DL june 2012

Asia’s premier Monthly Magazine on ICT in Education

volume 8

I issue 06 I june 2012 I ISSN 0973-4139 I ` 75

e-Content

the Digital Page

Turners

Nidhi Sirohi

Dr Manjula Goswami

Norina Fernandes

Sudha Goyal

Anupama Sagdeo

Mamta Gupta

Kothari International School

Millennium School, Lucknow

Smt Lilavatibai Podar High School

Scottish High International School

SG International School, Bangalore

Shiksha Bharti School

Poonam Sharma

Dr Uday Salunkhe

Dr Picheswar Gadde

Aman Mittal

Akhlesh Agarwal

Accurate Institute of Management and Technology

Welingkar Institute CEO, Lingaya’s of Management University Development & Research

Lovely Professional University

NIIT University

www.digitalLearning.in

23 - 24 July 2012, Le Méridien, New Delhi

Conclave of Global Leaders in Education Programme chair

Programme co-chair

Programme co-chair

Prof Sudhir K Jain Director, IIT, Gandhinagar

Prof V S Ramamurthy Director, National Institute of Advanced Studies (NIAS)

Prof. SS Mantha Chairman, All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE)

leaders gracing the World education summit 2011

Dr A P J Abdul Kalam Former President of India

Shri Kapil Sibal Hon’ble Minster of Human Resource Development and Communications and IT Government of India

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Dr N Jadhav Member, Planning Commission, Government of India

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Loynpo Thakur Singh Powdyel Hon’ble Minister of Education Thimphu, Bhutan

Dr Taseer Al Nuaimi Hon’ble Minister of Education, Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan

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Speakers at 2012 Government

The Honourable Dr Vasant Kumar Bunwaree Minister of Education, Ministry of Education and Human Resources, Mauritius

Dr. Narendra Jadhav Member, Planning Commission, & Member, National Advisory Council, Government of India

Vibha Puri Das Secretary, Department of Higher Education, Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India

Prof S V Raghavan Scientific Secretary, Office of the Principal Scientific Adviser ,Government of India

Dr. Sunil Nawaratne Secretary, Ministry of Higher Education, Sri Lanka

Dr. Shashi Tharoor Member of Parliament, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala

Dr. Akshai Aggarwal Vice Chancellor, Gujarat Technological University

Prof. Rameshwer Rao Vice-Chancellor, Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University

Prof. Pradipta Banerji Director Designate, IIT Roorkee

Prof. Dilip K. Bandyopadhyay Vice Chancellor,Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University

Revathi Srinivasan Director - Education and Principal, Smt. Sulochanadevi Singhania School, Thane, Maharashtra

Prof. Dr. Fong Soon Fook Professor of Multimedia Education, School of Educational Studies, Uniiversiti Sains Malaysia

Avnita Bir Principal, R N Podar School, Mumbai

Dr Vandana Lulla Director, Podar International School

Higher Education

Prof V S Rao Director, BITS Pilani, Hyderabad Campus

Prof Ajoy Kumar Ray Vice Chancellor, Bengal Engineering and Science University

School Education

Lina Ashar Founder, Kangaroo Kids Preschool & Billabong High International School

Kartikay Saini Chairman, Scottish High International School

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ISSN 0973-4139

Contents volume 08 issue 06 June 2012

10

Cover story

Beyond Chalk and Talk Once technology enabled education used to be a far-fetched idea for some. Thanks to our progressive education thinkers, the electronic content medium has gained momentum in Indian education. An analysis

cover story interview 14

Diwakar Rao, Educo International India Pvt Ltd Meena Ganesh, CEO and MD, Pearson Education 16 Ninad Vengurleka, Sr. VP & HeadContent Curriculum Group of IL & FS Education and Technology Services Ltd Snehal Tivatane, Project Coordinator of GurujiWorld Technologies Pvt Ltd 18 Veena Raizada, Director Academics, Next Education India Pvt. Ltd

Abhinav Dhar, Director- K12, Educomp Solutions Ltd 20 Rupesh Shah, CEO of InOpen Technologies

Anshul Sonak, President – Corporate, Core Education and Technologies Ltd 22 Mamta Gupta, Principal, Shiksha Bharti School 24 Aarati S. Mhasawade, Principal, Secondary School, PCMC, Pune 26 Norina Fernandes, Principal of Smt Lilavatibai Podar High School 30 Dr Manjula Goswami, Principal, Millennium School, Lucknow 32 Pradeep Kumar Mishra, Principal, Foundation School, Buxar (Bihar)

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32 Br Shaji Klavanal, Principal, Don Bosco Senior Secondary School, Kochi 33 Sudha Goyal, Principal, Scottish High International School

interview - higher education 34 Poonam Sharma, Group Director, Accurate Institute of Management and Technology, Greater Noida 40 Dr Picheswar Gadde, CEO, Lingaya’s University

corporate diary 38 Amitava Banerjee, Head of Marketing, Rumi Education

tech focus wireless campus 43 Dr Upinder Dhar, Vice Chancellor, JKLU 44 Dr Uday Salunkhe, Director, Welingkar Institute of Management Development & Research, Mumbai 45 Santanu Mishra, Co founder and Executive Trustee of Smile Foundation 46 Akhlesh Agarwal, VP – Learning Technologies, NIIT University (NU) 48 Rajesh Shetty, Vice President, Cisco India & SAARC 50 Aman Mittal, Deputy Director, LPU

k-12 | sports education 52 Jack, No More a Dull Boy with Sports Outsourcing 54 Saumil Majumdar, Co- founder and CEO, EduSports 55 Shrikant Hazare, Chief Marketing Officer, KOOH Pvt Ltd 56 Martin Gleeson, Chief Executive Officer, Sports Education Development India Ltd\ 58 Sudhanshu Fadnis, Founder Director & CEO, Sportseed

Jay Shah, Director, The Sports Gurukul 60 Vasanth Bharadwaj, Co-Founder and former Table Tennis International, TENVIC 61 Ramji Govindarajan, Director, Ten10 Racing

Ashutosh Batta, Director and Principal, Bloom Public School, Vasankunj, New Delhi 62 Anupama Sagdeo, Principal, SG International School, Bangalore 63 Sheelu Mathew, Principal & Director, St. Mary’s School, Dwarka Sports Education at Smt Lilavatibai Podar High School

interview k-12 64 Nidhi Sirohi, Principal, Kothari International School

For more information Contact:

asia’s first monthly magazine on The Enterprise of Healthcare Volume

08

Issue 06

June 2012

President: Dr M P Narayanan

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Editor-in-Chief: Dr Ravi Gupta onsulting editor: Ashis Sanyal c Editorial Team

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EDITORIAL

The Digital Push Now we have definitely entered the era of technology-centric classrooms, where students use a variety of digital tools to gain knowledge. Schools and higher education institutes are opting for classrooms that are decked out with laptops, big interactive screens and software that drills students on every basic subject.

In conjunction with the growth of digital learning, there is growth in e-content.

The e-content industry is rather asynchronous and it is also very fragmented. But the lack of synchronism and the fragmentation is a positive aspect, as they result in the creation of the widest possible range of products that can cater to all kinds of educational needs. The rapid growth in the e-content segment is primarily being driven by innovations in content customisations and many other services like the use of simulations, etc.

As technologies and associated standards forge ahead, the concept of Wireless Campus and technology enabled sports is also gaining popularity. When an institution is seamlessly connected with high-speed broadband, students, as well as the teachers, can access educational material with relative ease. As the popular saying goes – a healthy mind resides in a healthy body. Sports are a necessary part of a child’s training, and incorporation of digital systems only serves the purpose of further enhancing the scope of sports in education.

However, the field of digital learning is also fraught with challenges for which the industry and the government institutions continue to grope for answers. Even the best e-content solution and digital learning tools will not serve the purpose of broadening the scope of education if there are technological issues like server being down or erratic power supply. For the digital education system to really take off in the country lot of new infrastructure has to be created.

We have interacted with a host of industry leaders who are providing solutions for e-content, sports and wireless campus. The interviews that we have conducted with the teachers and other senior academics read like a case study on usage of digital systems in institutes. From these stakeholders we have distilled a gamut of perspectives. The potential benefits of digital teaching tools are also linked to the tech-training of the tutor. In urban areas, majority of the institutes have access to teachers who are tech-savvy, but in rural and semi-urban areas there is a crunch of teachers with such training.

On 23rd and 24th July 2012, we will be having The World Education Summit, at Le Méridien, New Delhi. Just like the May issue, the June issue of digitalLEARNING is also a part of the special series through which we are making an in depth coverage of the education sector in the country. Once again, I have the pleasure of inviting all of you to join the WES, where we can all be part of the discussion on the best ways by which new technologies can be used for enhancing the scope of modern education.

I would like to thank Professor S S Mantha, Chairman AICTE, who, in his position as guest editor to the entire series of issues that will be released in the run up to the World Education Summit, 2012, has been providing us with invaluable guidance.

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

digitalLEARNING / june 2012

7

guest editorial

Education and Best Practices In the connected world where we live, it is imperative that education is treated as the only glue that can ensure that the world flourishes. Education itself is a best practice that can happen in ones life. It should teach us humility and benevolence and a clarity of mind and purpose. I am reminded of Bhirthrihari the celebrated author of Shatakatrayi who wrote in Sanskrit

Hkou~rfue~jkl~rjo% iQyksn~xeS% uoke~cqHkfj~Hkwjfofye~cfuks ?kuk%A vuqn~/rk% lr~iqjq"kk% le`n~/fHkf% l~oHkko ,oS"k% ijksidkfj.kke~AA Translated in English this means “With fruits, trees bend, i.e. be humble, with water, clouds hang low, i.e. wealthy good men maintain humble posture, and hence are seen to be benevolent."

In my view it is not unfair to suggest that institutions of higher education have always been created and shaped by the interests of the ruling classes and elites in the societies in which they existed. This means they serve to reinforce the economic, political, ideological, and cultural interests of those who create them, fund them, and populate them. We need to take a hard look at this proposition and make education available to everyone who needs it. A truly inclusive system is in everyone’s interest.

Private, public and governmental participation has been steadily increasing in the education sector. Forecasts suggest that, if current patterns of participation continue, more than 30 percent of today’s school leavers will experience higher education in 10 years from now. A GER of about 15 percent would certainly need to be revisited and the Governments endeavour to push it as high as 30percent is indeed noble. I wish, we attain a figure of 50 percent in the next 20 odd years. Higher education will shape individual lives, the economy and society. Such an activity must be the subject of broad and informed consideration and debate. We need to create a knowledge society. Knowledge is all pervasive and it is said about Knowledge, again a couplet by Bhirthrihari:

tkM~;a /f;ks gjrflf×k~prfokpflr~;a ekuksu~urfnf'krfikieikdjksrfA psr% i~jlkn;rfnfd~"kq ruksfrdhj~rfA lr~laxrf% dFk; dfu djksrfiqalke~AA Translated “Knowledge removes lethargy of the intellect, invests truth in the speech, enhances the greatness and casts off sin; cleanses the mind and spreads the fame all around” We need to empower the youth with education that promotes knowledge and promotes meaningful employment based on this knowledge as applicable to a certain environment. Any activity that promotes this is a best practice and such a pursuit will always benefit the society we live in.

It is a challenge to be able to pen down best practices in education. The times we live in are full of flux and recounting any number of best practices of today can at best be a mere perspective. I would like to treat that subject in two stages: 1. How to identify what is best.

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guest editorial

2. How to ensure that the produce from the colleges hits the ground running to meet employment and opportunity.

The purpose of education is to ensure progress. I would like to choose to lay the foundations of understanding how to record the best practices. How to identify what is best.

The foremost three aspects of education are: 1. The student 2. The faculty and 3. The institution If there were a way to plot these three properties individually and then have a map that plots all the institutes on a single page; it shall enable us to develop a credible system of rating. drawing up a median and then identifying need-gaps in colleges that remain below the median will help us improve the performance of the colleges and reduce the base area of the education pyramid.

Indeed there are underlying layers that form the crux of each of the above aspects.

1. the student: financial, regional and aspirational mapping 2. the faculty: financial, regional, innovational and aspirational mapping 3. the institution: Its ability to create impact in its local vicinity, national and global realms, promote research, retain faculty and consistently out-perform its outturn each year.

While there are no quick fixes to what ails, we need to recognise that access to higher education is much better today, though the systems have become more complex and hence more challenging.

There can not be a “one size fits all” formula and understanding of need gaps when analysed against a backdrop of the best performing teams of faculty, institution and student will help us deliver a system that is optimised for results. From here shall emerge the best practices.

How to ensure that the produce from the colleges hits the ground running to meet employment and opportunity.

The other challenge is the lack of right metrics and planning that do not tie in the produce from the colleges to the available opportunities for the students outside in the commercial world. This leads to lopsided education imparted, there is unemployment leading to restive youth.

Just as there is a method of forecasting GDP and growth and use available data around FDI, industrial, farm outputs and service industry, similarly, the output of students and skills can be planned to meet such development midway. For that truly would be the exacting of the demographic dividend.

A Country blesssed with great numbers of youth in productive age can also be severly undercut if they are not in the mainstream. An example would suffice the seriousness of this statement. Over 50 percent of youth fail between 10th, 11th and 12th grade and probably out of the education scene for ever after that. They surely must be contributing to the growth of the Country in some way as much as contributing to the muck.

An out of box approach and a possible best practice could be to allow them to pass the grade with minimal intervention. The Government’s move to exempt Xth grade examinations is truly out of box, critics apart, and worth a million in the bullion market.

We need more of that.

Assuming an incremental value addition happens to the entropy of the Universe; it is still worth it apart from the collateral advanatage of higher GER’s and overall growth in economies brought about by an exalted youth.

Best practices in Education is notional at best though specifics can always be defined. Anything that adds to overall well being and acts as a force multiplier for economy is a best practice be it in education, medicine economics or any other.

"

The Government’s move to exempt Xth grade examinations is truly out of box, critics apart, and worth a million in the bullion market. We need more of that

"

Prof S S Mantha Chairman, All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) digitalLEARNING / June 2012

9

cover cover story story eContent

d n o ey

Bhalk and Talk C

Once technology enabled education used to be a far-fetched idea for some. Thanks to our progressive education thinkers, the electronic content medium has gained momentum in Indian education. An analysis!

By Sharmila Das, Elets News Network (ENN)

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cover story eContent

W

e cannot go back to the age when we used to study beneath a Banyan tree. The picture looks blurred and irrelevant now as our education system rushes into a digital world. We have evolved from Gurukul education system to smart or e-content system. The country’s educational eco system has realised the benefits of using the said solution in their institutions and thus the acceptance has increased manifold.

Are there any limitations?

The dissemination of e-content can be effected by technical problems, which range from server being down, power being cut or something else. Moreover, in a smart class room, teachers are expected to present the e-Content in an appropriate manner. For this we need to have teachers who are well trained in the digital medium.

Sudha Goyal, Principal, Scottish High International School, Haryana, shares her experience, “It was really challenging to motivate all subject teachers to deploy e-Content in their classrooms and come out of their shells and be innovative in classes. Once they were ready to learn the technology aids, meticulously planned training programmes were conducted for all subject teachers and experts to help them in adapting to the e-Content”.

Norina Fernandes, Principal, Smt Lilavatibai Podar High School, says, “Initially teething problems were there in deploying e-content education systems in the school but we have sailed through them successfully by the following steps: 1) we organised competitions to motivate teachers’ and encourage their participation, 2) Teachers were less confident to operate the Starboard before their more tech savvy students. Teachers organised their own practice sessions with co-teachers to overcome this”.

A continuous handholding from the solution providers is needed to ensure the smooth functioning of the system.

Chances are that with mutual understanding of both the parties (Schools and Solution Providers) the challenging areas of e-content solutions can be sailed through.

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Benefits of e-content in education •

• • •

• •

Impactful learning: The kind of impact electronic content creates is remarkable. With the audio-video aids, the package creates permanent impact on student’s minds. The level of understanding also gets better with better retaining capacity.

Hyperlinking – These contents can be linked to other pages inside and outside the book.

Non-linearity - The order of access can be determined by users.

Addition of multimedia - Content presentation is enhanced by mixing of information in formats like sound, video and so on.

Data density - Storage capacity is decreased, while at the same time there is improvement in portability.

Searching - The usefulness of the content is enhanced by the ability of the users to locate any piece of information, or access any section instantly.

A continuous handholding from the solution providers is needed to ensure the smooth functioning of the system Ninad Vengurlekar, Sr VP & Head-Content Curriculum Group of IL & FS, a leading e-content solution provider, says, “Our solution is called The K-Class Programme.

It is a combination of technology, academic interventions and content to enhance teacher and student performance. K-Class works cohesively with schools in multiples of 3 years to strengthen the foundations of student performance and teacher Capability through innovative interventions.

We offer repairs as well as replacements of our systems. In most cases, there is no extra charge”.

While the benefits and the impact of the education system are significant, it is also a fact that the solution deployment involves good investment from the schools side. In India only 25 percent of the schools can think of deploying e-content in their education infrastructure.

Diwakar Rao, Director-Operations Educosoft, informs, “Cost of infrastructure would be Rs 80 thousand per class having the simplest of elements. For

more innovative products in a classroom the investment would go up. Besides, the cost for accessing the content per child works out to be Rs100 per student per month”.

Veena Raizada, Director-Academics, Next Education shares, “Private schools have been few steps ahead of government schools in adopting digital content technology. However, we have seen a recent trend of government schools too adopting digital learning technology on a large scale”.

The digital education system has made deep forays into the schools in our urban areas, and now it is the turn of the semirural and rural schools to embrace it.

To get a clearer picture of digital content deployment in India, we have interacted with many school principals and also the e-content solution providers to get their inputs on the way things are moving in the e-content space. Flip through the pages to make a tryst with a range of expert opinions.

cover story eContent

The DigiClass Maker Pearson Education Services is the creator of syllabus mapped multimedia-based interactive content for schools. Meena Ganesh, CEO and MD of the company shares her insights Your take on the level of e-Content adoption by Indian schools.

The Indian school market has been very receptive to e content learning and has seen many positive changes towards a more progressive system of education. Surveys and reports have suggested that 65 per cent of teachers and school administers believe that printed textbooks will completely be replaced by interactive and e learning tools. The last decade has seen parents and teachers showing a keen interest in this new technology and I believe that this trend will show rapid expansion with many more schools adopting this solution.

Kind of solution you provide to schools.

We equip the schools with DigiClass; an ICT-based solution that combines state-

of-the-art hardware with syllabus linked multimedia-based interactive content.

DigiClass is a complete classroom solution that comes with a CPU, interactive device, digitally- patented, award winning teaching tool, syllabi specific course content, UPS, server, speakers and white board. A resource coordinator will set up and maintain the set up in school and also train teachers on its usage.

Challenges faced in convincing school management about the benefits of e-content.

At the implementation level, we sensed apprehension from the schools, as they were uncertain of the usage, implementation and hardware upkeep of the solution post installation. We addressed their

concern by providing full time resource coordinators in schools, on rolls to ensure assistance and resolve any issues on the day to day usage of the hardware.

Your best selling e-Content solution for schools; kind of innovations for future use.

Digitally is our patented multimedia enabled teaching tool which is a part of all our digital classrooms. This award winning tool has several attributes which makes it a superior e content solution for schools. We are currently in the process of developing a learning aid using the tablets.

Online Teaching & Learning Under OneRoof While traditional education methodology is not still passĂŠ, a new and smarter education system is gaining ground. Diwakar Rao of Educo International India Pvt Ltd believes new system will replace the old one but in due course of time Your take on the level of e-Content adoption by Indian schools.

Schools are adopting the e-content education system in a big way and most of the schools in urban areas are going for e-learning solutions.

Kind of solution you provide to schools.

We at Educosoft provide online teaching and learning solutions for schools. We provide them turn-key solutions, including setting up infrastructure for implementing our portal. During the time when the programme is being used in the schools we provide back up and support, this includes replacing and repairing of what is under warranty as per the dealer

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provided terms. We charge only the cost of the item to be replaced or repaired.

Largest adopters of e-content solutions.

Different state governments are adopting e-content solutions. The government aided schools are largest adopters as they have adequate funds to do that. Private schools have to raise such funds from their students or pay it from their own pockets.

Minimum investment needed to be made for setting up an e-content solution in school.

Cost of infrastructure would be around Rs 80,000 per class. The cost would go

up for more innovative products. Apart from this, the cost for accessing the content per child works out to be Rs.100 per student per month. Peak season is November to March when schools check out the various options available in the market.

Your best selling e-’Content solution for schools; kind of innovations for future use.

Our best selling e-Content option is where the programme is implemented in totality and is being used in the school for teaching, conducting online tests, and for quizzes in the school labs and giving online homework’s and tests as homework.

HRM/Payroll Finance Management

Inventory Management

cover story eContent

Schools are not Averse to e-Content “The school fraternity is not averse of adopting e-content”, affirms Ninad Vengurleka, Sr. VP & Head-Content Curriculum Group of IL & FS Education and Technology Services Ltd learning systems. The reason for non-use could be either because they cannot afford the high costs or may not be happy with the quality of content available.

Your take on the level of e-Content adoption by Indian schools.

Indian urban schools are frequently using e-content based education. Semi urban and rural schools are recently gearing up to this concept. At IETS, we believe close to 25 per cent of schools are actively using e-content. We also believe no school is averse to use e-content based

Kind of solution you provide to schools.

Our solution is called the K-Class Program.

It is a combination of technology, academic interventions and content to enhance teacher and student performance. K-Class stands for Knowledge Class. K-Class is an interactive learning solution for schools. It makes a school teach, learn, understand and perform better through an ingenious combination of technology and curriculum mapped content.

Challenges faced in convincing school management about the benefits of e-content.

Benefits of e-content based learning are already known to schools. The challenges are in convincing the schools to dif-

ferentiate between good and bad quality content in terms of learning experience.

Many schools tend to focus more on jazzy technology features of the hardware and overall pricing and curriculum mapped content. As a result many a times, learning quality may take a backseat.

Your best selling e-Content solution for schools; kind of innovations for future use.

The K-Class Content Bank is a wonderful mix of over 10,000 digital content units stored inside the K-Yan. These include, curriculum mapped multimedia lessons in Science, Math, Social Sciences and English, as well as assessments, mind maps, practice sheets, science experiment videos and interactive exploriments in science and math. In addition to this off-the-rack content, K-Class also provides a bank of teacher resources that can be used by the teacher to make her own lessons and lesson plans.

There is Vibrancy in Digital Content “The education world is waking up to embrace digital technologies,” says Snehal Tivatane, Project Coordinator of GurujiWorld Technologies Pvt Ltd

nation Solution name ‘GOES’ which takes care of the complete examination requirements wherever schools opting for conducting Online Exams instead of paper/pen mode.

Challenges faced in convincing school management about the benefits of e-content.

As software and e-contents are intangible it is at times difficult to convince schools to pay reasonable rates for such products. Huge efforts go into development of digital contents with features like high end 2D animation, voice over, in line questions, good quality illustrations and interactivity, but getting the right price for the same is a tough task.

Your take on the level of e-Content adoption by Indian schools.

Today schools in the urban and semi-urban areas are planning of adopting technology based education. Audio visual rooms for elearning are also in demand. The rural schools are untapped areas where a lot needs to be done in terms of usage of technology for Your best selling e-Content solution for schools; kind of innovations for future use. education and school management.

GurujiWorld’s best selling product is our Computer Based Training solutions. The Maharashtra State Board curriculum Kind of solution you provide to schools.

GurujiWorld is engaged with public and private schools directly or e-contents are also in demand. We are also increasing our user through its implementation partners to provide a complete 360 de- base for our vocational employability skills for e-Contents on gree educational platform, which caters to the needs, like: a) Digital Spoken English skills and Basic of accounting with Tally and learning via e-contents, b) a simple, robust and lightweight Online Cybercrime awareness. We are exploring the possibility of deSchool Management Solution named as GEMS, c) an Online Exami- veloping innovative educational contents for education tablets.

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The ‘Next’ Stage of Education ing technology on a large scale.

Veena Raizada, Director Academics, Next Education India Pvt. Ltd. senses abundant prospects in e-content segment and speaks about the solution the company delivers to schools and institutes

What kind of solutions do you provide to schools.

Our service is called “TeachNext,” which delivers high-quality 2D and 3D content in networked classrooms through modern projectors onto interactive digital whiteboards. TeachNext also includes several tools like NextStudio, NextTools and NextDictionary. We also provide other products like NextERP and NextLabs (MathLab, ScienceLab, EnglishLab).

We help schools set up the system by deploying our team at the school premises, which installs the equipment, and

also conduct training for the teachers to use the system. We have a huge team of support professionals across India, who continuously supports 4000+ schools in the country for replacement of any hardware and upgrades, etc.

Who form the biggest group of adopters of e-content solutions?

Private schools have been few steps ahead of government schools in adopting digital content technology. However, we have seen a recent trend of government schools also adopting digital learn-

The

Benefits of e-content learning system.

The mundane topics become interesting with lively content, which helps students to learn the concept through experiential learning rather than mug them up. Detailed lesson plans with the content helps the teachers deliver content in a standardized way, maintaining quality in education.

Your best selling e-Content solution for schools; kind of innovations for future use.

TeachNext is our bestselling e-Content solution for schools. We have recently launched our new version with options for schools that include lots more localised content in Hindi, KG, Pre-KG, Interactive Tools, just to name a few. We are continuously working to develop state of the art tools for TeachNext.

Smart Digital

Education

Abhinav Dhar, Director- K12, Educomp Solutions Ltd says the Indian education sectors has travelled a long way from chalk and talk to smart classes Your take on the level of e-Content adoption by Indian schools.

Indian education sector is today among the fastest growing in the world. There are close to 15 lakhs government schools and 1 lakh private schools in the country. Out of this, only 7-10 percent of the private schools have tapped the potential of multimedia classroom teaching whereas in government schools, it has barely made any inroads.

Kind of solution you provide to schools.

Educomp Smartclass is today the largest player in the digital content solutions space. We provide complete solution to

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the school- from hardware to India’s largest repository of high quality digital content. A knowledge centre manned

by Educomp resource coordinator is set up in each school to help teachers on a daily basis. Total support is provided in upkeep and maintenance.

Challenges faced in convincing school management about the benefits of e-content.

When we launched Smartcalss back in 2004, it was the first of its kind digital content solutions for schools and as with most pioneering initiatives, did meet with some reservations. Schools needed to be convinced about its effectiveness

and teacher community too was hesitant to adopt technology alongside the tried and tested chalk and talk method.

Your best selling e-Content solution for schools; kind of innovations for future use.

Smartclass CTS, the new avatar of the popular Smartclass program is an amazingly versatile, rich-on-technology innovation, which will make every teaching-learning session much the more stimulating, interactive, enlightening Educomp will continue to innovate and create new products that will enhance a student’s educational experience.

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Digital Learning is Confined to City Schools Rupesh Shah, CEO of InOpen Technologies feels the reach of digital learning is yet to touch rural schools although the prospect is magnificent

Your take on the level of e-Content adoption by Indian schools.

The concept of e-learning in India is in early stages and may not exactly be spreading like wild fire in many parts of the country, especially in rural India. However, as a mode of teaching and learning, it has seen an increasing use in urban educational institutions. In cities, the use of computers and audio visuals is being extensively promoted to get the children better versed with the lessons taught in the classroom.

Kind of solution you provide to schools.

InOpen has been serving K-12 market with the flagship product ‘Computer Masti’ and newly introduced Science curriculum called ‘Small Science’. We offer IT literacy solutions to government bodies and corporate. We make tailor made curriculum using Computer Masti for K-12 segment. The execution starts through training the existing IT faculty and setting up the computer lab. We design a series of handhold visits where faculty from InOpen visits the schools to do capacity building exercise and solve issues arising out of implementation.

Challenges faced in convincing school management about the benefits of e-content.

Most of the present efforts like government policies, public private partnerships are directed to ensure initial access to technology. One of the major challenges is renewing licenses of the software and providing hardware support. In this regard, if free and open source applications are actively used, this would help keep the total cost of implementation low and make good use of the old systems.

Your best selling e-Content solution for schools; kind of innovations for future use.

We intend to supply the highest quality of content and training in all major subjects for schools. We will launch the following econtent services: a) Launch CM 2.0, b) InOpen’s CM Everywhere Initiative, c) We are working on e-learning modules and different platforms which would help us attain scale and large audience.

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The Digi-content Enabler Digi-content has been yielding good results for its adopters feels Anshul Sonak, President – Corporate, Core Education and Technologies Ltd Your take on the level of e-Content adoption by Indian schools.

The education fraternity is fast becoming aware of the importance of content support and gradually adopting the same. It is only a matter of time for the school management community completely adopting the e content based education system.

Also with adoption of new technology tools like 3d and tablets for 1:1 virtual education is increasing the e-content adoption What kind of solution you provide to schools.

Core enables collaboration and best practice teaching methods within schools, local education authorities and school clusters. We offer developed content in collaboration with University of Oxford to enhance instructional capabilities and classroom efficiency, lesson and attendance control.

Challenges faced in convincing school management about the benefits of e-content.

Earlier there was a general apathy to advanced technologies in education but now the situation is different with the state and public both understanding the need for contextualizing education for revamping the education system in India.

In your opinion, why should every school go for e-content learning system?

Every school should focus on 21st century education transformation goals to make their students better poised to succeed in new world we are in. A strong research driven content coupled with whole school reform philosophy and strong teacher quality focus will be very critical for any change.

Your best selling e-Content solution for schools; kind of innovations for future use.

We have leadership solutions in research driven STEM, literacy and career tech content besides cognitive growth solutions and formative assessment tools that we deploy worldwide including India. We are also enhancing our e-content portfolio by introducing more gesture based computing content solutions, immersive 3d content, advanced STEM solutions.

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e-Content Facilitates Better Understanding Mamta Gupta, Principal, Shiksha Bharti School, feels her school is yielding good results because of ICT aided educations system How has ICT helped you to achieve the targeted quantum of success?

ICT is very much helpful. It’s an audio visual medium and through visualization children get more information. Even it’s a good experience for the teachers as well.

When teachers show the text content on board, it becomes the better means of understanding. Through e-content teaching has become easier. With very less time we can correct the things in no time.

We have got our solutions from Educomp Digital learning process and it is indeed very helpful for the teachers and for the students. Teachers find it very helpful.

In the beginning, there were few problems but as the teachers learnt the how-tos involved they are feeling it more convenient.

Rather than pen and paper students are showing more interest to learn their lessons. Retaining knowledge also gets better, when they see the content visually.

What are the problematic areas you have come across in deploying e-Content?

Last year when I attended your World Education Summit (WES) I realised that all my teachers should be computer trained. Furthering this, I had asked my computer teachers to teach computer to other teachers and he did. Then I made it compulsory for every teacher to type the Unit Test questions on their own, later on I also asked them to prepare PPT presentation of the contents they are going to teach in the classes. So that was the beginning. Although in the first phase, teachers came to my room and told me that it is not possible for them to learn computers. Some of them even complained that these things were not mentioned at the time of appointment.

I counseled them patiently and when they were convinced, they took help of

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ject. So when we started teaching History classes with the help of e-content, the students were enlightened. They came up with the feedback that History classes are no more boring.

their children to learn computer. Some of them taught it from outside computer training institutes, and from our computer teachers alike.

Later on when they learnt to operate computers, they brought the PPT to me and commented this is the better way of teaching, because maximum syllabus can be covered with lesser time. Naturally, understanding is also better. So my teachers got interested and they wanted to prepare the PPTs for the next session as well. I welcomed their efforts and they prepared the contents willingly. That was a very successful start and I got appreciation from the parental community and my students were also very happy with the change. The school management also was delighted with the digital learning process and the outcome.

Give us an example of using e-Content system that has solved your students’ issues.

I will cite the example of our History classes, as we know History is a dull sub-

Challenges do teachers face while dealing with Continuous and Comprehensive Evaluation (CCE)?

It is very challenging for the teachers; CCE recommends observing students behavior. Sometime I feel, the students are not behaving the real way, they are actually pretending to be something else in front of the teachers. Reasons could be fear or earning good grades. So this is the problem with CCE. To deal this problem I counsel my teachers to counsel the students to be honest and not to be diplomatic.

What is your take on CBSE guidelines for CCE? I welcome CCE and through CCE I have come to know that every child is special and through CCE I realised that if any student is not good in studies it does not mean that he/she is good for nothing.

CBSE guidelines are okay; only thing is that CBSE is more conservative, they advocate pen-paper examination. So I would like to have more CCE. CBSE has fulfilled all my expectations but few things are there which are still not cleared in the parental mind about the grading system. CCE has given a wide range of grading system that says from 91-100 per cent it is A- 1 and from 81to 9o, it is A-2. The range should be minimised. I expect CBSE to change this grading system.

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The Young e-Learning Adopter Aarati S Mhasawade, Principal, Secondary School, PimpriChinchwad Municipal Corporation (PCMC), Pune, has tested the water before implementing ICT aided teaching system in her school How has e-content been helping you?

School has very recently completed the implementation of the e-contents for K-12 state board curriculum, computer skills contents and spoken english contents provided by Guruji World Technologies Pvt. Ltd. under ICT@School project Phase II, Maharashtra. e-Contents implemented by GurujiWorld are as per syllabus of state board and easy to learn so teachers and students are enjoying the new ICT based learning approach.

What are the problematic areas you have come across in deploying e-Content?

School was lacking in infrastructure which was required for the implementation of digital learning. In this regard we have received lot of help from Director of Education (Secondary & Higher Secondary). Government has provided us basic infrastructure such as hardware, projectors, lab infrastructure along with full time instructor for the period of 5 years to run this project successfully.

How do you train your teachers to adopt e-Content in your classes?

Solution providers have trained the instructors to adopt econtents in classes. Students and teachers are excited to have e-contents in school. Teachers are willingly using e-contents in classes. They found it attention-grabbing and effective with a student centric approach. Now a day’s parents are aware of e-learning and its benefits so they are evenly happy.

Give us an example of using e-Content system that has solved your students’ issues.

E-contents have been beneficial for our students as e-contents facilitate them and keep them engage during the classes. Instead of traditional teaching methods in classrooms, students are exposed to the advanced digital learning tools and e-contents repository. Students are also provided with World Wide Web in labs to prepare them for the competitive persona and know-how attitude.

Can you give us an overview of the solutions that you are using in examination and assessment in your school?

Along with the traditional method of assessments, our solu-

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tion provider has also incorporated e-assessments at the end of the every chapter for all the subjects. This is an innovative solution and subject teachers can carry out oral assessments or select the chapters and carry out a mock assessment for those particular chapters. Students also get their results instantly after finishing the exam.

Tell us about your solution providers.

HCL and Guruji World are our solution providers for hardware and software respectively. We are very happy with the services which we are getting from our service providers.

How the challenges of traditional examination methodology are overcome by the introduction of modern ICT solutions?

We were facing challenges with traditional methods of examination and assessments. We tried to overcome these challenges by using tools offered by solution providers.

Solution providers have given handy assessments with each chapter which is very useful for students as well as

ucation d E f o r o ct The Dire Higher & y r a d n (Seco ovided us r p s a h ) ry Seconda e and a r u t c u r t s ra basic inf r for the o t c u r t s n i full time rs to run a e y e v fi period of essfully c c u s t c this proje teachers. Though multiple choice questions, they are very effective and evaluation is easier and accurate, subjective questions are also equally essential and should be obligatory for students to enhance their creative and ingenious minds.

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No Limits to Digital Tools in Classrooms

www.podar.org

How has ICT helped you to achieve the targeted quantum of success?

The ICT e-content has been generated in Lilavatibai Podar Senior Secondary School (LPSSS) to supplement both teaching and learning and we have been the pioneer for the same. We have won the best ICT enable school. All our classrooms are fitted with ICT, ‘Starboard’, from (STD I to XII).

We have achieved our targeted quantum of success after six years, with all our stakeholders very comfortable. All our e-content is developed in-house in our IT hub where academicians, technologist and IT media managers coordinate and work on the syllabus for the subject assigned. The content gradation is done timely and in-sync with the latest technologies. [Smart boards, Visualiser].

The School Heads review the lecture produced and certify its correctness academically. The lectures for each subject comprise of objectives, subject mapping, summary, text, case studies, FAQs, videos to enhance learning (eg movie clips for English, Hindi language and Marathi language) and audio (use of songs to teach concepts in language), assignments, quiz, tutorials, references, glossary, links, blogs, contacts.

Norina Fernandes, Principal of Smt Lilavatibai Podar High School leaves no stone unturned in ensuring that the school delivers the best ICT based learning experience to students

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How do you train your teachers to adopt e-content in your classes?

We have regular weekend training programmes to ensure that teachers are comfortable in using the required e-tools. Training sessions are held to refresh teachers on the effective use of Star board and subject wise. A hands-on training is then followed to monitor the teacher’s competencies with ICT. Teachers are then asked to prepare presentation on topics in subjects that they tech to check their command with ICT and effective usage in the classroom. Mock lessons sessions are held to make the teacher comfortable with its use. All their lessons include exercise, simulation, questionnaire, diagrams, graphs, index, tables, narrative text, exam, experiment, problem statement, self assessment and lecture. Both our student-teacher and student-parent community have a positive outlook.

Give us an example of using e-Content system that has solved your students’ issues.

The biggest problem that learners have with Shakespeare’s plays in their inability to understand a play by reading it. Our teachers felt that the plays were meant to be seen and not read to bring about deeper understanding of the period in which it was writ-

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ten. To approach Shakespeare’s complex languages, teachers at LPSSS us a multimedia approach in our classroom, watching a particular scene from a particular act on one screen and then reading the text of the play on screen. The pedagogical approach serves both as a model for teaching Shakespeare and as a site for discussion of the various ways to teach Shakespeare. The use of multi media has erased the fear of discussion of the various ways of teaching Shakespeare. The use of multimedia has erased the fear of learning classics like Shakespeare and his works. It also creates opportunities and develops strategies that permit students to dem-

•

Yoga Besides this the school encourages and coaches our students in many sporting events like Table Tennis, Lawn Tennis, Cricket, Football, Chess, Swimming, and Gymnastics. LPSSS students participating in interschool sporting events at the state and national level.

Can you tell us the nature of investment the school has made in the sports infrastructure.

At a distance of three furlongs from the school building, we have Podar Sport Academy and ground, where students are taken regular for their Physical Education Class and coached for ath-

To approach Shakespeare’s complex languages, we use a multimedia, watching a particular scene from a particular act on one screen and then reading the text of the play on screen. This serves as a model for teaching Shakespeare

onstrate, through their own work, the influence of language and visual images on thinking and composing likeminded matter.

What is your strategy to emphasise the need of sports development in the overall education of the student?

A sport has a critical role to play to improve the lives of people. Sports builds bridges between individuals and across communities providing fertile groups for sowing the seed of development and peace. At LPSSS we understand the need and importance of physical and mental health of our students. The regular Time Table offers our students weekly two periods of • PT • Aerobics

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letics, cricket, football, basketball, table tennis, and throw ball. Indoor sporting activities like gymnastics, karate, chess, carom, table tennis and skating are also taken care off.

What kind of challenges do teachers face while dealing with CCE system?

Introduction of Continuous and Comprehensive Evaluation has bought about a sea-change in the classroom. The main aspect of this change is the fact that assessment has become an integral part of the teaching-learning process.

There are not many challenges with regard the CCE system as we have seen a progressive growth curve with its introduction. The one off area of challenge in this system is dealing with student absenteeism. Especially with long sick

leaves where the student has missed out on a whole concept.

The other challenge teachers face while dealing with CCE system is that they have to be on the go all the time.

They have to continuously upgrade themselves and assess themselves. It also requires all teachers to be more interactive and have a sound knowledge of the students as applied to the various Bloom’s Taxonomy Process. Understanding and knowing every student should now be their priority.

What is your take on CBSE guidelines for CCE? CBSE introduced the CCE Scheme for doing a holistic assessment of a learner which also includes co scholastic area of Life Skills, Attitudes and Values, Sports and Games as well as Co-Curricular activities. The CCE scheme aims at addressing this in a holistic manner.

At LPSSS we do not outsource for any assistive software for CCE. We have our own well planned formative and summative evaluation throughout the year incorporated within the e-report card developed by our own IT Centre.

For 2012, we are taking the Detailed Assessment Program offered by Educational Initiatives, Ahmedabad they will be conducting at least 12 Formatives for the students, working jointly with our teachers on the lines of the syllabus covered. Being the first year, we have opted for only Std VI, VII and VIII for this program.

No doubt CCE can help in citing or learning problems and corrections/remedial for individuals, but the biggest challenge of the CCE is the grading system. The student scoring 90 marks and 99 marks will both score A – so it may seem unfair for some students.

Also a huge pool of students will be grouped together. A scenario emerges where all students scoring say above 91 per cent in all subjects will have the same cumulative grading. How can one rank them? The grading system may actually lead to more stress and disincentive to performance for many. Though with CCE, we are able to identify progress of students at regular time intervals on small portions of content.

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Potency Prevails in Smart Education Do the solution providers help you in setting up the infrastructure?

Yes, they provide all the infrastructure and installation. Their technical and e – learning coordinators provide regular trouble-shooting support. In case of any problem in an ongoing class, a teacher can call the coordinator for immediate help. A Smart Class register is maintained in all departments / staffrooms wherein all complaints are registered by teachers on a regular basis. These are resolved on a daily basis. A report on usage, troubleshooting and all areas of concern is mailed on a daily basis by the IT Coordinators.

Dr Manjula Goswami, Principal, Millennium School, Lucknow, shares her views on the deployment of new ICT enabled learning infrastructure at the school. www.themillenniumschools.com How has ICT helped you to achieve success in education field?

ICT can be used to great effect to improve understanding and performance in the target subject and to improve both learning and ways of learning. ICT has helped our teachers and students to develop as better and more informed personalities.

We have Educomp Technology enabled Classrooms with maximum number of Smart Class and various other technology enabled products like Mathguru, Educomp online, Wiziq, SAS, O3, CMPC etc.

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What kind of response do your high-tech education solutions see from students, teachers and also from the parents?

We have got amazing response from students and parents. Students who did not take interest earlier in studies are keen to learn through Smartclass. This has really improved the results. We also invite parents to demonstrate the Smartclass way of teaching. Parents appreciate this technology and very often adults want to repeat their school days with the new age tools.

What kind of challenges do teachers face while dealing with Continuous and Comprehensive Evaluation (CCE) system?

The CCE has been very thoughtfully designed after considerable research and as a motive to reduce the stress / pressure of board examinations for students. As change is the only constant, this kind of a change was sought in the education system. The CCE emphasis on Life Skill development, deployment of a variety of modes of evaluation and the clearly marked stress on Co-Scholastic development of students is the need of the hour. Young learners of the present generation clearly need an education system geared to prepare them for the challenges facing them in the 21st century. However, the CCE may not always be successful at its aim of reducing the stress for students and educators alike: • Change in any system, as all-pervasive as the CBSE in India’s school education, is bound to happen in phases and thus, the CCE is still in a state of flux, to a great extent. Changes in syllabi etc. add to the stress level of students. Thus, these should be communicated well ahead of the be-

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ginning of the academic sessions for the board classes. The communication procedures amidst schools and the CBSE definitely need to be more transparent, quick and effective.

• The Rubrics that need to be designed for the evaluation of Life Skill assessments are very tedious and difficult to achieve for teachers not adequately trained to create the same.

• With no reduction, on the contrary, increase in the syllabus to be covered, there is very little time left for proper development of Co-Scholastic activities within school hours.

What is your take on CBSE guidelines for CCE? The CCE is a very well-researched and needed change in the education system.

However, like most major changes, it shall take some time to move on from the state of flux to becoming a seamless new structure. Thus, the flow of information from CBSE to the schools needs to be wellorganised.

• The Inclusion of Life-skills and the emphasis on Co-scholastic develop-

We have got amazing response from students and parents.

Students who did not take interest earlier in studies are keen to learn through Smartclass.

This has really improved the results

ment of students is a praiseworthy effort by the CBSE. • The inclusion of Disaster Management in Social Studies is also a good addition, but it should be allocated more marks so that it is conducted seriously in schools.

• To reduce the pressure on students, the syllabus and marks allocated for Summative assessments can be reduced. Some sections can be evaluated through research-based learning techniques. For instance, students may conduct some real-time research and prepare dissertations. There can be viva-voce etc. on these. This shall go a long way at reducing the stress of an extensive syllabus to be prepared for an exam.

• The CCE can include some skill development trainings for teachers so that educators can be empowered enough to accept and adapt to the varied changes in the education environment and to understand the changing needs of young learners.

What is your strategy to emphasise the need of sports development in the overall education of the student?

Sports are an integral part of the education system.

Apart from the regular Sports fitness and Swimming classes, the school offers students a choice between various sports to be played regularly during their co-Curricular activity periods.

The student may choose between Basket Ball, Foot Ball, Lawn Tennis, Table Tennis, Badminton, Skating, Cricket and Shooting. Specialized trainers are engaged to train students on their chosen sport. Indoor Games like Chess, Scrabble and Carom are also available for students who prefer these. However, outdoor activities are compulsory. Yoga is an integral part of the daily assembly at the school. Regular Health checkups are conducted and students are trained about their general well-being and hygiene on a regular basis.

What kind of sports assessment system the school has?

Sports evaluation is a part of the Report

card in each term. The students are individually marked on Sporting Skill, Team Spirit and Interest. The report card also includes a detail of the students’ Height, weight, Vision, Oral Hygiene and reflexes.

Yoga is a special skill area on which the students earn Co-Scholastic grades in CCE. Can you give us an overview of the solutions that you are using in examination and assessment in your school?

We are using smart class SAS system.

It includes software, hardware receiver and remotes. The remotes are distributed among the students and with the help of SAS software, a questionnaire is displayed on the Smart board through projector with some options (MCQs). All students are required to push the correct option with the help of remotes. This activity is captured by the receiver. The Smartclass assessment software displays the correct answers student-wise and also compiles the results. This is time-saving for teachers and interesting for students. Moreover, with the SAS generated graphic analysis we directly come to know the areas of improvement to focus upon. The ‘O3’ technology, which connects the teacher’s laptop with students’ CMPCs, is also used for evaluations of soft copy assignments like PowerPoint Presentations. These may be assigned as group or individual work.

While the presentations can be evaluated through Rubrics, the content can be accessed through direct O3 (One-On-One) data sharing basis.

How the challenges of traditional examination methodology are overcome by the introduction of ICT? Compilation of assessment data is always an arduous task at hand for teachers. Thus, we have data management software to support the same. A Database management system for compilation of CCE and other evaluation marks and the printing of report cards is provided to the teachers who can enter the marks obtained and the skill-based grades get generated as per the percentage allocations defined by MLS and CBSE. The SAS is also used as an evaluation tool after each chapter. digitalLEARNING / june 2012

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Benefits of Digital Learning How has ICT helped you to achieve the targeted quantum of success?

We are currently using the Teach Next classroom solutions of Next Education India Pvt Ltd, and have found that the quality education and quality admission increases miraculously.

Pradeep Kumar Mishra, Principal, Foundation School, Buxar (Bihar) sees lot of benefits coming from digital learning tools in his school

How do you train your teachers to adopt e-content in your classes?

I have got my computer teacher trained

by Next Education people and they ensure that every teacher is using the system and every student is getting benefited equally.

Do you think e-Content has a long way to go in Indian education?

Yes. Surely it helps the Indian Education by providing quality animation for

http://foundationschool.in concept clarity. Next Education takes the whole responsibility to setup the infrastructure and to maintain the quality service.

What kind of challenges do teachers face while dealing with Continuous and Comprehensive Evaluation (CCE)?

Teachers have to maintain the records of every activity which comes in CCE Pattern. Their area of observation has increased increasing their work load.

What kind of CCE assistive software is being used by the school? We are using the CCE Software provided by Next Education in their server setup. It is very useful for teachers to mark entry and get report card generated in few minutes.

Embracing e-Content Solution Br Shaji Klavanal, Principal, Don Bosco Senior Secondary School, Kochi recommends e-Content for his students.

How has ICT helped you to achieve the targeted quantum of success?

The content and presentation has helped the students to better understand concepts. We get the e-content from Teach Next.

Till now what are the problematic areas you have come across in deploying e-content education system in your schools?

The competent of teachers in using the system was lacking and that was the only problem that we had in the initial phase of using e-content in our school.

We have sailed through the concern with the training given by our solution provider-Teach Next.

How have been the responses from both student teacher and student-parent community?

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Teachers are been finding it easy to explain certain concepts with the help of visual and animated experiments etc.

What is the role of solution providers in setting, replacing required e-content equipments?

Yes, they had installed the e-classroom, they replaces if systems don’t work and no extra charges charged.

What is your strategy to emphasise

the need of sports development in the overall education of the student?

Students are trained in one sport or games and special coaching is arranged for it.

An overview of sports infrastructure installed in the school?

Availability of ground for football, bascketball, hockey and indoor games area for Table Tenis, badminton etc.

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Smart Education for

Smarter Students www.scottishigh.com/index.html

Sudha Goyal, Principal, Scottish High International School, is of the opinion that education system has to be revamped to fulfil the needs of the next generation students

In what ways has e-content been helping you in providing proper education to your students?

Scottish High is dedicated to using modern tools for providing quality education to students We have an approach that puts learning and teaching at the centre. Creative teaching, assessing and evaluation techniques are used. We have e-content (mapped lessons) from IL&FS for English, Mathematics, Social Studies and Science. They have provided us the infrastructure such as Kyan, projectors and systems.

Tell us about the challenges that you face in deploying e-content in classrooms?

The teachers were apprehensive in using the e-content especially for subjects like Mathematics, Science and Social Studies where they struggle with the completion of syllabus. The traditional methodologies appear to be safe and reliable to them.

They were not very comfortable in using the technology in their routine teaching practices. It was really challenging to motivate teachers of all subjects to deploy econtent in their classrooms.

How do you train your teachers to adopt e-content in your classes?

We continually train the teachers so that they feel comfortable in using the e-content. Also we upgrade the e-content periodically so that the content is always in sync with the syllabus in specialised subjects. Besides, mapping topics in subjects like Mathematics, Science and Social Science with the e-content helps teachers in planning their topics in advance and conducting the classes using the e-content.

How do you think e-content has been beneficial for your students?

The students of 21st century are a different lot. They no longer live, communicate and socialise as we used to do. So they do not want to be taught the same way as we were taught. Students want to use engaging technologies in collaborative, inquiry based learning environments with teachers who are willing and able to use technology’s power to assist them in transforming knowledge and skills into products, solutions and new information.

There are many students who are not able to concentrate in the class. They get distracted easily with the traditional chalk

and board methodology. In a 35 minute period, the students with differentiated comprehensive skills are unable to grasp the content of the lecture/topic in the classroom. There is no scope of retention and in-depth understanding of the concepts for such students.

Can you give us an overview of the solutions that you are using for examination and assessment in your school?

We have in-house software for examination and assessment in our school. The Report Cards are compiled and generated at the conclusion of the First term and Final term of each session. The grades for all academic subjects, sports and extra-curricular activities are handed over to the Class Teachers by all subject in-charges. Then the examination department, ICT department and class teachers compile these grades and generate the reports through the in-house software installed in school.

CBT or computer-based training is a reproducible system of instruction conveyed through the use of a computer for the purpose of training an individual.

The assessments are also carried out periodically and are recorded electronically by all subject in-charges.

What are the benefits of new practices like CBT, IBT in examination and assessments over traditional methodologies?

Computer-based testing delivers a host of benefits directly to the examinee, examiners and the institute by: • Providing examinees with the convenience of scheduling their tests on the dates, times and locations most suitable for them • Reducing examinee response errors by presenting questions one at a time, if the test sponsor opts for this delivery method. Often, this allows the examinee to better focus on each individual test item • Facilitating re-testing by providing more immediate scoring and more frequent or continuous test administration • Seamlessly supporting reference materials and a variety of multimedia for more engaging assessment techniques. digitalLEARNING / june 2012

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Interview

Higher Education

Using Digital Technologies to Improve Academic Results Poonam Sharma, Group Director, Accurate Institute of Management and Technology, Greater Noida, in conversation with Sheena Joseph Cherian on digital technologies in engineering education. Excerpts: www.accurate.in What are your views on use of digital technologies in engineering institutions?

Digital technologies provide professors with a sense of ownership and motiva-

tion as they create their own lecture, add/edit content. Such technologies are of great help in illustrating concepts and reinforcing skills, facts and ideas effectively thus creating an enhanced classroom experience. An effective use also improves the academic results of the institution. It is also helpful in positioning the institution as technology-forward institution with state-of-the art infrastructure.

What are the digital technologies already deployed in the institute?

We have designed programmes, which equip professors with skills to integrate technology into the curriculum and customise their classroom lessons. A ceiling mounted projector, along with an interactive device is installed in classroom, with a CPU equipped with digital content and audiovisual resources. By utilising digital technology inter alia faculty members are able to do the following: • Share content with other teacher.

• Add/edit content.

• C r e a t e question papers.

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New digital teaching tools you are planning to deploy in future.

We are in the process of introducing complete digital set up in all areas of activities including Lab, Library, Classroom teaching, monitoring of attendance, evaluation system, etc.

Tell us about the practices in engineering education being followed at the institute.

With India becoming one of the fastest growing economies in the globe, the demand for industrially and technically skilled professionals is increasing. There are various practices we are following like, renowned faculty members, advance labs, industrial visits, brain storming sessions, case based study etc.

Please share your vision for future.

Accurate has a vision to produce students who have knowledge comparable to the top Institutes of the Country. Our motto remains to impart vibrant, comprehensive and innovative learning to our students enabling them to be technocrats, managers, entrepreneurs and leaders with strong cultural values and to provide an ideal teaching environment and ambience to develop their skills to meet the challenges of the global environment”. Our future plans include sponsored research and consultancies for private, public and government undertakings, patents, technology transfer and TBIU (Technology Business Incubation Units).

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AICTE Devices Mechanism to Register Complaints against Colleges All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) has invited stakeholders and outsiders to write to them in case of any malpractice on the part of any institution. The initiative intends to bring more accountability and transparency into technical education. This will give an option of receiving feedback and complaint through emails after it came to light that many institutions had been furnishing exaggerated information whenever the governing body sought it.

Directorate of Correspondence Courses and Distance Education, BU to Hold Contact Classes The Directorate of Correspondence Courses and Distance Education, Bangalore University, will be conducting contact classes at Government Arts College, K L E’s S Nijalingappa College, Government R C College of Commerce and Management for candidates who have registered for various undergraduate courses under the Open University Scheme at Directorate of Correspondence Courses and Distance Education for the academic year 2011- 12.

Visvesvaraya Technological University, Belgaum Signs MoU with EdCIL (India) The Visvesvaraya Technological University, Belgaum has signed MoU with Educational Consultants India Limited (EdCIL). EdCIL was established as a Public Sector enterprise by the Government of India in 1981, under the Ministry of Educa-

tion and Culture. EdCIL is a nodal agency for arranging admission and placement opportunities for foreign students to pursue their higher studies and training in Indian educational institutions.

Indian Schools Adopt Cloud In a move to provide superior education to students with collaborative learning tools, reputed schools like Delhi Public School, American School of Bombay, KR Mangalam have adopted Microsoft Live@edu, a cloud based service. Microsoft Live@edu enables institutions in brand building, social and professional collaboration, knowledge repository that leads to career opportunities.

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CourseLine® is an online learning platform that offers Hospitality Management Education courses from the American Hotel & Lodging Educational Institute (EI) in a digital format. These higher education courses are used in hospitality programs worldwide.

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CyberCinema® is an online platform that provides access to EI’s various hospitality training videos; many of which come with quizzes to gauge viewer comprehension.

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digitalLEARNING / june 2012 12-04249

Corporate Interview Diary Higher Education

“We Aim to Reach Out to 300 Schools

by End of this Year” Amitava Banerjee, Head of Marketing, Rumi Education, talks about the advanced solutions that his company is offering to schools, inconversation with Pragya Gupta, ENN

Please share the genesis of Rumi Education in India.

Rumi is an education solutions company that is dedicated to transforming the quality of education provided in schools.

We offer a host of education solutions that are world-class, comprehensive, cost-effective and enable partner institutions to greatly enhance learning outcomes. Rumi was established in 2008 by the Richard Chandler Corporation, a Singapore-based investment organisation. We strongly believe that making quality education cost-effective for all is the first step towards building a strong and prosperous society.

Tell us about Rumi’s classroom solutions.

Rumi Ready School is our introductory programme that enhances the school’s present curriculum. It can be implemented at any time during the academic year. The programme focuses on language development, communication skills and phonics training, conceptual tools for Math and enables students to acquire the skills that are essential for social interaction and knowledge absorption. The product is available for pre-primary, primary and high schools.

Rumi Smart School is a comprehensive programme that introduces core curriculum and runs throughout the academic year. The core curriculum includes specially conceptualised enhancement tools to boost inquiry-based learning that aims to satisfy students’ curiosity and offers an exploratory approach to build problem-solving and thinking skills. The tools are designed to develop confidence, critical thinking, and articulation skills that allow real-life

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application and lay the foundation for higher learning.

Rumi Digital Skills is an add-on programme. This award-winning digital education product has an IT-based curriculum and seeks to develop students for future employability.

Rumi English for Teachers present a rigorous curriculum that aims to improve the English speaking skills of teachers, thereby enabling them to communicate better with their students.

What is your opinion on the issue of having curriculum that is more employability specific?

‘Employability’ refers to a candidate’s potential to obtain a ‘job’, and should not be confused with the actual acquisition of the job. Whereas the world of employment has, by and large, been satisfied with the disciplinary understanding and skills developed as a consequence of participation in education, it has been less happy with the development of what has been termed ‘generic skills’, such as communication, team-work and critical thinking. Employability derives from complex learning, and is a concept of wider range than those of ‘core’ and ‘key’ skills.

And our programmes like Rumi Digital Skills and Rumi English for Teachers addresses just those gaps.

Please highlight your plans for the Indian market?

Successful imple-

mentation of our school education solutions leads to improved academic performance, better student attendance, reduced dropout rates and increased motivation, retention and engagement of teachers.

Our mission is to be the market leader in providing education solutions by offering comprehensive and sustainable education solutions that enable schools, teachers and students reach their full potential through effective and innovative teachinglearning methods. We aim to reach out to 300 schools by the end of this year.

Interview

Higher Education

Enabling Value Added Education Dr Picheswar Gadde, CEO, Lingaya’s University, speaks to Sheena Joseph Cherian, about the mission and vision of his institution http://lingayasuniversity.edu.in Tell us about the Lingaya’s University. What was the main inspiration that brought the university into being?

Lingaya’s University came into being in1998 with the simple objective of offering professional and technical education in North India. Most of the students were going from North India to South India as there was scarcity of good colleges in the North. We wanted to start an institution in Delhi, but those were the days when Delhi University was not giving affiliations. Indraprashtha (IP) came into being only in 1999. Faridabad was the nearest location to Delhi. So we decided to start there. Being a South Indian group, apart from the academics, we wanted to give more importance to the moral values and ethics. To an extent, we have been successful in the first year; we were amongst the top three colleges. In 2009, we completed ten years. As per the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) regulations, we needed ten years to become a deemed university, so we applied for I then. For that we needed to undergo very vigorous inspection. However, we got permission in January 2009.

Tell us about your views on providing job related skills to the students.

In the MNCs, where majority of students want find jobs, there is lot of competition; the MNCs give 60 percent emphasis on the academic part and 40 percent on the factors like: what is the attitude of the student, is he going to be a good team worker, how good is his body language, communication skills etc. So these are the very important things that we must also emphasise upon.

At Lingaya’s we follow a simple strategy, which says that if you manufacture a good product it will be definitely be sold in the market, if you don’t manufacture properly it won’t be sold.

We produce engineers and if they are good, they will be sold in the market otherwise they will not be sold. If we are just giving

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the degree for the sake of it, it means we are not doing justice.

How does Lingaya’s University distinguish itself from other technical universities?

There are certain systems that we have maintained at the Lingaya’s University. We are emphasising more on the Research and Development. We don’t emphasise on increasing the number of students or increasing the number of courses. The emphasis of the University is industry oriented. We do not emphasise on the academics; we see what the industry wants us to teach the students. Overall development of a child is also very important and this is what the Lingaya’s University emphasises on.

Tell us about your plans for building new institutes in Faridabad.

We want to build an international school in Faridabad. Haryana government has already given us the no objection certificate.

The idea and concept behind this is that we want to shape the child from nursery to the Phd. level. And hopefully we will be able to complete it in the coming years.

What are your future plans?

We have our colleges in Vijayawada, we have colleges in Delhi also and we want to expand further. We wish to expand outside India also. The concept is very clear. We want to expand our wings to California. We wish to have a system that allows a student to study for three years in India and then go to USA for doing his final year. One advantage is that the student has to pay lower fees, and the other advantage is that if he does his finishing course from there, he gets visa for two years as per the policy.

Same is for the Masters Program also; the student does one year here and one year there.

Advertorial

Pearson Brings America’s No.1 School Test to India The International standard of excellence in achievement testing for over 80 years, now has its own India edition. Pearson launches Stanford Achievement Test Series, Tenth Edition (India) in Kolkata

P

earson, the world’s largest education company, has launched Stanford Achievement Test Series, Tenth Edition (India) – Stanford 10 India in Kolkata. This is the Indian adaptation and standardization of the gold standard for achievement testing.

The Stanford 10 India was launched at a guest lecture event presided by Dr Jose Aikara, Chariman, ICSE Board, on ‘The Future of Assessment in Indian Schools’. Also present for the launch were principals and educationists from prominent schools in Kolkata.

Devised to suit the needs of the Indian education system, Stanford 10 India is a valid and a reliable tool needed for objective assessment of academic achievement based on application-based

Benefits and features of Stanford 10 India • Comprehensive assessment of achievement for students tested on Mathematics, English and Science • Wide range covered through eight test levels, from classes 3 to 10 • Easy-hard-easy format encourages students complete the test • Listening section, introduced for the first time in India for an indepth assessment of language skills • Full color testing materials engage and motivate children more effectively during test taking • Easy-to-navigate test documents offer a hassle free testing experience

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Dr Aikara (middle), Sabyasachi Mukherjee (left), Naveen Rajlani (right)

learning of classroom curriculum. It is mapped onto all educations boards in India such as ICSE, CBSE, and IB. Stanford 10 India enters India at an interesting juncture, when the country is slowly realizing that application of learning is more valuable than getting good marks by rote-learning. Stanford 10 India gives parents, teachers and the students a glimpse of where a child stands on a national percentile scale, unlike normal exams where the child is tested against her classmates alone. This test series measures student’s progress towards high academic standards. It includes a range of user friendly score-reports, designed with the inputs from administrators and teachers across the country and also supports teaching, learning and accountability requirements.

Speaking on the occasion, Naveen Rajlani, Senior Vice President, ELT and School, Pearson Education, said, “We, at Pearson, firmly believe that applicationbased learning fosters higher order of thinking skills such as problem-solving, critical thinking and creativity. Stanford Assessment Test Series’ relevance in the Indian educational environment is higher as more and more educators now realise that learning by rote is ineffective.

In our endeavour to bring the best for the

Indian education system, Stanford 10 India is yet another product, unmatched in its category. It will help schools in India change the way they educate students by helping and encouraging applicationbased learning over rote-learning.”

Dr Aikara is the current Chairman of ICSE commenting on the test said, “Achievement tests are essential for objective assessment of academic standards. Using application-based evaluation methods makes the learning and teaching process for the students and teachers more user-friendly and meaningful. Look at my hand. All my fingers do not have the same length or the same function. Hence, learning and assessments should be customized for each child.”

Commenting on the product, Sushil Eapen, Managing Director, Pearson Clinical and Talent Assessment, said, “Pearson has launched the Stanford Achievement Test, one of the best known student achievement tests in India. This test has been adapted and standardized for our country. Pearson will be introducing Mathematics, Science and English tests for grades 3-10 in India and has plans to introduce more subjects in future years.

The test will be beneficial for students, parents and teachers across India.”

wireless campus tech focus

Excellent Experience with WiFi

www.jklu.edu.in

Dr Upinder Dhar, Vice Chancellor of J K Lakshmipat University (JKLU), Jaipur speaks about digital technologies and wireless campus in the XXXXXX university to Pragya Gupta, Elets News Network (ENN)

XXXXXXX

Dr Upinder Dhar

Vice Chancellor, JKLU

Digital teaching technologies in education Digital technologies are transforming the education sector. The purpose of using such technologies is to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of delivery mechanism and at the same time involve the learners in the process. With the use of such technologies, teaching/learning has become more informal and geographical limitations have disappeared.

Students can now learn at their own convenience and professional education is literally coming out of the four walls of classrooms.

Digital technologies deployed at JKLU We have taken a conscious decision from day one that this is going to be a hightech university in terms of technology usage and deployment. To meet this end, all classrooms are equipped with LCD projection systems with remote operated motorized screens. Classrooms also have high-fidelity acoustics and all necessary audio-video facilities. The University has deployed video-conferencing facility from the very first day and the students are immensely benefitted in the form of expert lectures from academia located in different parts of the world. Not to mention, all classrooms are connected with the rest of the world in real time through high speed

WiFi Internet access. All academic and administrative processes are automated with the help of ERP software.

Wireless Campus The campus is fully wireless with highspeed wired connectivity available in the labs and IT centre. The University has invested in WiFi technology to enable seamless access to Internet/Intranet technology without any hassles. At the same time, students can also access learning resources on the go, without being tied to any specific location. Wireless campus improves the process of learning.

The major advantage is in the form of mobility of the students as well as facilitators. The students can access the online resources in the most unassuming places with ease and great convenience.

Wireless campus indeed improves the teaching learning process. The major advantage is in the form of mobility of the students as well as facilitators. The can access the online resources in the most unassuming places with ease and great convenience.

IT infrastructure is continuously evolving at JKLU, which has a most scalable and flexible IT policy. More access points are planned to be installed.

WiFi systems Experience Excellent browsing and downloading

experience with a strong encryption and secure infrastructure is a primary requirement. With hundreds of simultaneous users, controller based solutions with load balancing features and seamless roaming are being sought after. This is being done to ensure highest up-time as well as sound traffic management.

The final vendor has been chosen after live demonstration, scalability of the solution and commercials.

The WiFi network installed at JKLU campus is totally controller based. All access points are of advanced N-series type with 300 Mbps throughput. All the access points are centrally managed with the help of controller. The campus has around 30 access points covering the entire campus with each access point capable of supporting 90 simultaneous users with load balancing features. All hardware facilities are scalable and capable of smart wireless meshing which can meet the growing needs of the University in the years to come.

Key challenges in making the campus wireless Key challenge is in terms of speedy obsolescence and security concerns.

Companies should develop more secure and robust technologies keeping in mind the specific needs of educational institutes. digitalLEARNING / june 2012

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TECH focus

WIRELESS CAMPUS

“WiFi - The Solution for Connectivity in the Campus”

www.welingkar.org

Dr Uday Salunkhe, Director, Welingkar Institute of Management Development & Research, Mumbai and Bangalore, spoke to Rachita Jha on the importance of WiFi and other tools of connectivity play in the process of teaching Tell us the reasons for which you have invested in WiFi technology for the campus?

WiFi serves a very important purpose of linking faculty with students as well as with one another. It leads to the creation of the necessary infrastructure for faculty engagement. It supports both: formal and informal learning and communications among all on the campus. For most students, the WiFi networks are the primary way of connecting while on the campus.

Seamless access to email, and other avenues of learning, can dramatically change the way our students go about their academic pursuits. WiFi can lead to a convergance between voice and video, while liberating the students from the constraints of location. WiFi is also easy for the administration to manage as they have to manage only one central Access Point (AP).

How did you decide on the company to install WiFi technology on campus?

We looked at a company that had the capabilities to accommodate a wide range of devices as technology keeps evolving. Technology is not only fast paced, it also springs surprises. Also, for a company that could offer a good backend support.

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Tell us more about the wireless network at Welingkar campus.

Our institutions is one of the first WiFi enabled campuses (2001) with a proper data centre, a Giga Ethernet backbone and enterprise backend solutions. WiFi comes with the speed of 54 mbps. One AP and can cater around 90 students at a time.

There are around 35 APs. The Institute has a 10 mbps Internet bandwidth with backup arrangements to ensure minimum downtime. Students using their own laptops and other devices such as tablet PCs can avail of the Internet through the WiFi from any place on the campus.

In what ways is the technology helping the students?

1. Students can roam around the campus and still be in touch with their class. They can be reached through Internet whenever required.

2. The WiFi systems are also enabling video conferencing and audio video lectures. In our distance learning programmes with the virtual classroom facility, technology has almost nullified the distance. We are accessible to our students worldwide at a click.

3. Global events like Global Jam Session which saw a concurrent participation of entrepreneurs and innova-

tors from around 40 nations went on swimmingly; now talent sharing is not constrained by geography. Web has given a virtual global platform to talent in all domains.

4. Welingkar’s IT has the wherewithal to conduct online synchronised training sessions and online exams.

Each class room is also equipped with a PC, Projector and audio devices. Some of the classrooms are also enabled with Video Conference.

5. Admissions, placements internship all these require students to be well-connected. We have some very reputed companies that have been recruiting via video conferencing on campus.

What are the key challenges in the use and adoption of Wi-Fi on campus?

Setting up a campus-wide WiFi system has its share of challenges. Security is a big area of concern. We are trying our best to prevent any unauthorised access to the network.

There should be streamlined inbuilt channels for each individual user within the network. Welingkar does have this facility but it has to be further updated.

Other concerns include coverage, capacity and density.

wireless campus tech focus

“Connectivity that makes us SMILE” Santanu Mishra, Co founder and Executive Trustee of Smile Foundation spoke to Pragya Gupta, about wireless campus

http://smilefoundationindia.org

Tell us about your Wireless campus.

We are making our Smile Twin e-Learning Programme (STeP) centres across 60 locations in India completely Wi-Fi enabled. It’s very important to have Wi-Fi campus because as it reduces the cost of wires along with the complexities of connectivity. The maintenance cost comes down. It also helps in seamless teaching and learning.

How critical is wireless campus in creating better teaching learning outcomes?

The role of wireless campus for the enhancement of teaching learning process is vast. Wireless campus supports

everyday activities unobtrusively and seamlessly in classroom contexts. Projectbased learning is facilitated as teachers and students can engage in teaching and learning via Wi-Fi. Also, it gives the class freedom and spontaneity in learning as the teaching is in progress.

Tell us about the ways by which the institute is making use of digital and connectivity related technologies?

We aim towards connecting all our institutes with WiFi for availing the maximum mobility. Also we are looking forward to convert our institutes into virtual classrooms for maintaining the quality of education through the country. We are

195*136, 3mm bleed both side

looking forward in conducting virtual recruitments for increasing job opportunities of our students. In near future, we may facilitate free teaching of our students by connecting our classrooms with the best of the institutes and colleges.

What new digital teaching tools do you plan to deploy in future?

Our centres are already being upgraded with WiFi networks, which will reduce the cost and complication of wires. Also cloud computing is being made availed to all the centres. The main idea is to provide virtual classes across the country to all our students. In future we will like to introduce virtual recruitment process.

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TECH focus

WIRELESS CAMPUS

“We are Going to Acquire More APs” www.niituniversity.in

application of technology and engineering to improve their understanding of fundamental and often complex concepts, in a way, that makes sense to them through exploration of the established norms.

Akhlesh Agarwal

VP – Learning Technologies, NIIT University (NU)

Akhlesh Agarwal, VP – Learning Technologies, NIIT University(NU), talks about Wireless Campus and digital technology tools in education

Tell us about your views on the use of digital teaching technologies in Education.

Technology is complimentary to teaching. Digital resources have the potential to enhance science, technology, engineering and mathematics education by providing access to innovative curricula, stimulating applets and other hands-on resources.

Use of the digital learning technologies engage students in the everyday

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What are the digital technologies that have already been deployed in the university?

Our focus is to use the best of technologies to increase effectiveness of teaching learning process. We use Open source LMS Moodle, where all the faculty members upload class content and also use it for online quizzes and assignment. The LMS is integrated with mail and SMS gateway to communicate effectively with students.

We also use a Synchronous Learning technology (SLT) to deliver lectures to students who are not on campus. SLT technology allows us to provide the best possible combination of Work integrated learning.

We use electronic, digital whiteboard technology in some of the courses to use the interactive digital content efficiently. Recently, we have also deployed an online hostel management and gate-pass management system to streamline the student in and outflow to reduce the paper usage.

Tell us about the new digital teaching tools the university plans to deploy in future.

We are in the process of implementing a digital library, where all the faculty members will be able to make any digital content available to all the students in the university. This will be an addition to the content in the LMS, which is accessible to only students of the specific batch/ course.

We are also starting a pilot of the Mobile based attendance system that will facilitate accuracy in the attendance system and will save time for the faculty member. Moreover, a student information management system will also be implemented from the

forth-coming academic year, which will include academic records, fee records, and hostel and library management.

What kind of features do you generally seek in WiFi solutions for education?

A WiFi campus network offers teachers and students, a diverse and secure access to the information they need.

We decided to give only wireless LAN in hostel, so we were looking for solution that should fulfill the need of student of Internet. We have explored various companies based on the following criteria: latest standards with higher bandwidth support, video streaming, coverage of maximum area. In addition, it should offer single Access Point (AP) to support the maximum users with friendly diagnostic tools. The controlled performance monitoring capabilities is also one of the important criteria.

Wi-Fi Access Point(AP) in NU campus is of latest ‘n’ standard and dual band. We have installed 54 APs to cover the academic block, hostels and open area. The speed varies from 100 Mbps to 300 Mbps.

All (400+) students on campus can access the Wi-Fi simultaneously. All APs are centrally controlled. we are going to acquire some more APs. Tell us about the key challenges that you faced in implementation of WiFi solutions.

The key challenges in the use and adoption of WiFi on campus includes the placement of Access Points. It should be done in such a way that minimum number of APs should cover the maximum area, with redundancy. Also, efforts should be taken to eradicate issues like- WiFi is slower than any other Internet connection and it does not support the bandwidth-oriented applications like Streaming Video, Live Lecture Feed, etc.

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TECH focus

WIRELESS CAMPUS

, nt his e d si res f e Pr sha e o st e e ic RC, anc lat V t e , ty SAA por th the gya t e d r a m Sh ia & e i an fo Pr h h k h e es Ind on t wor labl wit j Ra sco ts net vai ent Ci sigh ss y a gm g se in rele olo n i w chn tio te uca ed pta Gu

Rajesh Shetty

Vice President, Cisco India & SAARC

“Education Sector to Spend USD 704 Million on IT” How do you see the role of wireless campus for better learning delivery outcomes?

Wireless campuses benefit both students and teachers. For instance, apart from uploading assignments and sharing related links on mails, students can access information on-the-go, listen and view virtual classes at a time convenient to them. Most importantly, it enables the institutes to reach out to students who are physically challenged or students who stay in far off places, enabling them to view lessons remotely.

Furthermore, with students today adopting tablets and other devices, many educational institutes are embracing the concept of BYOD (bring your own

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device) to enhance learning and teaching. Going wireless helps as it addresses the need to be connected constantly and provides seamless networking, ensuring improved student engagement.

Please tell us about the most popular solutions among institutes.

Universities and educational institutions today are using a diverse range of technologies. However, the fundamental need is for robust network that would allow all stakeholders of an institute, including the staff, administration and students, to be connected on one platform. This enables the institute to recognise relevant applications and

technologies to suit their purposes. Most institutes opt for solutions with focus on video communication, collaboration tools, IT-as-a-Service, or any combination of services and applications. Some of the solutions provided by Cisco for educational institutes are – Unified Communications, Mobility, Digital Media System, Notifi-ED, Smart+Connected Communities, Physical Security, and Cisco CloudVerse.

What is the market size of WiFi in India? What is the contribution of education in that?

Over the last few years, WiFi has been the preferred medium through which individuals are connecting to the internet

WIRELESS CAMPUS TECH focus

and social networking sites. According to a report issued by WiFi Alliance in 2009, the WiFi market in India is supposed to hit $1billion in 2012.

Last year, the sector was estimated at Rs 3,000 crore. This is slated to grow further by 25-30 percent this year. New areas such as e-learning, digital classrooms and campus networking are growing within this sector. The Indian education sector is one of the largest in the world, with over 600 universities and about 13 lakh education institutes, presenting a huge opportunity to technology vendors.

According to a Springboard Research, India’s education sector will also step up its IT spending to USD 704 million in 2012.

Please comment on the adoption of WiFi by the higher education institutes in India?

Digital revolution has just begun in the education sector of India. This can be largely attributed to students having access to the net on their smart phones and tablets. This has prompted institutes to invest in technology to develop their IT infrastructure and provide better learning experiences. The demand for WiFi in education can also be partly attributed to foreign collaborations, working professionals opting for higher education online etc. Like we said before, this sector has a huge potential and we foresee investments growing in the near future.

The Indian government is also playing an important role in driving the adoption of digital technologies in the education sector. Under the 11th Five Year Plan (2007-12), National Mission on Education through Information and Communication Technology (NMEICT) has been set up to provide digitised content, connectivity and low-cost computing devices to the higher education sector in the country.

What challenges do you face while deploying solutions in educational institutes?

While institutes are adopting technology, there is still room for improvement.

The primary roadblock for IT adoption is a low perceived ROI. Another challenge we face is the comfort level and familiarity with technology among faculties who are slow in adapting to new

technologies and devices. Furthermore, lack of digital content and courses, fragmented material, copyrights are other common issues. Huge data demand, infrastructure, delay in decision making and user density at the campus are other common concerns that need to be considered while deploying.

What Security features are being deployed to eliminate possibility of data breaches and to control the students from accessing unauthorised sites?

During deployment itself, Cisco ensures utmost security of the network. Cisco offers Cisco Self-Defending Network technology, including Cisco Network Admission Control Enterprise-class security with a built-in intrusion prevention system (IPS) and intrusion detection system (IDS). Threat Defence is another security feature that provides real-time RF monitoring for rogue detection and self-management. The product also offers a centralised network management of campus, branch office, and remote locations from a single management console, thereby enabling a tightly integrated secure network. Cisco also offers integrated mobility services for security, voice services, guest access, and location services.

What advice would you like to give to the education institutes planning to go for wireless networks?

In India quality educational institutes are mostly concentrated in urban areas and students are often forced to choose their specialisation based on proximity and course cost. Education institutes can overcome this problem by going wireless.

Wireless environments will also help faculties to mould the future workforce, improve campus efficiencies, streamline operations, and enable real-time connectivity through any device. Students will benefit from the exposure to technology, as more and more corporate houses are looking for job-ready candidates who are tech savvy.

With students today expecting services such as video conferencing, live streaming of video, virtual classrooms and social media access through high

speed internet connections, there is a significant strain on the wireless infrastructure. Education institutes should deploy solutions which can cater to these requirements and should be willing to pay a premium for solutions which are scalable and reliable.

While deploying wireless infrastructure, educational institutions should also keep in view security above the traditional UTM solutions. Data loss prevention and content filtering are requisites for any educational institution migrating to technology infrastructure.

Please throw some light on the latest trends and futuristic solutions in wireless segment.

Operators are experiencing (or will experience) congestion in their networks especially in densely populated areas. To alleviate the congestion, many operators are turning towards WiFi networks to offload data traffic. However, WiFi networks in its current form of implementation bring several challenges for wide user adoption. WiFi Hotspot network selection is a manual process and the browser based authentication is not seamless and further requires user intervention.

To overcome these challenges, WiFi Alliance has launched a new standard called “Passpoint technology”. This standard would allow people to access a carrier’s Wi-Fi without needing to type a passcode or selecting a Wi-Fi hot spot. The technology automatically authenticates users and it layers on security that is typically missing from some Wi-Fi hot spots. Depending on roaming agreements between carriers, this technology also provide the users to access more than one Wi-Fi network.

Wi-Fi Alliance will start certifying carrier networks and the devices with Passpoint technology from June 2012.

802.11ac, also known as 5G-WiFi, is a new standard currently under development and is the next step after 802.11n.

This specification will enable multi-station WLAN network to achieve datarates upto 1 Gigabit per second. This is accomplished by extending the air interface concepts embraced by 802.11n: wider RF bandwidth (up to 160 MHz), more MIMO spatial streams (up to 8), multi-user MIMO, and high-density modulation. digitalLEARNING / june 2012

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TECH focus STORY

WIRELESS CAMPUS

“We Are Open to New Investments in Technology” www.lpu.in curity of the network is also an issue that needs our attention. Further expansion in network and the prospects of switching on to a higher technology in future is also being contemplated.

Do you see any improvements in teaching-learning process after having the wireless campus?

A wireless campus goes a long way in creating a culture of free sharing of information.

The giant strides India has made in professional education in the last decade can be attributed to the access of information to the students via Internet. With the progression of time, a larger student base has got access to Internet, and this augurs well for Indian education as a whole. So, the role of WiFi cannot be underestimated. Some of the key advantages of having a WiFi campus include multi-user log in facility, getting rid from the maze of wired networks, better connectivity and higher signal strength, lesser frequency of service disruption, ease to use, cheaper deployment of (LANs), enhanced security, etc.

Please share key challenges in the adoption of WiFi on campus?

A multitude of challenges are faced in the use and adoption of WiFi on campus.

The major one is the integration of a new solution with the existing set up, which sometimes acquires tedious propositions.

Distributing the spread of the network on a uniform basis across a large area is yet another big challenge. Sometimes, the layout of certain buildings is such that it retards the penetration of the signal in its interior, which again poses serious troubles. Then, when the coverage area is vast and access points are in large number, it becomes difficult to address a problem arising at distant location remotely from the control centre. Training of users is another challenge inherent in setting up a WiFi campus.

Companies should go in for an extensive survey before laying down the network. The survey will help in identifying the weak links in advance, which can be addressed in a timely manner. Secondly, there should be a Fibre Backbone at the back end to ensure that the services are not hampered when new applications are integrated, or the usage surges. Finally, in a bid to cut costs, the companies should not compromise on aspects that ultimately lead to setting up of a weak network.

Tell us about the WiFi network at your campus.

In hardware, we have deployed equipments of Cisco and Ruckus and have configured it with Juniper. We are using software like LDAP and Active Directory. The maximum speed of our WiFi network is of the tune of 64 -100 mbps. We have 1000 WiFi points in our campus, to which nearly 40,000 students can log in at a given point of time.

Our prime concern is to provide seamless, uninterrupted, high quality Internet connectivity to all the students, faculty members and other staff. And with an army of more than 30,000 Internet users in the campus, this is a daunting task. The se-

Do you have plans to acquire more devices for wireless?

Yes, we will certainly be upgrading our existing system on a continuous basis – in sync with the emergence of new technologies. We are open to make new investments in technology as long as it benefits our students.

Aman Mittal

Deputy Director, Lovely Professional University (LPU)

Aman Mittal, Deputy Director, Lovely Professional University (LPU), in conversation with Pragya Gupta, shares his insights on importance of Wireless Campus Please share your views on the use of digital teaching technologies in education?

The infusion of digital teaching technologies is revolutionising systems of education everywhere in the world. We now have access to advanced tools of imparting quality education. Use of digital teaching technologies in India is of utmost importance, as we need to accelerate the process through which we can build up the human resource base.

Digital technologies should not be identified only with higher education; but there is a greater need to infuse them in primary and middle education as well.

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Sports Education

Jack, No More a Dull Boy with Sports Outsourcing “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy - the very famous saying goes well with today’s young children. They might not be bookworms, but they are mostly lazy bones as they have limited options to indulge in sports and physical activities”

By Pragya Gupta, Elets News Network (ENN)

A

decade ago children used to play for long hours. But the expansion of cities happened in such a way that this has become applicable to almost every student studying in schools especially in metro cities. There are parks, but many of them have restrictions. The sports coaching are far from home and parents are busy in earning, all these leave children with very few options. The stress of studies and other extra- curricular activities have also robbed their free time to play.

Such urban environments lead to the development of lazy habits in kids, who prefer to have fun with TV and computer games.

Vasanth Bharadwaj, Co-Founder of TENVIC says, “The natural tendency of a child is to play. Sports are a necessary part of the growing up process, and it is often independent of any expectations to develop excellence at it. From the perspectives of focus and determination as well

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as courage and persistence, sports is a source of many invaluable lessons in life”.

Many institutions seem to have developed the opinion that the best possible way of providing quality sporting facility to their students is to outsource sports to competent private companies.

Sports education outsourcing-On a rise Government has now started emphasising on the importance of sports and physical education at the school level.

But schools have their own challenges; they do not have the proper infrastructure and the trainers. The mindset is a challenge; some traditionalists believe that sports is not as important as other branches of study.

CBSE, ICSE and other state boards and governments have seriously taken it on their agenda for having sports education in schools with some regulations and compliances associated with it.

To fulfil the need of sports education,

schools are now looking out to acquire sports and physical education infrastructure. Schools have been joining hands with companies to provide complete sporting solutions from infrastructure to curriculum and training.

Mostly eminent sportsmen are associated with these companies or directly with schools.

Some of the leading sports solution providers in the Indian education segment are Edusports, Kooh sports, Sportseed, Tenvic, The Sports Gurukul, and Leapstart, etc. The charges depend on the service they offer to each child. The range starts from rupees 150 per child.

Jay Shah, Director, The Sports Gurukul says, “The country does not have very well trained faculty yet in sports education. By outsourcing the sports faculty needs to private companies, institutes can start offering quality sports facilities to their students at very low costs. Focused effort on developing

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KOOH - IMRB survey result indicates the following: Schools: • Out of the total 394 schools surveyed 70 percent of the schools were interested in sports outsourcing • Out of 394 schools surveyed 14 per cent have outsourced their PE program • 75 per cent of the interested schools have some form of sports facilities that includes sports ground and sports equipment • On average each interested school caters to 7 sporting discipline and have 2 Physical Trainers per school • Kids spend 90 minutes per week on PE classes Colleges: • Out of the total 120 colleges surveyed 75 percent of the colleges were interested in sports outsourcing • None of the colleges that were interested have outsourced their PE program • 55 per cent of the interested colleges have some form of sports facilities that includes sports ground and sports equipment • On average each interested college caters to 7 sporting disciplines and have 3 Physical Trainers per college • Average number of students interested in sports was 250 per college

“The country does

not have very well trained faculty yet in sports education.

By outsourcing the sports faculty needs to private companies, institutes can start offering quality sports facilities to their students at very low costs. Focused effort on developing sports education in schools will only help in creating a fitter generation and it will also result in our bagging high awards at major international events Jay Shah Director, The Sports Gurukul

sports education in schools will only help in creating a fitter generation and it will also result in our bagging high awards at major international events”.

Martin Gleeson, Chief Executive Officer, Sports Education Development India Ltd says, “Sport is a rapidly developing industry in India and alongside the professionalism on field there is also a growing need for qualified sports management professionals to effectively administer sporting associations, events and sports programs.”

Some international schools and big school chains have shown aggression in adopting sports education but the level of adoption is not yet up to the mark.

KOOH-IMRB has conducted a research across 394 English Medium

Schools across all boards and 120 colleges in India. The Survey was conducted in 8 cities in India including Mumbai, Pune, Bangalore, Chennai, Chandigarh, Delhi, Hyderabad, and Kolkata.

In this special focus on sports education, digitalLEARNINING has made an attempt to talk to education outsourcing companies and schools alike on the importance of sports on the overall develoApment of a child and about sports outsourcing in India. >>>

”

digitalLEARNING / june 2012

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Sports Education

“Reaching Out to the Un-served Segments of Schools” Founded in 2009, EduSports began its operations with 10 schools. Now the company is working with more than 130,000 children in schools located in 60 cities. Saumil Majumdar, Co- founder and CEO, EduSports, shares his views on need of sports education in India …

How can it be fun enough when there is dearth of parks, the kids are being forced to play on roads. Their games often get them on the way of their neighbours and the traffic on the road. Therefore the kids hardly have any alternative except watching TV and playing video games. I am of the opinion that if the kids are given a good playground and good sporting equipment, they will prefer the playground to the best video game or TV programme.

Why is there a need for outsourcing of sports in India?

The boards have made it mandatory to have certain number of classes on physical education and sports education. Having trained teachers on the roll is also a must. So at a regulatory level, it is accepted as a critical part of education. During the last 20-30 years, sports in India have not got the kind of importance it deserved. Children used to play on their own after school hours. They could as there was no dearth of open areas.

But now the situation has changed. In urban areas we hardly have any open space. There is scarcity of playgrounds. Perhaps we are expecting the kids to get their exercise in the gym. But gym is not the same thing as a sports field. That is why it is important for schools to have adequate sporting facilities.

Do you thing computers, video games and television have taken away the time share of kids?

It is important to know why kids play. Kids don’t play with the intention of becoming healthy; they play because they want to have fun. So we need to find out if the current playing fun?

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Tell us about the growth that you are expecting.

With more awareness about the category and wider acceptance of our philosophy, we expect to double our turnover every year. About 1 million children will play with the EduSports programme by 2014-2015. Considering that there are potentially 15,000+ early adopters (Private schools with a tuition fee of at least INR 1250 a month), EduSports expects the robust growth to continue. All the policy changes (CBSE, Government mandates) supports the idea of sports/physical education for all and will only add to the growth. Expanding within India to newer geographies with the existing proposition (More cities and schools), reaching out to the un-served segments of the schools (Pre-Schools), and enhancing our existing impact through addition of complementary services (e.g. Infrastructure, Middle School, Training the Trainers etc.) will help us realise the goals of the company.

Please share with us the details of your Expansion Plans.

We are expanding our partnerships with schools in Gujarat.

We offer sports and PE curriculum to about eight schools comprising 5,500 students in Gujarat. We are looking at partnering with another 10 such schools in Gujarat whereby we will extend our reach to over 10,000 students in the state. Of these, we intend to initiate training in five schools by June this year.

Any plan for diversification?

EduSports does not plan to diversify beyond the school-sports business focus. In order to strengthen the value proposition to schools, EduSports has just started the sports infrastructure business. Other initiatives like Leagues, GetActive Workbooks, EduSports Academy of Coaching Excellence, etc. are designed to ensure that our core position as India’s largest school sports provider gets strengthened.

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“Our target is to provide sporting facilities to 3 lakhs kids in next three years” skill set. So coaching skills and playing skills need to be matched for someone to be a sports coach. Second aspect is that most of schools in India and in metros do not have infrastructure like fields for outdoor games, whereas few schools in Pune, Chandigarh have fields. Third challenge is that India doesn’t have any sports curriculum in place. From kinder garden to 12th standard we need to have proper curriculum for sports like we have for maths, biology, physics etc.

Shrikant Hazare, Chief Marketing Officer, KOOH Pvt Ltd talks about dynamics of Indian education market

How important is sports education in the overall development of a student?

From an Indian context, sports education is still not a priority and why I say that is because there exist large number of issues in sports education. I would break it into three aspects; one is getting quality sports coaches. One could find good sportsmen, but sports coaches are difficult to find because teaching is a different skill set and playing is a different

What is your opinion of the private sector initiatives in the school sports space?

There are very few companies which are into this business. We have got a start for sure and this is a positive sign.

Corporates have started getting into sports education; they have also made forays into formal education space. One of the companies’ active in education space is ours.

Do you think that private sector initiatives in sporting field will create a positive difference?

It will definitely create a difference. I see lot of plusses happening and also before entering into sports education space we did some research with IMRB across 394 schools and 120 colleges in 8 cities, including include Mumbai, Pune, Delhi, Bangalore, Chandigarh and Chennai. We found that 70 percent of those schools and 75 percent of colleges show interest in outsourcing sports, which is a real boost where outsourcing and business of sports education is concerned.

How many schools are you working with right now?

I will not get into the rigmarole of identifying the number of schools, as the number of students vary from school to school. The number of students being trained is more important.

Some schools have 500 students, some have 2000 and some have 1000. Currently, we are addressing about 14000 students across 8-9 cities in India.

What is the dynamics of sports education solutions market in India? Tell us about the aspects of things like growth rate, opportunities, etc.?

See the base is so small that high growth is assured. In any case, it makes no point to anticipate growth rates of as much as 40 percent, because we are not operating in a mature market. There is a huge potential and growth prospect.

So there are lot of opportunities?

Opportunity is huge. We have more than lakh of schools in India and we have barely started scratching the tip of the iceberg. There is lot that can be done.

Tell us about your expansion and investment plans in this segment?

Our founders are Sushil Kumar and Prabhu Srinivasan. We stared with an initial seed capital of one million. Our target is to provide sporting facilities to 3 lakhs kids in next three years. We are geared to make that kind of investment to address 3 lakhs kids. digitalLEARNING / june 2012

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Sports Education

“The Next Sachin or Dhoni is Out There” benchmarked programmes such as Cricket Education Programme provides a solution to the sporting needs of a school. The provision of trained coaches, a syllabus for training and an additional focus on the soft skill development of the child provide impetus to classroom based subjects. To support an individual’s academic growth, sport is able to develop the key values of integrity, honesty, respect, pursuit of excellence, leadership, team work and performance.

Martin Gleeson, Chief Executive Officer, Sports Education Development India Ltd, talks about sports education and role of private partnership Please highlight the current scenario for Sports Education in schools in India?

Sports education is a growing field and with a focus on educational outcomes and not just talent identification, sport education is providing ‘more than just sport’.

Parents are increasingly demanding a higher quality sport experience and exposure for their children. Classroom teachers are being trained, certified and provided with a syllabus for teaching to upgrade their skills. Unfortunately, sport in schools has not had the same standards or benchmarks that was attached to it in the past.

The good thing is that now the scenario has started evolving and the emergence of new sport education programmes is helping us in is proving to be more helpful to the students.

How do you see the acceptance of sports education in school curriculum?

The inclusion of quality based and

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How important are the private partnerships for school in providing better sports facilities?

Sporting facilities are very important in schools. The provision of a suitable facility allows a child to mix sporting activities will classroom based education. Obviously the quality of the programme and teaching needs to be of high standards.

How do you enhance the skills of students to produce more Sachin and Dhoni?

We can produce the next Sachin or Dhoni if we can ensure a holistic developmental system, which helps in fostering an all round development of the student. A systemised programme will help to build the

foundations for success. The next Sachin or Dhoni is out there. It’s our role to provide the programme and infrastructure to allow that talent to reach its potential.

Please highlight sports education solutions that you are offering to schools?

Currently, we are offering a specialised cricket programme through Cricket India Academy, our cricket division. We have secured the rights to Cricket Education Programme in Affiliation with Cricket Australia. The programme is a six level curriculum based coaching programme with inbuilt assessment and performance monitoring. Our coaches combine their local knowledge and experiences with specific training and accreditation from Cricket Australia.

The response to the programme has been very good so far. Across five major cities, there are 17 Cricket India Academy centres with over 950 children. In fact, we are currently offering franchising opportunities for interested partners.

Cricket India Academy is our first division and we are currently in discussions with a few other sports about developing similar quality based and benchmarked programmes.

Attention School Principals

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Inviting School Leaders to join us at School Leaders Conclave SCHOOL TRACK PARTNERS

Programme chair

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Prof Sudhir K Jain Director, IIT, Gandhinagar

Prof V S Ramamurthy Director, National Institute of Advanced Studies (NIAS)

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K-12

Sports Education

“Schools Adopt Sports “Modern from a Compliance Parents Prefer Perspective” Schools with Sudhanshu Fadnis, Founder Director & CEO, Sportseed, speaks on the subject of acceptance of sports education in India

Good Sporting Facilities”

Objective of Sportseed in India

Jay Shah, Director, The Sports Gurukul talks about the necessity of having quality sports education in schools

The National Sports bill has been tabled by Shri Ajay Maken, Honourable Minister of Sports. The bill is focussed on broad basing sports in education system of India. The broad basing is in terms of reaching out to Panchayat, villages, etc. with sports other than the most popular sports like football and cricket.

Second thing, which the bill is looking at, is excellence in sports where India is likely to do well in the next 8-10 years. We at Sportseed are focussed on offering the kind of sports curriculum that is in line with the objectives of the National Sports Bill. We differentiate sports education and physical education in our own way. Sports education is a subset of physical education. Our focus is on sports education. We try to focus on various developments in kids through the medium of sports.

In the lower classes where the development objective is typically body balance, the child is required to do balance beam. But in our case, we are doing that doing with sports association.

Due to limited access to land in cities and towns, we thought of creating mobile centre of excellence to achieve our next objective of attaining excellence. There are two types of constraints that children face. Firstly, they are unable to reach the sporting facilities as the cities are getting bigger. Secondly, the space is not large enough to accommodate all the kids.

That is why we are taking the whole thing into the schools and introducing the various Olympics and Asian games level sports in the schools. Our focus is on non-mainstream sports like Archery, Horse shoe, etc.

We want to create excellence in these sports from the school level to identify and groom the talent.

Acceptance for outsourcing of curriculum by schools The maturity is yet to come. The existing players existing facing challenges that have to do with traditional mindset of schools. Typically schools have very few PE staff. Schools look at sports as an empty activity. In fact, more importance gets provided to things like art or music. PE is not accepted as a subject like maths and science, which every child in the class has to study compulsorily. If schools were to be of the view that sports has to be made compulsory then much better training can be provided to the children.

Expansion plans Currently, we are working with close to 50 schools. We are largely based out of Delhi-NCR. But we are eager to start extending our footprints. By end of 2014, we will be present in four states in the country. We will move to Gujarat and Maharashtra in the west. In south we will target Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh.

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How do you see the acceptance of sports education in a curriculum by schools, students, parents, and teachers?

Sports education is gaining good amount of support from institutions. A new breed of international schools have started focusing actively on sports. In fact, these new age schools have started using their excellent sporting infrastructure to garner new support from parents.

Modern parents prefer to enrol their children in schools with good sporting facilities.

How important are the private partnerships for school in providing better sports facilities?

This is the critical aspect. Schools will have to look at raising revenues and investing in better sports facilities. Sports infrastructure entails heavy capital investments, at times the schools are not capable of developing that kind of investments by themselves. Also the technology involved is also very advanced. The bottom line is that it is much better for schools to outsource their sporting requirements to private players.

Please highlight your contribution for the development of sports in schools?

We have done lot of work in the field of sports.

We have worked with more than 8 schools Ajmera Global School, Holy Family School, Billabong High International School, Thane, Billabong High International School, Juhu.

Some of our achievements include the setting up India’s first full size tennis court on a terrace, also provided sports training opportunity to over 15000 kids in the last 10 years.

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Sports Education

Private Partnerships for Focused Approach to Sports

Vasanth Bharadwaj, Co-Founder and former Table Tennis International, TENVIC, shares his views on the development of sports education school

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How do you see the acceptance of sports education in school curriculum?

Although sport education in India has evolved in the past few years, there is no denying that there is lack of structure and scientific approach to coaching. Developing competency in sports has to start along with physical education and fitness at a young age, but schools still have some way to go towards adopting a sporting culture at the grassroots levels and towards having people with the right set of competencies to train children at a particular sport. That’s the differentiator we bring in and that is what we offer.

Our engagement with parents has helped us in understanding certain assumptions that we made. Apart from being encouraging they are far more involved than we thought. A lot of parents’ especially in Tier 1 and Tier 2 cities realise that sports is an important element in a child’s upbringing. Parents have also moved to a stage where sports finds immense acceptance as a potential career for their child. None of the schools we approached, have dismissed the need. However there are still schools that have not yet embraced sports as an integral element. Generally speaking, schools, parents and teachers are very receptive and understanding. They are also fascinated by the fact that we are focusing on it with the same level of structure and method as the treatment proffered to an academic curriculum.

They like that because it aligns very well with the way they function today.

How important are the private partnerships for school in providing better sports facilities?

Although schools are realising the importance of sports education, not many have the necessary infrastructure, time and manpower to train students in the right manner. A private partnership will help

www.digitalLEARNING.in

bridge this gap, by providing trained coaches and guidance on infrastructure and curriculum and also by understanding the needs of grassroots sport development. With schools keeping focus towards academic excellence, a private partnership will provide these schools a focused approach to sports.

What are the challenges in sports education in India?

Public Private Partnerships (PPP) is the way forward in developing the quality of sport. The key challenges faced today in sports pertain to availability of quality infrastructure and this is a significant area in which the government can have an impact. The actual skills pertaining to the sport can be handled by professionals operating in the private sector as well, with the right kind of competencies.

However, the government has been showing impetus towards the development of a sporting culture in India and some of the changes we see around are a result of that.

Being an eminent sportsperson, please highlight your contribution to the development of sports among students?

Having seen the sport from a player’s perspective as well as a coach’s perspective, I understand the needs of both stakeholders. Our model is to engage with schools and to make structured sport available to every level of the society. While the content offering is world class we have got the best brains in the world to come together, spending time with us and developing content which is modular and also scientific. So our model is to engage with schools, carry these offers for them, look at the infrastructural facilities and limitations they might have and offer this option there, which is clearly credit based. Today we have the vision and goal to address 20-25,000 students in next two year.

We have signed around 11 schools across India and are in the process of signing a couple of major school groups in the South. You might also be aware of the validation that TTFI (Table Tennis Federation of India) has given our ‘train the trainer’ model. We have also executed multisport summer camps across North and South India this year and have observed good turnouts for the same.

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“Ten10 Racing is on its way to set up a Training School for Children”

Ramji Govindarajan, Director, Ten10 Racing presents his perspective on the importance of sports education in India

What is your view of the sports education that is being currently provided by schools in India?

Sport is an important part of human life.

It is important that sports should be introduced in early days of a child’s life. Schools should try to teach the child about the ways by which sports can be developed as a professional career. Children have to be allowed to peruse a passion and a dream. In fact, I am of the opinion that India can win world class tournaments once we have proper sporting culture in our institutions. So when it comes to our institutes, lot of work has to be done for creating a proper sporting environment.

What are your expectations from the government to enhance the quality of sports in Education in schools?

It is very important for the government to invest in improvement of facilities. The proper

infrastructure has to be there to allow students to access sports related technology and knowledge.

Being an eminent sportsman, please highlight your contribution for the development of sports among students?

We invest a lot of time interacting with children who are interested in taking up motorcycle racing as a career, but we also face the challenge of accessing right technology and proper equipment. This restricts the children from dreaming big. Ten10 racing is in the process of setting a small training school for young children to start learning to ride mini motorcycles in a controlled environment so that they can have some fun. This may also lead to the building of crop of talented young motorcycle riders in the country, we are working towards the fulfilment of this aim.

“Sandeep Sejwal, Olympian Swimmer, is Alumnus of our School” www.bloompublicschool.com

Ashutosh Batta, Director and Principal, Bloom Public School, Vasantkunj, New Delhi, speaks about the importance of sports in overall education of a child

What kind of steps is the school taking to emphasise the need of sports development ?

Our sports curriculum starts with basic physical activities at 3+ onwards level to imparting skills in various sports at middle and senior level.

In addition to this we are hiring Sports faculty with specialised coaches. The school is also conducting a programme called Physical Education in curriculum initiated by British council. Along with this, we are conducting intra-school and interschool sports tournament.

To boost the sports among students we offer designation of sports captain in the body of student council.

For sports development among the students, we award

scholarship to students participating at state level. Also, we impart free coaching to students in various sports before and after school.

We have seen very positive results of this. Sandeep Sejwal, Olympian Swimmer, is an alumnus of our school.

Please provide us with an overview of sports solutions installed in the school.

Sporting infrastructure available in the school includes courts for volleyball, badminton, basketball, skating and we also have grounds for cricket, football, etc. There are tables for Table Tennis. Large expense on sport equipments has been made. We would appreciate some assistance from government and also from the cor-

porate sector to subsidise our sporting needs.

Tell us about the company from which you are getting your solutions.

We are working with Sportseed towards introducing non-mainstream sports like Archery, which is an Olympic Sport with tremendous potential. They are able to bring the best coaches in these sports due to their tie ups with the concerned sports association/ federation at national levels.

We are working with Sportseed for the introduction of new Olympic sports. Advantage of such an alliance is that we are able to institutionalise certain sports for which the coaches are not easily available and we can stay abreast with global standards on sports and Physical Education. digitalLEARNING / june 2012

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Sports Education

“Parents are Now Realising the True Potential of Sports”

Anupama Sagdeo, Principal, SG International School, Bangalore, shares her views on the importance of sports in overall education being offered at schools http://sginternationalschool.com What steps is the school taking to emphasise the need of sports development in the overall education of the student?

While there is no denying that we provide our students the best of academics, we do make sure that our students get the best in sports as well. We understand and believe that sports can play an integral element in the holistic development of a child.

We need to ensure that when our students graduate from our school, they are not just nurtured intellectually, but are also filled with sporting spirit. Being a performance oriented school, we decided to rope in TENVIC as we wanted trained coaches who will provide focussed and sincere training to our students in a student friendly manner.

Please provide us with an overview of sports infrastructure and solutions installed in the school.

The school has a playground and a volley ball court. We have Table Tennis tables in the school. We have implemented the Edusports programme for Primary and Middle school students, while the TENVIC programme, which is optional, is available to all students. We provide our students with customised coaching in the field of cricket, badminton, table tennis and chess.

The coaching is offered at Beginner, Intermediate and Advanced levels.

Tell us about the company from which you are getting your solutions.

We share a fruitful association with TENVIC, a sports consulting and training company founded by Anil Kumble, Diinesh

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Kumble and Vasanth Bharadwaj. TENVIC has understood our needs and has helped bridge the gap that existed between learning sports and enjoying sports. The company teaches sports to students in a manner that is engaging and fun. The performance of the students is analysed by the parents as well as the teachers. The students can also conduct self analysis on basis of the data that has been provided by TENVIC How do you see the sports education in the school curriculum?

Being in the education sector, I have noticed that parents off late have started to realise the true potential of sport. Sports is a dynamic field, it helps in the overall development of a child. It teaches the students the art of managing challenges with the right attitude. The recent announcement by the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) to offer Fitness and Gym Operational vocational courses in sports for class 11 and 12 from the academic year 2012-13 shows that sports education in school curriculum is heading for a much needed revolution.

Please mention the benefits that your students, parents, and teachers have received as an outcome of these solutions?

Parents and students enjoy lots of benefits. There is state of the art sporting facility in the school so students don’t have to join training academies and clubs. They can learn sports in the school itself. We as a school can promise parents that not only can we have students excel in academics, but also excel in their choice of sport at the same time.

Sports Education

K-12

“Sports form an Integral Part of the School Curriculum” Sheelu Mathew, Principal and Director, St. Mary’s School, Dwarka What kind of steps is the school taking to include sports in the overall education of the student?

Games and sports form an integral part of school curriculum.

It is our constant endeavour to involve more and more students to take part in various games.

The school has proper facilities for the disciplines like Athletics, Badminton, Basketball Netball, Football, Volleyball, Cricket, Skating ring, and Yoga, etc. We have yoga period for every class to teach mental relaxation, good health and to help our students develop good personality.

Tell us about the sports infrastructure and solutions installed at the school.

St Mary’s School, Dwarka, has facilities for cricket and football with designated grounds for each, along with basketball, volleyball and badminton courts.

We have outsourced introduction of new sports at the school to the company called Sportseed. They have helped us introduce archery into the list of sports available at the school.

Sports Education at Smt Lilavatibai Podar High School Smt Lilavatibai Podar High School encourages its students to participate in sporting events like Table Tennis, Lawn Tennis, Cricket, Football, Chess, Swimming, and Gymnastics Sports infrastructure at school At a distance of three furlongs from the school building, the school has Podar Sport Academy and ground, where students are taken regularly for their Physical Education Class and coached for athletics, cricket, football, basketball, table tennis, and throw ball. Indoor sporting activities like gymnastics, karate, chess, carom, table tennis and skating are also taken care of.

Sports assessment system at School Students are assessed on the following descriptors: • Displays an innate talent in an identified sport and appreciates importance of good health • Demonstrate endurance and strength to perform well • Ability to move quickly • Displays agility, coordination and balance and is able to change direction quickly during any game/match.

• Display healthy team spirit and discipline on and off the field • Displays leadership skills, a high level of responsibility and is self motivated • Is an inspiration or is able to inspire other members of the school

Tie-up for sports infrastructure The Podar Sports Academy has qualified and experienced coaches from Sports Authority of India and National Institute of Sports. Students are given training in various disciplines like athletics, Basketball, Chess, Cricket, Football, Table Tennis, swimming, etc.

• Academy is organizing various Inter School competitions.

• Hobby classes are organized on every Saturdays.

• Special sports training programmes are conducted during summer vacation and Diwali Vacations. digitalLEARNING / june 2012

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k-12

INTERVIEW

Nidhi Sirohi, Principal, Kothari International School, speaks on the subject of sports education solutions, and also about the education tools deployed at the school to Pragya Gupta, ENN Nidhi Sirohi Principal, Kothari International School

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INTERVIEW K-12

Ushering Revolution with

Tech-Enabled Education What steps is the school taking to emphasise the need of sports development in the overall education of the student?

We have signed up with KOOH Sports to run the sports curriculum for our school.

We strongly believe that it is extremely important to have a healthy body with a healthy mind. We at Kothari ensure that while it is important for children to pay attention to academics, sports plays an integral part in the overall development of a child.

Can you throw some light on investments the school has made in the sports infrastructure?

We have state of the art infrastructure installed in the school. We have a big playfield, a multipurpose hall for indoor activities, skating rink, squash courts, and a swimming pool. The sports equipment is also being provided by KOOH Sports for several activities like football, cricket and badminton. Sport is the fabric of the mission and vision of our school. We value discipline and believe in building a mentally sound team through academic education and sports.

Tell us about the key assessment modules that the school follows to evaluate the student’s performance in sports.

We follow the following assessment modules for sports: Physiological tests report card Energy Intake and Expenditure tests Video-based Performance Analysis Report Card DVD Talent Assessment Testing

www.kotharischool.edu.in

What kind of teacher training do you have to enable teachers to provide better sports training to students?

We have very well qualified coaches deployed by the solution provider. The teachers are retrained every year to hone their skills so that they can provide the best training to our students.

What kind of tie up do you have with private solution providers for modern teaching tools?

For Content we have tie up with IYC and Synergy School. KOOH Sports (Kids out of home sports) is taking care of sports at our school. We have Remedial online Teaching Programme from Good School.

What are your views on use of modern teaching tools and their role in improving the learning delivery?

Technology has played a major role in the teaching- learning process today.

Children are able to learn and understand through a medium they are well versed in i.e. technology. They are very comfortable using it and are able to see visuals, have hands on experience and understand better. For the teacher class room deliveries are more effective. Online assessments help develop critical thinking skills.

Smart Classes, PPT’s, Audio Visual Aids, field trips definitely supplement and aid class room interaction. However, they cannot be a substitute for the teacher.

What kind of challenges do teachers face while dealing with CCE system (Continuous and Comprehensive Evaluation)?

It is a wonderful tool for growth, development and holistic progress of the child. The children learn by doing, it inculcates team spirit as number of activities are done in groups; it enhances creativity and imagination, develops the urge to know more and brings out the spirit of enquiry. Flexibility provided in the CCE module leads to complacency amongst students. Thus follow up for submission becomes cumbersome for the teachers.

What are the technologies already deployed in the classroom and in the institute?

We have Smart classes, Audio visual aids, Laboratory aided teaching, PPT’s specially researched, designed and developed and presented by students, hands-on-activities, and experimental learning tools.

What kind of CCE assistive software is being used by the school?

• Evaluation of CCE is aided by software solutions • Projects • Working modules • Role play • Debates/ discussion • Field trips • Data handling • Source based analysis .

digitalLEARNING / june 2012

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