions, this number is expected to be increase further have traditionally been vulnerable to leak and exposure. These instances could lead to reputational risks and legal challenges. So, how can technology help these examinations become more secure? Just-in-Time Question Paper (JIT-QP) management – a process of managing question paper security with application of technology, will ensure that question papers are not exposed till the time of examination. The question bank managed by the examination body generates question papers which are accessible at the test centre by ONLY the designated official minutes before the examination. The solution prints the exact number of question papers as required in the centre under surveillance, thereby ensuring its security. This technology coupled with the OSM service has already helped a state university in administering secure exams and speed up turn-around of results. After the successful adoption of CBT, OSM and JIT-QP management are the next big transformations that we will witness in the India. With increased fairness, security, transparency and faster turn-around time, students will be the greatest beneficiaries of this introduction of technology.n

digitalLEARNING

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eduTech

Video-enabled

LEARNING MANAGEMENT SOLUTION

Amit Chowdry, CEO - PeopleLink

There is a tectonic shift in the field of education wherein the conventional methods are being challenged by the technology-led education systems. Educational institutions are using various technological equivalents, like the evolution of VILT (Virtual/ Visual Instructor-led Training) culture, to provide the much-needed differentiation among their peers, writes Amit Chowdry, CEO - PeopleLink

eopleLink’s Video-enabled Learning Management Solution (VeLMS) provides a blended experience of in-class and virtual remote classes with the same impactful and engaging course delivery methods. The Industry has been moving towards the newer trends of providing virtual and technology-led content over the Internet. Offerings like VeLMS being SCORM-compliant ensure a universality in its course / content management along with the capability of integrating a Live Video over web to make learning fun and effective at the same time. “We, at PeopleLink, have created an intuitive experience for the educational institutes called the Video-enabled LMS to connect the learners with trainers in real-time and provide their engaging content along with the option of Live Video to bring realism in the virtual education methods,” says Amit Chowdry, Founder CEO of PeopleLink Unified Communications Pvt Ltd. Experts from the Education vertical have often stressed on the challenges faced by the educational institutes in integrating their classroom digitisation with content management, which generally come from different vendors. The need of the hour is to determine the most appropriate solution provider with a complete product portfolio. PeopleLink has a comprehensive product line of Podiums, Visualisers, Lecturer-tracking Cameras, Classroom Audio setups, along with the state-of-the-art VeLMS, which provides easy User Administration, Universal Content Management, effective and transparent Evaluation Techniques, along with seamless schedulers, feedback and competency reporting features. The country currently is employing methods to have a larger base of skilled manpower for moving towards the eradication of unemployment issues. There are institutions, both private and government initiated, which are starting their individual efforts towards skill development. The key to highest penetration and farthest reach-out can be achieved only by the use of Video. The Government is trending towards having customisable solutions,

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digitalLEARNING

There is a new trend being adopted by universities wherein, they Live Video-stream their important functions, like annual day, convocations or launch ceremonies, to reach out to the larger student community, alumni and parents of the students. We ourselves have been associated with several such institutions like, Integral University (Lucknow), Anand Agriculture University (Gujarat), etc., for their streaming requirements. -Abhishek Pratap Singh, Head-Marketing, PeopleLink which have the flexibility of effective and dynamic content authoring in different languages to have a larger access base. PeopleLink recently implemented one of the largest Video deployments for IIT-Gandhinagar having around 800-port connectivity. The institutions of higher education have been making use of these visual capabilities for conducting much engaging learning sessions virtually. In another of our synchronisations with the institutions, including Veer Bahadur Singh Purvanchal University, Jaunpur, which recently joined the race of firsts in creating virtual classrooms by deploying Video-enabled digital podiums, along with Document Visualisers with capability of conducting Live Lectures with distant and affiliated colleges using PeopleLink Video Collaboration. Not just the educational institutions, but various organisations with training requirements, are adopting the Video-enabled learning solutions for training their students, staff and partners. This not only brings down the cost involved in training but also increases the reach and effectiveness. Institutions have started using these technologies to initiate Distance Education programmes, Rural Education drives, International Courses, etc. Students can use these technologies and content to interact with the best of institutions without the need of travelling and having an access to vast Digital Libraries for accessing content to encourage self-paced learning. n

LE MERIDIEN, NEW DELHI

PARTNERSâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; DIRECTORY

Academia ERP

wes.eletsonline.com

rtner

tner

ner

Partners’ Directory ORGANISER

Elets Technomedia Pvt Ltd CONTACT Stellar IT Park, 7A/7B 5th Flo or, Tower – 2 C-25, Sector 62, Noida 201301 Uttar Pradesh, India www.eletsonline.com

Established in the year 2003, Elets Technomedia is a media company focusing on ICT in governance, education and healthcare sectors. Our mandate is to provide effective information on latest developments in the ICT space. Elets provides an unmatched versatility for working with multiple partners and consultants to mutually share knowledge. It publishes four magazines, namely eGov (www.egovonline. net), eHEALTH (www.ehealthonline.org), digitalLEARNING (www.digitallearning.in) and Banking & Finance Post (bfsi.eletsonline.com), which cater to the segments of governance, healthcare, education and banking & finance sector, respectively. Besides this, the company organises a number of national and international level conferences and exhibitions in the areas it serves. eIndia (www.eindia.net.in), eAsia (www.e-asia. org), World Education Summit (WES) and eWorld Forum (www.eworldforum.net) are some of its ﬂagship event brands.

Skill Devemopment Partner

University Partner

Workshop Partner

Examination Partner

SKILL DEVELOMENT PARTNER

NSDC The National Skill Development Corporation, (NSDC) is a one of its kind Public Private Partnership (PPP) in India. It aims to promote skill development by catalyzing creation of a large number of for-profit Pre vocational institutions. NSDC provides Education Automation Partner School Partner funding to build scalable, for-profit vocational training initiatives. Its mandate is also to enable support systems such as quality assurance, information systems and train the trainer academies either directly or through partnerships. NSDC acts as a catalyst in skill development by providing funding to enterprises, companies and organisations that provide skill training. It will also develop appropriate models to enhance, support and coordinate private sector initiatives. The differentiated focus on the 21 sectors under NSDC’s purview and its understanding of their viability will make every sector Video Enabled Learning Partner Technical University Partner Sector attractive to private investment. CONTACT Block A, Clarion Collection Shaheed Jeet Singh Marg New Delhi 110016, India www.nsdcindia.org

PSU Partner

Sector Skill Council Partners SECTOR SKILL COUNCIL PARTNER

Telecom Sector Skill Council Associate Partners CONTACT 2nd Floor Plot No:- 105, Sector-44 Gurgaon 122003, India www.tsscindia.com

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digitalLEARNING

Established in Jan 2013, TSSC is a not-for-profit organization set up with funding support of NSDC through Ministry of Finance, Government of India and industry associations. In less than two years, TSSC has enrolled over 3.11 lakh candidates and certified 1.50 lakh candidates in various Telecom Job Roles across 33 State and UTs, and 495 cities and towns of India, with active support from TSSC-affiliated 493 Training Partners, 141 Industry Partners, 21 State Government Partners, 485 Academia Partners including 22 Universities and 7 Assessment Partners. TSSC has developed National Occupational Standards for 38 Job Roles and over 100 NoS, which cover close to 70% employment need of the Telecom industry. The training is provided by TSSC Affiliated Training Partner and 3rd Party Assessment done by TSSC-affiliated assessment bodies.

Exhibitors

digitallearning.eletsonline.com

ning Partner

Technical University Partner

Sector Skill Council Partners

SECTOR SKILL COUNCIL PARTNER

Security Sector Skill Development Council Constituted under the National Skill Policy of the Government of India, the Security Sector Skill Development Council (SSSDC), was jointly formed by the Central Association of Private Security Industry and the National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC). As per NSDC’s SSC formation term sheet, top 10 companies of the private security sector, along with representatives from state-based associations, CII, FICCI, Ministry of Defence and MSMEs, were invited to join the Board of Directors. Top 10 guarding companies have extended support to and joined the NSDC initiative. State-based industry associations like Karnataka Security Services Association and Security Association of India also back the initiative. End users of private security services like CII and FICCI joined the Board and extended total support in the Council’s formation.

Associate Partners

CONTACT 305, City Court Sikanderpur MG Road Gurgaon 122002, India www.sssdc.in

PSU PARTNER

EDCIL The Educational Consultants India Limited (EdCIL) was conceived and incorporated Exhibitors as a public sector enterprise by the Government of India in 1981, under the Ministry of

Education & Culture, subsequently reconstituted as the Ministry of Human Resource Development in 1985. Having established its credentials in the education sector for providing quality services at reasonable costs, EdCIL has diversified in other areas of the social sector and has been accepted as a preferred organisation for undertaking consultancy assignments. EdCIL has also been awarded the Prime Minister’s Award of Excellence for the year 1998-99 and is categorised as a ‘Mini Ratna Organisation’ by the Government of India.

CONTACT Ed.CIL House, 18 A Sector 16 A Noida 201301 Uttar Pradesh, India www.edcilindia.co.in

WORKSHOP PARTNER

GL Education GL Education is a leading provider of integrated assessments, stakeholder surveys, self-evaluation systems and professional development services. Its resources and services are used by British, bilingual and international schools in over 100 countries worldwide. For over 30 years, GL Education has provided rigorous and high quality assessments for children’s education, mental health and wellbeing. Originally founded by the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER), which it continues to work with today, its tests are used by over 3 million pupils every year and have delivered over 6 million online tests worldwide. The company’s extensive portfolio of print-based and online tests assess children’s progress in literacy, ability and numeracy, and identify a range of special educational needs. Its most popular assessments include the Cognitive Abilities Test (CAT), Progress in English (PiE), Progress in Maths (PiM) and New Group Reading Test (NGRT) series.

CONTACT GL Education Group 9th Floor East, 3 89 Chiswick High Road London UK W4J www.gl-education.com

digitalLEARNING

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Partners’ Directory EXAMINATION PARTNER

MeritTrac CONTACT Market Square No.12/5, 4th ﬂoor Kaikondarahalli Varthur Hobli Sarjapur Main Road Bangalore 560035 Karnataka, India www.merittrac.com

Skill Devemopment Partner

MeritTrac is India’s largest pure play Testing & Assessment services company in the private sector. It provides innovative assessment services to leading educational institutions, government organizations and corporate entities. Over the past 16 years, MeritTrac has garnered significant expertise in Test Research, Test Development, and Test Delivery and Administration for computer-based as well as paper based tests. Leveraging its rich experience and robust technology framework, MeritTrac has streamlined the examination process for a number of Leading government bodies, educational institutions, examination boards, universities, and corporates. With a wide range of best of breed offerings, MeritTrac has successfully helped organizations automate the examination processes - from application form processing to test administration, including candidate authentication and digital evaluation of answer scripts.

Workshop Partner

Education Automation Partner

Examination Partner

Pre School Partner

EDUCATION AUTOMATION PARTNER

CONTACT 505/506, Powai Plaza, Hiranandani Gardens, Powai Mumbai 400076, India www.orioninc.com

Orion Systems Integrators, LLC With a global footprint and over 1,300 technology professionals in four continents, Orion designs, develops, integrates, deploys and manages IT services and solutions for leading financial, telecom, pharmaceutical, education, and government organisations across the globe. The company provides a full range of IT solutions, including Cloud Solutions, Data Analytics and Business Intelligence, Enterprise Solutions, Workshop Partner Skill Devemopment Partner Custom Application Development Services to Fortune 1,000, mid-market and fast growing clients. The company capitalises on its strength of delivery excellence and core competencies including decades of IT services experience, ﬂexible and unique engagement models, deep domain and delivery expertise, proprietary tools and frameworks, technology alliances and a global reach to be a proven business partner for clients. Headquartered in New Jersey, USA, it has additional offices across the US, India, Canada, Germany and Chile.

Video Enabled Learning Partner Organiser

Education Partner

Technical University Partner

Secto

Associate Partners

Education Automation Partner

EDUCATION PARTNER

Eurokidz CONTACT EuroKids International Private Ltd Dani Corporate Park, 1st Floor, 158, Vidyanagari Marg, Kalina, Santacruz (East), Mumbai, India www.eurokidsindia.com

School Partner

EuroKids International is one of India’s leading education services providers in the Pre-School segment, specializing in early childhood education. Launched in 2001, Video Enabled Learning Partner Technical EuroKids has raised the bar of Pre-School education in the country with its innovative approach of offering an integrated curriculum that initiates holistic development right from the early age. EuroKids runs 900+ pre-schools in over 350+ cities in India and has won more than 16 awards, which are testimony of the unique training methodology coupled with new-age tools to benefit the gen-next learners.

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digitalLEARNING

digitallearning.eletsonline.com

UNIVERSITY PARTNER

Canadian University Dubai Canadian University Dubai was established in 2006 to deliver high-quality undergraduate and graduate education in the UAE and provide a gateway for students to pursue higher education opportunities in Canada. CUD is located in the heart of Dubai and our academic programs are based on Canadian curriculum and education principles. All programs are accredited by the UAE Ministry of Higher Education, and as a portal to Canadian higher education, we offer unique options to students to continue their studies or research in Canada. Students are taught by world-class faculties, who are academic specialists and active researchers in their respective fields with degrees from renowned global universities. We offer ﬂexible learning schedules for both undergraduate and graduate programs. With over 100 different nationalities, our diverse student community is building bridge across cultures and continents.

TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY PARTNER

Gujarat Technological University Gujarat Technological University is a relatively new technology university, established by the Government of Gujarat. The University caters to the entire field of Engineering, Pharmacy, Business Studies (MBA programs) and Computer Applications (MCA) in Gujarat. Today the University has about 4, 50,000 students, a large number of Master’s programs and a robust doctoral program. It has 583 colleges affiliated to it. Today it is the largest university in Gujarat. GTU Innovation Council is the most active innovation council in the country. Every year for the last three years, it has sent 50,000 students to the industries during the summer. About 50 industry leaders are members of 25 of its regional committees (called GTU Innovation Sankul Committees) and work jointly with Principals/ Directors of Colleges/ Institutes for enhancing the industry-institute interaction.

CONTACT 1st Interchange SZR Dubai UAE PO Box: 117781 www.cud.ac.ae

Gujarat

Organiser Technological Skill Dev University

CONTACT Sabarmati-Koba Highway, Nr. Visat Three Roads, (Campus of Vishwakarma Government Engg. College IIT Gandhinagar), Chandkheda, Ahmedabad 382424, Gujarat, India www.gtu.ac.in

Education Partner

Educat

Vide

School Partner

SCHOOL PARTNER

Seth Anandram Jaipuria School Weaving success through excellence for over a decade, Seth Anandram Jaipuria School, Vasundhara, Ghaziabad is embellished with a robust and state-of-the-art infrastructure conducive for a harmonious integration of heart, body mind and spirit. Located in the heart of Vasundhara, with a sprawling 5 acre campus, the school has become a benchmark for latest innovations in technology under the mentorship of Principalcum-Director Mrs. Manju Rana. The school has today positioned itself as one of the premium institutions of NCR with a strength of 4,600+ students from Nursery to K-12, offering the three progressive streams – Science, Commerce and Humanities. The philosophy of the school, ‘Empower, Enthuse & Excel’, is dedicated to keep the ﬂame of knowledge ablaze.

CONTACT Sector 14, Vasundhara, Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh 201012, India www.jaipuria.edu.in

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Partners’ Directory

Partner

Pre School Partner PRE SCHOOL PARTNER

Brats n Cutties

op Partner

At Brats n Cuties, we endeavor to create corridors of open learning that nurtures each child with unwavering Indian values coalesced with an International outlook. The school was conceptualised in Nov 2006 and got into operations in July 2008. In these 18 months, lots of hard work was put in by curriculum designers, child psychologists and top-end educationists to develop a unique curriculum and implement it in our model school. We now have expanded to 20 branches across India. The Group has been active in education industry since 1991 and the areas ventured in education segment are Pre-Schools, K-12, schools and professional studies. Brats n Cuties, the pioneer in structured nursery education, has a vast reservoir of experienced staff that has moulded thousands of little children into successful individuals.

Examination Partner

CONTACT Brats n Cuties HITS Bhawan Sector-11 Adjacent Pocket-2 DDA Flats, Dwarka New Delhi 110075, India www.bratsandcuties.com

ning Partner

University Partner

Technical University Partner

Sector

PSU Partner

Pre School Partner PRE SCHOOL PARTNER

Sanfort

The U. K. Concept Preschool Chain is a brainchild of husband-wife duo Mr. S. Associate Partners K.Rathor & Mrs. Kavita Rathor. They started their first preschool in 1999 and launched CONTACT SAR Edutech Limited1514/1 Sector-5, Vasundhra Ghaziabad Uttar Pradesh, India www.sanfortschools.com

their preschool brand SANFORT in December 2009. The innovative curriculum and successfully running branches made SANFORT popular, and in a small span of fiveand-a-half years, we have 41 branches in Delhi-NCR and nearly 90 branches across the country. SANFORT aims to offer quality education to children to help them grow in a harmonious environment resulting in their all-round development. The first and foremost thing about SANFORT is its innovative curriculum, which is, accredited to “British Association of Early Childhood Education” – U.K. and SANFORT are also a member of “Preschool Learning Alliance”.

Technical University Partner

e Partners

PRE SCHOOL PARTNER

Smartkidz

CONTACT Plot # 97, Phase 1 Gunrock Enclave Near Mudford Secunderabad 500009 Andhra Pradesh, India www.smartkidzindia.com

SMARTKiDZ is a rapidly growing chain of Preschools started in the year 2008 with 10 centres in the first year. Currently smartkidz has 260+ Centres spread across Pan India. Being inspired by Waldorf and Montessori methodology, the course curriculum and syllabus is being designed to ensure that children learn efficiently in a caring and friendly environment where equal consideration is given to Social, Physical, Emotional, Spiritual and Intellectual development and where children are well equipped to meet the challenges ahead. Smartkidz also conducts in-house Teacher Training Programs for teachers in all branches and has trained over 8000 teachers so far.

Exhibitors

48 xhibitors

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Sector Skill Council Partners

digitalLEARNING

digitallearning.eletsonline.com

VIDEO ENABLED LEARNING PARTNER

PeopleLink Founded in 2007, PeopleLink has emerged as India’s first ISO 9001-2008 certified Video Conference Company. It has marked an exponential 108% growth Y-o-Y from the past 5 years. A pioneer of modern video technology, PeopleLink, after accomplishing its pan India coverage is now expanding its Global operations. Its range of offerings includes next generation Video technology and Audio Video peripherals across a wide range of focused industry verticals. PeopleLink shall be showcasing their strong presence in the Education Vertical. PeopleLink Learning Management System (LMS) is a browser based collaboration platform powered by PeopleLink’s InstaVC architecture.

CONTACT A3-Q3, 10th Floor, Cyber Towers, Hitech City, Madhapur, Hyderabad 500081, India www.peoplelinkvc.com

ASSOCIATE PARTNER

COM-SUR It’s better to audit CCTV or suffer. CCTV isn’t enough. It’s bitter truth that crime and process violation continues despite CCTV. World’s first CCTV auditing and incident reporting system COM-SUR makes it possible to – 1. Audit (review) hours of CCTV within minutes. Auditing CCTV as a SOP helps users discover exceptions missed by most VMS/Video Analytics like: Pilferage/theft/insider job, sleeping security guards, recce housekeeping/safety issues and others can be discovered with human analytics. 2. Smartly backup CCTV in the form of screenshots at remote locations 3. Creating standardised intelligent incident reports to solve crime faster. COM-SUR helps get valuable outcomes from CCTV -- Crime and loss prevention, improvement of processes and sales and solving crime faster.

CONTACT Hayagriva Software Pvt Ltd, Solitaire Building, 1st Floor Above Bank of India, Opp Asha Parekh Hospital, S.V Road Santa Cruz (WEST) Mumbai 400054 Maharashtra, India www.comsur.biz

ASSOCIATE PARTNER

Educomp Educomp is the largest Education Company in India and the only company spread across the entire education ecosystem. From schools to skills; over last two decades. Educomp group has empowered over 30 million learners and educators across over 65,000 schools to imagine, think and create a better future. Our presence in each of the education verticals is marked with technology-enabled products, high quality people, structured processes and entrepreneurial leadership, that come together to deliver unmatched value. From pre-school toddlers, from core curriculum subjects at the school level to vocational and employability skills for young adults; Educomp reaches out to the entire education life cycle. Educomp works with India’s largest K12 content library with over 20,000 modules of rich 3D multimedia educational content and has reached out to over six million students across 10,000 private schools and 17.5 million students across 35000 government schools. Besides this in our network are 350 Little Millennium pre-schools, 47 brick and mortar K12 schools, and 63 Test Prep centers.

CONTACT Educomp Towers, 514, Udyog Vihar Phase III Gurgaon 122001, India www.educomp.com

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Partners’ Directory ASSOCIATE PARTNER

Echelon Institutes of Technology CONTACT Kabulpur Jasana-Manjhawali Road Naharpar, Faridabad Haryana 121101, India www.eitfaridabad.com

Situated in Delhi NCR, Echelon Institute of Technology, Faridabad is a brand name among the comity of technical institutes. The Institute was founded in 2007 and in a short span of eight years it has scaled great heights both in the academics and co-curricular activities and carved out a niche for itself among the renowned technical institutions. The Institute is approved by AICTE, Directorate of Technical Education, Haryana and affiliated to M.D. University, Rohtak. Focus on Active and Experiential Learning Echelon believes that knowledge results from the combination of grasping and transforming experiences. Therefore, Echelon focuses on the three learning domains referred to as Knowledge, Skills and Experience (KSE) and ensures that students do more and gather experience than just listen. In Echelon, learning tasks require active participation of the student in handsonopportunities which connects the content to the student’s life.

ASSOCIATE PARTNER CONTACT 2nd Floor, Siddhivinayak Arcade, Akurli Cross Road No.1, Near Kandivali East Station (Fatak), Kandivali East, Mumbai 400101, India www.hikvisionindia.co.in

Logo normal

Hikvision Hikvision uses its state-of-the-art manufacturing facilities to design and develop innovative CCTV and video surveillance products. Hikvision’s complete product suite includes Smart IP cameras, HD analog cameras, speed domes, NVRs, DVRs, video management software, access control and alarm systems, encoders, decoders, and other elements of sophisticated security systems. Hikvision products serve vertical markets including retail, banking and finance, transportation, education, commercial, government, and residential applications. Hikvision is the world’s leading supplier of video surveillance products and solutions according to IHS Inc.’s 2016 report — the fifth consecutive year that Hikvision has topped the list. Hikvision plays an active role in video surveillance market, devoting 8% of its annual revenue to research and development for continued product innovation. It has over 7,000 engineers, including over 2,000 software engineers. Logo 72 DPI

ASSOCIATE PARTNER Logo 150 DPI

LearnEngg CONTACT No 61 plot, Industrial Research Development Company Industrial Estate Perungudi, Chennai Tamil Nadu 600096, India www.infoplus.co.in

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digitalLEARNING

Started in UK in 1999 but launched in India in 2005, the Infoplus Technologies primarily focuses on latest innovative technologies for enriching education and skill development for the Human Resource Sector and Industry, on ERP implementations and support services for Major ERPs like SAP, Oracle etc. Infoplus has completed over 100 medium and large projects for Fortune 200 companies across Europe. Visual Rich e-Learning Solution LearnEngg-an interactive visual-rich accelerated learning and teaching aid, embedded with real-world applications on-screen for better grasp of engineering fundamentals, principles and concepts, covering all disciplines of technical education and skill development. LearnEngg is ICT based contents have been developed for Graduate Engineering Program, Polytechnic Diploma, ITI Trades and Skill Development courses. Course contents are provided with depth of 2D/3D demonstrations.

digitallearning.eletsonline.com

ASSOCIATE PARTNER

Konika Minolta Started in 2010, Konica Minolta India is recognised as best subsidiary within Konica Minolta worldwide. With 2000+ Digital Press, 1500 + Digital Production Press , 100 + C8000 Colour Press and 45,000 + A3 office MFP’s installations so far, it is the leader in Production Printer industry . On the advent of 2016, it added another vertical in business educoERP, an ERP solution platform specifically designed for institutes, teachers, parents and students. educo ERP promises to bring a refreshing change in the field of education ERP and management systems and set high benchmarks to empower an educational institution as a speedy, enabling and user friendly hub for efficiently delivering humane education. educo ERP brings each and everyone on the same platform with an easy and customizable interface and can be used by anyone at anytime easily.

CONTACT Building No. 8, Tower-C 10th Floor DLF Cyber City, Phase -2 Gurgaon 122001, India www.konicaminolta.com

ASSOCIATE PARTNER

LearnOn Technology Solutions LearnOn Technology Solutions, which develops revolutionary EdTech solutions to enable teachers bridge students’ learning gaps, prepares students for the 21st century with effective parental engagement. Headquartered in Chennai, its team focuses on making a difference in the K12 segment. LearnOn equips educators with technology solutions. It enables them to provide personalised attention to students, helping them unlock latent talent. Through path-breaking technology solutions and products, LearnOn aims to transform usage of technology in the K12 school segment, providing a differentiated learning experience without disrupting existing pedagogy. It’s a subsidiary of the JMR Infotech group, a leading IT solutions provider, with proven expertise in banking, financial services and insurance domain. With 400+ IT experts serving 120 customers in 5 continents, JMR Infotech enjoys a global presence.

CONTACT Siruseri IT Park - Project Office, First Cross Rd, Siruseri Tamil Nadu 603103, India www.learnonsolutions.com

ASSOCIATE PARTNER

Mahendras Mahendra Education Pvt. Ltd. (MEPL) is India’s leading organisation for Competitive Exams with pan- India presence. Having its roots since 1994, Mahendra has become a center of excellence in guiding students through various competitive exams. Mahendra Skills Training & Development Pvt Ltd (MSTDPL) is the recent addition in Mahendra Family majorly focusing on various skill development initiatives. The organisation is having own branches network of 136 branches and 10 administrative offices in 23 states, 115 cities and student pool of approx. 500,000 graduates majorly of Tier B & Tier C Cities. Mahendra does Pre Recruitment Trainings/Pre Promotional training for almost all Public Sector Banks, Insurance companies and being training partner with various government institutions like UPSDM, SUDA, Ministry of Minority Affairs etc. have successfully completed various skill development projects.

CONTACT Mahendra Education Pvt. Ltd., 101-104, Pragati Deep Building, Plot No.8 District Centre Laxminagar Delhi 110092, India www.mahendras.org

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Partners’ Directory ASSOCIATE PARTNER

Nischal's

Workshop Partner

ner

Examination Partner

CONTACT 5th Floor Varun Towers 1, Begumpet Hyderabad, Telangana 500 016, India www.nsls.in

University Partner

Nischal’s Smart Learning Solutions Pvt. Ltd. (nischals), the ISO certified, NCERT empanelled international company, aims to simplify education system. With a variety of perfectly blended, innovative, academic product mix that makes teaching and learning a rewarding experience, the company was founded to improve children’s ability to grasp, apply and retain concepts forever. It equips students with educational products that are smart, safe, engaging, and provide hands-on practical knowledge. This refines their critical thinking skills, fosters creativity, hones systematic reasoning abilities and unlocks innate potential. It offers a comprehensive solution to inculcate activity-based learning, as per latest curriculum. The company’s products are currently being used by over 200,000 schools from Jammu-Kashmir to Andaman and Nicobar islands. They are suitable for CBSE, ICSE, IGCSE, IB and any State Board.

PSU Partner

Pre School Partner

ASSOCIATE PARTNER

Technical University Partner

Sector Skill Council Partners

Pearson

CONTACT 7th Floor, Knowledge Boulevard A-8 (A), Sector - 62, Noida 201309 Uttar Pradesh, India www.pearson.com

sociate Partners

Pearson is the world’s learning company, with 40,000 employees in more than 70 countries. From schooling, test preparation, higher education, professional qualifications to the vocational education, Pearson’s publications, curriculum materials, multimedia learning tools, testing and assessment programmes and integrated services help people of all ages make measurable progress in their lives through learning. In India and globally, Pearson’s work spans through three core verticals – a) K-12, b) Higher education and test preparation and c) Vocational (and professional) education. Established in India since 1998, Pearson has introduced a wide range of products and services in the top-notch educational institutes as well as directly to the learners.

ASSOCIATE PARTNER

Radius Systems Pvt. Ltd CONTACT 274, Ground Floor Sant Nagar, East of Kailash New Delhi 110065, India www.radiussystems.net

Exhibitors

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digitalLEARNING

Radius Systems Pvt. Ltd. started operations in 1997 with a vision to provide hardware and software solutions to the ever-growing technology market in India. Initially, providing quality sales and excellent after sales services to the publishing industry Radius today has a client base in all aspects of the Industry. With the brand name of APPLE, XEROX and HP, all Global giants, as its technology partners, the company has grown to 100 million in a decade. The company today provides IT services and solutions for a variety of industry verticals including education, design and print, government, manufacturing and retail.

digitallearning.eletsonline.com

ASSOCIATE PARTNER

School Partner

Video Enabled Lear

Robomate+ Developed by experienced teachers, Robomate+, a curriculum-based study app, makes studying easy, simplifying the most complex chapters of the curriculum. Even the question bank is created from simple to complex, strengthening students’ confidence. The audio-visual design of the Robomate+ makes the content cohesive, helping more interaction and participation of students in classrooms. Robomate+ has several components that make it a must for students. It understands student’s mindset; where curriculum may look tough or challenging to comprehend. It anticipates doubts and displays it as a thought bubble. When the audio-visual content is recorded within a classroom environment and a teacher in consideration, it gets easier for students to revise just before exams or learn anytime, anywhere. Robomate+ is an educational technology platform, working on students’ enablement, teacher’s empowerment and parents’ satisfaction.

CONTACT Office No. 220, 2nd Floor, Neptune’s Flying Colors, Near Check Naka Bus Depot, L.B.S Cross Road, Mulund (W), Mumbai 400080, India www.robomateplus.com

ASSOCIATE PARTNER

Xiphias Software Technologies Ltd XIPHIAS Software Technologies, a leading technology provider since 2005, offers a vast portfolio of innovative products and services in hardware and software division. Claiming being India’s No 1 interactive KIOSK manufacturer and application provider, it offers a sophisticated range of customised kiosks within industry standards and specifications.” The core business focuses on providing an end to end solution product; by developing various software packages in-house and integrating them with a variety of kiosks systems. It also develops ERP and CRM solutions for various industry verticals like education, government, healthcare, energy, retail, rural development. Its latest offering is a state-of-art school automation system (A.T.S.I) engineered to be the best ERP solution to handle student information. It has worked on over 5,000 websites, reﬂecting expertise in creating a winning corporate presence on the internet.

EXHIBITOR

BiBox

CONTACT 8th Floor, B.M.T.C / T.T.M.C Building, 6th Block, Koramangala, Bangalore 560095, India www.xiphiastec.com

Academia ERP

Bibox is an education startup, Govt. of India, Dept. of Science and Technology seed funded company from Bangalore, working towards improving Innovation Quotient, Scientific Temper and Entrepreneurship among students. Associated with over 70 schools and 30,000 students enrolled for an integrated BIBOX Innovation programme as a part of their curriculum, BIBOX is a comprehensive platform of a hardware and software which can help a child in bringing imagination to a reality. For Schools, it has designed a unique programme, considering needs of the 21st century students, that combines the best new age education methodologies accepted worldwide including like 21st Century Learning (4 C’s), STEAM, Design Thinking and Challenge Based Learning (pedagogic approach for K-12 education pioneered by Apple Inc.)

CONTACT Evobi Automations Private Limited 1st Floor, Pixel Park ‘A’, PESIT Bangalore South Campus Hosur Road, Bangalore 560100, India www.bibox.in

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rtner

Technical University Partner Organiser

Sector Skill Council Partners

Skill Devemopment Partner

Partners’ Directory

Associate Partners Education Partner

Workshop Partner

Examin

EXHIBITOR

Education Automation Partner

Cambridge International Examination

CONTACT 1 Hills Rd Cambridge CB1 2EU United Kingdom www.cie.org.uk

School Partner

Exhibitors

Pre School Pa

Cambridge International Examinations is a part of Cambridge Assessment, a department of the University of Cambridge. It prepares students for life, helping them develop an informed curiosity and a lasting passion for learning. It is the world’s largest provider of Video Enabled Partner international educationLearning programmes and qualifications for Technical 5-19 year olds. ItsUniversity programmes and qualifications set the global standard for international education. They are created by subject experts, rooted in academic rigour and reﬂect the latest educational research. They provide a strong platform for learners to progress from one stage to the next. Its international qualifications such as Cambridge IGCSE, Cambridge International AS & A Level are recognised by universities and employers worldwide and open doors for Cambridge learners. It also offers Cambridge Professional Development Qualifications for teachers and trainers.

Associate Partners EXHIBITOR

CONTACT Pitampura, PP-6, 3rd Floor Gopal Mandir Road Opp to Easy Day, Pitampura Delhi 110034, India www.eduliftapp.in

Edulift ICA Edu Skill, a leading skill and education company in existence for 17 years, believes education needs not be hard and expensive without being boring. EDULIFT an ICA initiative aims to facilitate our skill and education ecosystem with bouquet of mobile enabled EdTech products centering on education industry. It will connect these products to school, colleges, VTPs and university and tutorial centers in every district which will provide solutions related to training, assessment, management, sports and health of these institutions. Edulift will have an associate at every district who will bring technology enabled products to schools, colleges, VTPs, tutorials and other institutions in the field of education, skill and training.

Exhibitors

Academia ERP

EXHIBITOR

CONTACT #5, Yashwant Ghadgenagar, Near E-Square,, Range Hill Road, Yashwant nagar, Ashok Nagar, Pune, Maharashtra 411007, India www.feecounter.com

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digitalLEARNING

Feecounter FeeCounter is revolutionizing the way educational applications are processed and fees are collected online. Having joined Searce Group in October 2013, it has registered almost 15 times growth in transactions. Searce is a cloud and analytics led business transformation company focused on futurifying businesses across North America, Asia Pacific and Europe. Searce is one of Google’s premier partners in India and promotes Google for work offerings that enable enterprises ride the cloud. Searce has delivered business process improvement leveraging cloud & analytics for 1,000+ customers, including the largest as well as the fastest growing tech startups in India. Searce’s customer base includes some of the largest names in retail and e-commerce, taxi and food-tech, technology, media and advertising, manufacturing, healthcare and pharma.

Part

Education Partner

Education Automation Partne digitallearning.eletsonline.com

ciate Partners

Exhibitors

EXHIBITOR

Fidel Softech

School Partner

Fidel Softech is an IT solutions and localisation company with a special focus on IOT, Fintech and multilingual localisation. With offices in India and Japan, it is working with some most reputed global and local organisations, helping them to meet business objectives. myRashak is an IOT based initiative of Fidel used by many schools to track school buses’ location and keep parents informed about their wards on smart phones. Today myRakshak is used by over 20,000 students across multiple schools, assuring peace of mind for parents. Fidel Localization services (FiLoSe) offers localization and translation services of different content types into multiple(100+) languages. CSA industry research report for 2016 has recognised FiLoSe as one of the fastest growing companies in Asia in the field of translation and localisation.

Video Enabled Learning P CONTACT #5, Yashwant Ghadgenagar, Near E-Square, Range Hill Road, Yashwant nagar, Ashok Nagar, Pune, Maharashtra 411007, India www.fideltech.com

Exhibitors EXHIBITOR

fitness365 Fitness365, India’s first structured, class and age-appropriate Sports, Health and Physical Education (SHAPE365) programme for schools, helps build active schools across the country by empowering children from nursery to Class XII to adopt a physically active lifestyle and be leaders of tomorrow. It has been conceptualised by professionals with extensive experience in major international multi-sporting events like 2010 Commonwealth Games, Olympics and other multi-sporting international events and education from BITS Pilani, LNUPE, XLRI, IIMC and IIMs. Fitness365’s Assessment, Intervention and Monitoring programme revolves around participation and performance of children in schools in these activities: Progressive Curriculum and Physical Activities delivered by Trained Coaches and PE Teachers.

CONTACT 19 (FF), H.B.Colony, Sec-15 Part-2, Jharsa Road, Gurgaon 122001, India www.fitness365.me

Academia ERP

EXHIBITOR

Huawei Huawei is a global leader of ICT solutions. Continuously innovating based on customer needs, it is committed to enhancing customer experiences and creating maximum value for telecom carriers, enterprises and consumers. Its telecom network, equipment, IT products and solutions, and smart devices are used in 170 countries and regions. By leveraging its strong R&D capabilities, Huawei’s strategy in the enterprise domain focuses on close cooperation and integration with partners to deliver a wide range of customer-centric ICT solutions and services. Huawei offers a broad portfolio of innovative ICT solutions that cater to global vertical industry and enterprise customers across government and public sector, finance, transportation, energy, large enterprises and SMEs. The portfolio covers enterprise networking, Unified Communications & Collaboration, cloud computing & data center, enterprise wireless, network energy and infrastructure services.

CONTACT 12th Floor, Tower C Unitech Cyber Park Sector-39, Gurgaon Haryana 122002, India www.huawei.com

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Partners’ Directory Associate Partners

EXHIBITOR

KONVERV CONTACT Marvel Fria, F103 Wagholi pune 412207, India www.konverv.com

Exhibitors

Konverv is India’s leading ed-tech company with presence in Australia, New Zealand, UK and the USA. It has over 100 customers including schools, pre-schools and colleges. Konverv takes care of entire IT and Digital Marketing needs. The company launches one’s mobile apps in Google and Apple app stores for only Rs. 5 / student / month. One gets a complete ERP at the same price. Konverv also offers a school bus tracking solution called ‘Kon-Track’, that helps parents see real-time bus location and estimated time of arrival of the bus. Konverv can be contacted for a 30-day free trial. It also designs new websites or re-design existing websites for Rs.10,000. The company’s websites are mobile-friendly and have a chat and online admission features.

EXHIBITOR

Manipal Integrated Services CONTACT Golden Enclave, B-1, 3rd Floor, Old Airport Road, Bangalore 560 017, India www.manipalis.in

Manipal Integrated Services (MIS), a part of Manipal Education and Medical Group provides integrated facility management services to its esteemed clients across India and overseas. MIS builds, owns and operates premium student hostels for educational institutions, under the brand Yoho. The Integrated facility management vertical Golden Star offers services in housekeeping, engineering and all other allied facility management services. Chef on wheels offering premium yet affordable catering and F&amp;B services and MES that provides security services. MIS is therefore a one stop shop for integrated services. We are a leading name in the market since 2004 and has made its mark visible in all the verticals that it operates in. Over the years, the company’s service offerings have expanded and so has its clientele. We are ‘redefining service’ from an intangible commodity to a delightful experience by orchestrating the appropriate level of resources that changes the way consumers are served.

EXHIBITOR

MKT Software CONTACT MKT Softwares (P) Ltd 605, Software Technology Park A-1/4, UPSIDC, Lakhanpur Kanpur 208024, India www.mktsoftwares.com

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digitalLEARNING

MKT Softwares, one of the leading providers of IT consulting and implementation services to some of the finest organisations, offers complete end-to-end solutions for technology driven business transformation initiatives. These provide solutions for a dynamic environment where business and technology strategies converge. The company focuses on new ways of business combining IT innovation and adoption while also leveraging an organisation’s current IT assets. Aware of the contribution of institutes and other educational institutions in shaping children’s future, MKT has come up with integrated Institute management software for educational institutions called ESIM CAMPUS SOLUTION. The Institute Management Software helps to connect daily operations in educational institution’s environment ranging from admissions and registration to finance, faculty, and time table management, ESIM CAMPUS SOLUTION is affordable and scalable Institute management software.

digitallearning.eletsonline.com

myly

EXHIBITOR

Myly

Connect | Engage | Learn Myly provides complete ecosystem for all stakeholders of the school learning system to connect, communicate and transact. It provides mobile app and web panel for teachers The most trusted Mobile App Solution CONTACT and school admin, while providing for an easy to use mobile app for parents. With its F-44, Nandpuri Students Extension & Parents connecting Educators, modular approach, myly provides optional ERP modules which can be subscribed Swez Farm, Nandpuri to as needed. myly combines these ERP features with next generational mobile app Jaipur-302006, Rajasthan, India technology to provide schools an integrated approach for school management and www.mylyapp.com Academia communication management. myly is a part of EduCommerce Technologies Private ERP Limited, which is founded with a vision to become market leader in cloud based technology platform for institution management, communication and transaction.

EXHIBITOR

Naesys Dimensions Solution

FREE FOR

Naesys Dimensions Solution Private Limited (Naesys) has come a longSchool way in| College terms | University CONTACT | Coaching center | Tuition center | Hobby class of showing maturity to implement solutions, aimed at solving the complex and mis293, Kehar Singh Estate sion critical problems. From a large and complex multi-location Enterprise Resource 3rd Floor, Westend Marg Planning (ERP) and Enterprise Document Management System (DMS) implementaNew Delhi 110030, India Fees paymen Homework, Attendance Share calender Share images tion to a security and surveillance solution, specifically designed for Bidirectional city surveillance, www.naesys.com Assignment by credit/deb notification and videos and & event messaging & Notices card & walle on absence promote events notification for students traffic management and transport industry, we have served customers from diverse business background. Naesys has shown a high-level of technical ability to secure the Sign-up for FREE at extremely confidential and critical data of the government, defense, BFSI customers from direct attacks or a zero day attack. It has perfected our solutions to cater to our customer’s mission critical problems with the optimum ROI with less complexity. A P P

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www.mylyapp.com

EXHIBITOR

NextEducation Next Education, a pioneer in the K–12 education segment, offers a series of products and services to make education an effective process. Its solutions assist millions of students to acquire relevant skills and knowledge. Its technology-based K–12 solutions such as TeachNext, LearnNext, MathLab, ScienceLab are used by over 2,00,000 teachers and 10 million students across 10,000+ schools. Next Education covers syllabi of CBSE, ICSE and 29 State Boards, in seven Indian languages. Since 2007, Next Education’s curriculum and pedagogical solutions and services have been wellreceived nationally and internationally. Next Education is present in all aspects of K–12 education. Its USP lies in extensive research and development for its products. CCE compliant content, technically-advanced 2D/3D animation, Linux-based operating systems and remote operable systems are its key strengths.

CONTACT A-17, 3rd Floor, Near Rajnigandha Chowk Sector 4, Noida 201301 Uttar Pradesh, India www.nexteducation.com

digitalLEARNING

JULY - AUGUST 2016

Partners’ Directory EXHIBITOR

NRDC CONTACT Ministry of Science & Technology, Govt. of India 20-22, Zamroodhpur Community Centre, Kailash Colony Extn. New Delhi - 110048, India www.nrdcindia.com

National Research Development Corporation (NRDC), a Government of India Enterprise, was established in 1953 as a non-dividend disbursing company to develop, promote and transfer / commercialise IPRs emanating from various national R and D institutions/ universities/PSUs. It offers its IPR and Technology Transfer services nearly across all industry verticals in translating innovative research into marketable industrial products / processes and services. NRDC has repository of over 2,500 Indian technologies, filed about 1,700 patents and signed about 5,000 technology licensing agreements in different sectors in India and abroad developed by various CSIR, ICAR, ICMR, DRDO, IITs/ Universities, PSUs, DST, DBT, etc. and gained rich experience in IPRs and Technology Transfer. NRDC is the oldest and largest technology transfer organisation in the country.

EXHIBITOR

Open Door CONTACT Hatch101, Plot 54B Sector 18 Gurgaon 122015, India www.opendooreducation.in

Open Door is the result of years of teaching and research by IIT alumni on how children learn. Open Door aims at developing the habit of ‘learning by understanding’ among school children. Its product ‘Mastery Assessments’ helps teachers make children think and find more depths to learn science and mathematics. Through repeated assessments and pin-pointed feedback, Open Door helps teachers guide their children towards mastery. Over 20,000 children in 40+ schools across India are currently being benefited from Open Door’s system of assessments.

EXHIBITOR

CONTACT BCG Tower, Opp. CSEZ, Seaport Airport Road, Kakkanad, Kochi 682037, India www.orell.ae

JULY - AUGUST 2016

digitalLEARNING

Oréll Technosystems (India) Private Limited Oréll Technosystems (India) Private Limited is a vibrant IT company, offering innovative, advanced and world-class software solutions in Language Learning (Digital Language Lab), Campus and School Management and Digital Library. Orell Digital Language Lab – iTell is the most preferred digital language lab in India with successful installations at over 3,500 prestigious educational organisations in more than 40 countries. Oréll, with their corporate offices and development centres in Cochin and regional offices in all metro cities in India, are committed to offering superior software solutions and excellent customer services to the educational domain worldwide.

digitallearning.eletsonline.com

EXHIBITOR

Pearson Vue Helping to improve people’s lives through admissions testing and professional certification is Pearson VUE’s mission. Its customers’ credentials help people advance in technology, government and professional careers. One can visit hthiketps://india. pearsonvue.com/ to explore how its testing experts develop, manage, deliver and grow one’s testing programme.

Organiser CONTACT Ground Floor, SB Tower 1A/1, Sector 16A Noida 201301 Uttar Pradesh, India www.home.pearsonvue.com

Education Partner

Skill Devem

Education

Video

School Partner

EXHIBITOR

PopCorn Popcorn has become India’s largest school furniture company, a one-stop shop. It offers solutions for all furniture needs of an educational institution. Winner of two prestigious awards from World Didac for excellence in school furniture, its objective is to make learning fun and provide ergonomic, safe and functional furniture for students. Its products are innovative as they are developed by company’s design team and promote collaborative learning by being modular, knocked down and ﬂexible. These products are available from kindergarten to university level. Its kindergarten range includes furniture for classrooms, role-play equipment like kitchens, supermarkets, puppetry, doll areas, gymnasiums and playground equipment. The school range includes furniture for classrooms, libraries, cafeterias, laboratories, gymnasiums and playgrounds. The company offers customized solutions for schools to ensure available space can be utilised optimally.

EXHIBITOR

Serosoft ACADEMIA ERP, the Campus Management Software (www.academiaerp.com) helps automate and manage the entire campus operations, administration and learning needs in an effective way. With Academia, all processes, departments and functions of an institution from Enquiry to Graduation, along with administrative processes, are automated and streamlined. The award winning ACADEMIA is powering over 175 institutions - including universities, colleges, schools, training organisations and education groups - across India, Middle East, Africa and APAC. The company behind Academia – Serosoft - is India’s leading educational software company, promoted by a dynamic team of erstwhile I-Bankers, US & IIM-C graduates. It was declared the Company of Year 2014 by a leading IT magazine. Serosoft is a part of the prestigious 50-year old Hindustan Group of Companies (www.hindustangroup.com).

CONTACT B-11, Sector 59 Noida 201301 Uttar Predesh, India www.popcornfurniture.com

Academia ERP

CONTACT 5th Floor Milinda’s Manor, 2 RNT Marg, Opposite Central Mall, Indore 452001, MP, India www.serosoft.in

digitalLEARNING

JULY - AUGUST 2016

Video Enabled Learning Partner

Partnersâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Directory

Technical University Partner

EXHIBITOR

SM Associate Sportathon Partners CONTACT F 2/22, 2nd Floor Sector 3, Rohini New Delhi 110085, India www.smsporathan.com

Sportahan is an initiative by eminent physical education and sports experts to facilitate sports education in school system at an affordable cost. It is gearing up with a simple vision to make quality physical education and sports education accessible to each and every school and child. It works with schools to implement a best-in- class Physical Education and sports programme. The program is designed to offer the same rigour in sports and physical education as in academics. It ensures children learn holistically through physical activity and sports in addition to help children improve health and fitness level dramatically.

EXHIBITOR

CONTACT SoftAge Information Technology Limited 204, Phase IV, Udyog Vihar, Gurgaon, India www.softage.net

Exhibitors

Softage India Launched in 1994, SoftAge are pioneers of Document Management Services. With a distinct vision to provide world class document management services, along with ISO 27001:2013 compliance for data security. SoftAge handled over 570 Million Documents and 135TB Data. Ever since its inception, the company has been providing document management services to sectors like telecom, banking,insurance, government, media, healthcare, education, aviation, legal and realty. SoftAge has a workforce of about 8,000 employees with around 600 offices and warehouses in India and overseas.

EXHIBITOR

Stem Learning CONTACT C/103, Gandharva Darshan, Shankar Rao Naram Path, Lower Parel (W), Mumbai 400013 Maharashtra, India www.stemlearning.in

JULY - AUGUST 2016

digitalLEARNING

STEM Learning opts for a dynamic direction to guide and motivate students to consider a career and lifestyle in the sciences. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a pioneer in education through the introduction and installation of mini science centers in schools. Conceptualized to induce an interest for science, technology, engineering and mathematics at schoollevel, these interactive working models help students in identifying and experiencing fundamental concepts which they learn from books, making studying more practical. Having presence in 13 states in India, STEM Learning has setup 350 plus Mini Science Centers in urban and rural schools. A Mini Science Center includes 60 working models/exhibits that portray the principles of science along with 30 informational colourful backdrops, teachers manual and user manuals. These centers open a new dimension for children to watch-observe through science fair.

Sect

demia

digitallearning.eletsonline.com

EXHIBITOR

StemRobo

Exhibitors

STEMROBO Technologies, a design and product company based out of Noida, is focused on designing and making innovative electronic devices, software and methodologies and IoT based embedded solutions for education segment. It’s is a unique methodology developed by industry veteran of technology field. The company nurture innovation and creativity in education through innovative models and methodology around STEM-Robotics (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math and Robotics). The company is focused on leveraging technology in education, that will act as an enabler for students to learn, programme and experiment in the field of science, technology, engineering, math and Robotics (STEM-Robotics).The objective of STEMROBO is to embed curiosity, creativity and imagination in young minds and inculcate skills such as design mind-set, computational thinking, adaptive learning, physical computing etc.

CONTACT Electroprenure Park,Library Building, South Campus, Delhi University, New Delhi, India www.stemrobo.com

EXHIBITOR

Tabkids Tabkids is the tablet based education platform, targeted specifically at pre-primary and early primary classes, to compliment current teaching learning process of a child with a tabkids activity session based on school’s time -table and convenience. Tabkids serves as an enhancement for existing teaching learning methodologies in the form of self - interactive learning and assessment, i-learning as compared to e-learning. It ensures children understanding all the key concepts in a better and faster way. Tabkids ensures interactive engagement of each child and a channel of continuous reinforcement and assessment with numerous apps. It connects students, teachers and parents to achieve best results.

CONTACT Pensar Solutions Private Limited 515, Hemkunt Chambers, 89 Nehru Place New Delhi 110019, India www.tabkids.in

EXHIBITOR

Trikona Technologies Trikona Technologies, the only company in the world to provide 100% total turnkey solution in 3D holography. From designing hardware, manufacturing, installation, training, support, content creation and management will be handled by Trikona. 3D Holography can be effectively used in 3D visualization, education, teaching, training and innovative audio-visuals etc. Until now this hi-end technology was primarily used in promotion of lifestyle products and Industrial visualisation. Trikona has determined to cross its price barrier and make it usable in education in large scale. Trikona has decided to create new 3D Holographic education modules to be used extensively. It’s a fascinating technology, which can be used in many areas and virtually everywhere. For more information, visit www.trikonatech.com.

CONTACT Sriman Chambers #8-2-293/K/311 & 312 Kamalapuri Colony, Phase III, Hyderabad 500 073 Telangana, India www.trikonatech.com

digitalLEARNING

JULY - AUGUST 2016

Partners’ Directory EXHIBITOR

Swadhyaya CONTACT F 2/22, 2nd Floor Sector 3, Rohini New Delhi 110085, India www.smsporathan.com

CREATNLRN CREATNLRN is a company focusing on learning and content in the K12 market space. The company was founded in Year 2014 by professionals who have a combined 75+ Years of experience in Research and Development, Core Engineering, Teaching and training across segments. Senior academicians and industry veterans have been mentoring and guiding this organisation. Swadhyaya is a ﬂagship product of CREATNLN. The product’s focus is on helping students learn STEM education in a fun and explorative way, through realistic simulations and game based approach. SWADHYAYA brings together difficult concepts of Science onto a virtual medium which then allows the students to experiment with multiple scenarios and variables. Contents are mapped to CBSE and State Board Syllabus. Summative and formative assessments incorporated within the simulations and also as via worksheets, test and reinforce concepts learnt.

EXHIBITOR

Butterﬂy Edufields CONTACT #43, Sarvasukhi Colony West Marredpally, Secunderabad Telangana 500026 www.butterﬂyfields.com

Strengthen your science club with minimum hassles, transform your classrooms into labs and address space constraints. Try a Flip Classroom model, spice up your curriculum with innovation. Differentiate yourself from competition and transform learning from Rote to Real. Make Junior Science Labs effective. Implement 21st century STEM learning at as low as Rs. 500/- per student.

DIGITAL EDUCATION PARTNER

Adobe CONTACT Adobe Tower, Block A, 8th Floor, Prestige Tech Platina, Outer Ring Road, Kadubeesanahalli, Varthur Hobli Bangalore – 560 087, India

JULY - AUGUST 2016

digitalLEARNING

Adobe is changing the world through digital experiences. Our tools and services allow our customers to create groundbreaking digital content, deploy it across media and devices, measure and optimize it over time, and achieve greater business success. We help our customers make, manage, measure, and monetize their content across every channel and screen.

Event Report

digitallearning.eletsonline.com

Day 1

Jnana

Sangama National Convention on Higher Education

Karnataka in Focus as

Higher Education Hub

Jnana Sangama, a two-day conference, which was held in Bangalore on May 27-28, 2016, highlighted the idea of bringing large-scale reforms for facilitating quality education and good content delivery using the power of ICT. Organised jointly by the Department of Higher Education, Government of Karnataka, and Elets Technomedia, the event focused on Karnataka as a prime destination for Higher Education in India by promoting the state’s model of Best ICT Practices in Higher Education. TB Jayachandra, Minister for Law, Parliamentary Affairs and Higher Education, Government of Karnataka, inaugurated the two-day conference while Bharat Lal Meena, Additional Chief Secretary, Department of Higher Education, Government of Karnataka, and SV Ranganath, former Chief Secretary and Vice-Chairman, Karnataka State Higher Education Council addressed the inaugural session. The participants of the event included vice chancellors of universities, experts in the education domain and secretaries of Department of Education. Addressing the gathering, TB Jayachandra, said: “Our vision for Karnataka is to continue to empower students by imparting quality education, enabling skill development opportunities, and facilitating needful resources equally for one and all.” Kadiyam Srihari, Deputy Chief Minister and Minister for Education, Government of Telangana, who was the Chief Guest at the conference, observed that higher education in the country was moving towards “transformative change” with the proposed “new education policy” by the Central Government. According to him, ICT was being treated as a modern tool to enhance the quality of education, which can make significant contribution towards improving teaching and learning at all stages of higher education. digitalLEARNING

July - August 2016

Event Report

Day 1

Education Disparity

We are mobilising our resources and this year (2016-17) we have presented a budget of Rs.1,15,000 crore and are spending nearly Rs. 18000 crores on total education

Observes, the sub-standard quality of classroom education conttributing in the overall degradation inviting serious issues in higher education like low enrollment ratio, and gender gap.

Shri Kadiyam Srihari, Honâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ble Deputy Chief Minister and Minister for Education, Government of Telangana

Quality Education

Revised Curriculum

Possible changes can be made in curriculum ensuring that more autonomy is granted. Vice Chancellors need not be just people of competence but also people of charisma, character, commitment and compassion

The higher education strength of India in terms of students is third largest in the world next only to China and the United States. Unlike China, India has the advantage of English as a primary language of higher education and research Stresses on the availability of manpower as the backbone for the development of the state of Karnataka and suggests the institutions of higher education to provide education in such a way that they become competitive. Shri TB Jayachandra, Honâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ble Minister for Law, Parliamentary Affairs and Higher Education, Government of Karnataka

July - August 2016

digitalLEARNING

Believes that the higher education sector in India is facing various challenges and it is the need for promoting excellence while seeking expansion of the higher education sector. Shri SV Ranganath, Vice Chairman, Karnataka State Higher Education Council

digitallearning.eletsonline.com

Day 1 End-to-End Solution Lacking Infrastructure Our vision is to integrate all institutes in Karnataka in terms of facilities to students. If a student is studying in ‘X’ institute then he should have the best of facilities in institute ‘Y’

Feels a dire need to upgrade the processes of imparting education and ICT is the only way forward. Support from National Informatics Centre (NIC), will prepare for a vision and convert it into programme for execution Shri Bharat Lal Meena, IAS, Addl Chief Secretary, Department of Higher Education, Government of Karnataka

We have made the entire system digitised which promotes transparency on the part of both the college and the university although through our system much of the hassles of day to day functioning are done away with

Talks about his latest innovative product CAREEVS ( Campus Affiliation Registration Examination Enquiry Verification System) that intends to provide complete end to end solution for any university or board Prasanth Balakrishnan, Project Manager, Orion India systems Pvt Ltd

Interactive Platform Mobile Tutor is a dynamic and interactive digital tutorial wherein we create animated content which will induce passion in the students

Tells the basic inspiration of Mobile Tutor is to make the student understand what they are learning and how Mobile Tutor is going to connect with all the stakeholders in one platform for the benefit of the students.

Sundar, Founder & Director, Mobile Tutor digitalLEARNING

July - August 2016

Event Report

Day 1

Broad Connectivity Views a paradigm shift in the nature of students they are addressing and that the students can be rightly called digital natives and not digital immigrants

IGNOU has the privilege of having four DTH (Direct To Home) telecast channels for round the clock teaching through DTH telecast which will make a major shift in the overall learning environment of the education atmosphere in the country

Prof Ravindra Kumar, Vice Chancellor (I/c), IGNOU, New Delhi

DTH Education

Future Workforce Through our advanced level training programmes we impart training to lecturers to improve their teaching abilities. 1 GB connectivity is supported to the universities and in Karnataka around 29 universities are already utilising the services

Informs that 20 colleges in Karnataka are using their broadband network and that 75 % of the cost is borne by MHRD. P Nagaraju, Chief General Manager BSNL, Karnataka Telecom Circle

July - August 2016

digitalLEARNING

Our survey tells us that close to 90 % of the graduated students are not employable and hence companies induct students in their system, train them over a period of 6-9 months at a cost of 10-15 lakhs just to make them tenable

Believes in investing on time and building an ecosystem where people are ready to get into industry in a much faster pace. Jose Koshy, Country Director, Oracle University, India

digitallearning.eletsonline.com

Day 1 Logistics Solutions Inadequate Leaders With 700 universities and thousands of colleges we will need efficient leaders to drive these institutions to excellence. A good leader will always pull through the best out of an average team

One challenge that the examination system is facing is that of impersonation. The image in the soft copy of the hall ticket can be removed by anyone and hence impersonation takes place

Says that there is a big vacuum in the leadership space of educational institutions as there is dearth of well trained and experts educationists. Prof Sandeep Sancheti, President, Manipal University, Jaipur

Informs about solutions they provide wherein the hassles of logistics can be overthrown and the question paper can be printed right at the venue of the exam an hour before the exam starts Nagendran Sundararajan, Executive Vice President, MeritTrac Services Pvt Ltd

Online Classroom The idea of online classroom attendance is great but unfortunately most schools in our country do not have that facility

Says that at the university level the poll data of period wise attendance of all the affiliated colleges can be easily acquired through the GPS System

T Vijay Kumar, IAS, Joint Secretary, Department of Education, Government of Telangana digitalLEARNING

July - August 2016

Event Report

Day 1

Education Transformation We should create a situation where the interest of the students generates automatically and the teachers should have the enthusiasm to teach them and educate them

Stresses that education is informal where the student learn certain things without the patronage of the teacher like Ekalavya from the Mahabharata Prof CA Sreenivas Murthy, Director, Central Agricultural University, Manipur

Technology Empowerment To what extent we have to adopt technology is a question we have to ask. We donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t know whether this technology is better than the old one

Remarks that the industry expects certain skill set from the candidate but unfortunately lack of internet facility poses big challenge for students in Karnataka Chakravarthi Mohan, IAS, Commissioner, Department of Collegiate Education, Government of Karnataka

Faculty Supplies

The purpose of sending students abroad is to get enriched as there is no dearth of faculty supplies in American Universities or any Western Universities

Dr J Mahender Reddy, Vice Chancellor, ICFAI Foundation for Higher Education, Hyderabad

July - August 2016

digitalLEARNING

Asserts that technology now has become the indispensable factor in education, irrespective of the level of education

digitallearning.eletsonline.com

Day 1 Class Education Productive Workforce

Our desired outcome from learning is to be able to get a skilled, job ready and a productive workforce by imparting technical and soft skill training

Suggests the courses should be synchronised with the market requirement and should be a combination of the theory with the practical Prof S Ramachandran, Vice Chancellor, Hindustan University, Chennai

It is not enough to have good teachers, good buildings and a group of good students if they cannot interact with each other.A student must understand what the teacher is saying, assimilate it and reproduce in the exams Informs that the government of India has just brought in the new draft of National Building Code which mentions 0.75 seconds as code for educational buildings Naresh Duble, Head, Education & Healthcare Business, Armstrong World Industries India Pvt Ltd

Research Scholars I think when we talk of undergraduate courses we should go for breadth and when we are talking about postgraduate courses or research then we should have depth in knowledge

Remarks about quality that varies with different strata of society and expecting the same quality at centres of excellence is not a good idea

Dr Sivaji Chakravorti, Director, National Institute of Technology, Calicut digitalLEARNING

July - August 2016

Event Report

Day 1

Value Education Lacking Infrastructure I look at three aspects in any university, one is the teaching and learning process, the second is research and innovation and the third one is entrepreneurship

We do not teach value education to our science students, such as language and literacy education, social responsibility, ethical behaviour, national pride. Unless we integrate these there cannot be good citizens Remarks our graduates to be industry ready, and they should go to the universities for more knowledge as universities are knowledge providers Dr AH Rajasab, Vice Chancellor, Tumkur University

Says Higher education has also socio economic responsibility in the context of where it exists and thus we should think globally and act locally Prof ANN Murthy, Vice-Chancellor, DayanandSagar University

Assessment Tools

Implementing of unique assessment tools for affiliation of colleges is a challenging task for universities because there are many complaints in the ways colleges are affiliated

Prof BC Prabhakar, Director IQAC, Bangalore University

July - August 2016

digitalLEARNING

Informs about students of affiliated colleges having access to e-books and e-journals equipped with portable cameras that can read scripts for the blind

digitallearning.eletsonline.com

Day 1

Funds Inadequacy We have seen that more than 86 percent of students who goes to the US for higher studies do not return to their home country. This brain drain has to be reversed for a brain gain for our homeland

Thinks the public private partnership can act as a catalyst in order to boom higher education

Dr MK Abdul Khader, Vice Chancellor, Kannur University, Kerala

Teaching Challenge

Says everything is available on whatsapp and hence a teacher has to really work overnight for tomorrowâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s classes, else the students will not be impressed

After studying for four years the student does not know where to go and thus the stakeholders have to sit down together for a 360 degree change in the higher education scenario A Sevukamoorthy, Director, Mahendra Institute of Technology digitalLEARNING

July - August 2016

Event Report

Day 2 1

Socio-political Development

A serious challenge facing the higher education is the absence of synchronisation of policies between the UGC and other bodies and the respective state governments

Remarks that the students are giving more emphasis to individualistic attitude, material comfort and are not bothered about the society

Dr Ganapatigouda B Patil, Registrar (Evaluation) Karnataka State Law University

Online Payments

By using our online payment system the institutions, the students and the parents at tier II and III cities have benefitted in a big way Says that they have installed point of sale terminals wherein parents can go and make payments which is both cost and time effective Dewang Neralla, CEO, Atom Technologies Ltd

July - August 2016

digitalLEARNING

Knowledge Impartation

The knowledge impartation should be in such a way that it should impact the lives of the students so that they can give something back to the society

Believes that lack of communication between the administration and the students can hamper the reputation of the college Pranjali Khare, SIS Specialist, Apar Technologies Ltd

Seth Anandram Jaipuria School, Kanpur was adjudged best school in Educational World Survey 2014 & 2015 Seth Anandram Jaipuria School, Ghaziabad ranked 5th best school of NCR by HT & TOI 20 students got admission in IIT and other colleges of National & International repute International Collaboration for students to get global perspective

Fostering the spirit of Exploration with a finesse

• Contouring excellence in Education through academics and holistic development. • A progressive school with innovative curriculum design and content. • A place where learning becomes a fun filled quest for knowledge. • Empowering and nurturing a community of thinkers and compassionate learners.

• Envisioning a dynamic and didactic educational philosophy to nurture creativity & innovation.

KANPUR | GHAZIABAD | LUCKNOW

Sector 14c, VaSundhara, Ghaziabad t: 0120-4179300/18 M: 8447069991 Visit: http://jaipuria.edu.in/ghaziabadschool email: gzb.jaipuria@gmail.com

Event Report

Day 2 1

Faculty Evaluation I think a transparent faculty evaluation is very important so that the faculty is also made responsible or accountable as to what he or she communicates

Tells about the development of their mobile app where results and other student related activities take place Er Maroof Qadri, Director IT & SS, University of Kashmir

Student Involvement One of the best practices we should follow is involve the students in the process of impartation. The technique is called â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;Z to Aâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;, which means answer first and discuss next

Thinks that universities should emphasise that their students become wiser rather than simply acquiring knowledge Dr P Balakrishna Shetty, Vice-Chancellor, Sri Siddhartha Academy of Higher Education, Tumkur

Quality Education Many universities are having shortage of funds and it takes a lot of time to extract the sanctioned money of the government, instead it is better for the university to raise their own finance

Prof VSS Kumar, Vice Chancellor, Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University, Kakinada

July - August 2016

digitalLEARNING

Feel that technological universities are facing the dual problem of qualified faculties and quality of education simultaneously

digitallearning.eletsonline.com

Day 1 2 Performance Evaluation

Scholarship Programmes In the recent past the state of Karnataka has taken a slew of measures in the higher education department with regards to implementation of ICT which has been appreciated by the Honâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ble Education Minister

We have made it compulsory to pass the skill based papers which were not taken seriously by the students otherwise Informs with the advanced technology in application the performance evaluation of faculties has become easy B.B Kaliwal, Vice Chancellor, Davangere University

Talks about enabling the students of Jammu and Kashmir through various scholarship programmes to study in other parts of the country Dr NH Siddalinga Swamy, Director ,e-Governance Cell, AICTE, New Delhi

Learning Methods

We follow 70:30 learning method, wherein 70 percent of the studentâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s learning has to come from off the classroom and the rest 30 percent has to come from inside

Dr HR Venkatesh, Director, Academics, Acharya Bangalore B School digitalLEARNING

July - August 2016

event report

day 2 1

teaching empowerement Motivational aspects The students are looking up to their seniors rather than teachers for motivational aspects and weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve roped in our alumnus to communicate with them in any manner possible via any media

If the teachers impose themselves on the students then the students will learn only to pass the exam and will neither respect nor carry anything what the teacher teaches

Dr Jitendra Kumar Mishra, Director, MATS Institute of Management and Entrepreneurship

Dr Y Vijayakumar, Principal, Sri Sairam College of Engineering

Skill development

The syllabus bound curriculum leaves very little room for exploring and experimenting with anything else

Dr Dinesh Anvekar, Principal, Alpha College of Engineering

JULY - AUGUST 2016

digitalLEARNING

Think

Robotics in Education.... Think

"The most affordable Humanoid in the world, now ready to serve you" Sirena Technologies Pvt. Ltd +91 80 4130 8885 contactus@sirenatech.com, www.sirenatech.com, www.facebook.com/sirenatech

2016 Sirena Technologies Pvt. Ltd.

event report

day 2 1

Student involvement

tools & technologies Our virtual lab is fully equipped and students have to go there compulsorily and our civil engineering students are directly put on site since we have ties with Nagarju

Student involvement in a number of internal and external projects of the college which keeps the student interested is essential

Dr Suresh Lal, Principal, Cambridge Institute of Technology

Dr SG Gopala Krishna, Principal, Nagarjuna College of Engineering and Technology

eligibility Criteria

To increase the skill levels of the students, we try to segregate them on the basis of their eligibility and try to uplift and motivate the weaker ones

Dr TV Govindaraju, Principal Director, KS Institute of Technology

JULY - AUGUST 2016

digitalLEARNING

Thank You!

Jnana

Event Report

Sangama Day 1 National Convention on Higher Education

May 27 & 28, 2016, The Lalit Ashok, Bengaluru

for making Jnana Sangama Event

A GRAND SUCCESS!

Karnataka State Higher Education Council

MHRD-RUSA

THE SPIRIT OF INNOVATION

July - August 2016

digitalLEARNING

E LIN IONS N O AT ISTR NOW G E R PEN O

RNI NO. UPENG/2008/25311 | UP/GZB/70/2015-17