Nikhil Pingle is Chief of Strategy & Research at the Mumbai-based Magic Bus India Foundation As technologies evolve and economic landscapes shift, the old paradigm of skills acquired in college and university guaranteeing secure lifetime employment has become outdated In this era where career paths are redrawn overnight and new skills become prerequisites almost instantly, embracing a culture of lifelong learning is no longer optional; it’s critical for professional survival and long-term success. As technologies evolve and economic landscapes shift, the old paradigm of skills acquired in college and university would secure a lifetime career has become outdated. The reality is that career pathways are no longer predictable. For instance, it was once common for a commerce graduate to join a company as a junior accountant and retire as head of finance. Such linear career trajectories are becoming increasingly rare. Moreover, the job market is under significant pressure, with an estimated 12 million young people joining the workforce each year while the number of new jobs created is estimated at 4.5 million. This imbalance underscores the necessity of continuous learning and skills acquisition to remain competitive in a rapidly changing job marketplace. These days, career and professional success is not just about keeping up; it requires seizing opportunities in a future dominated by inevitable and constant change. The industrial revolution of the 18th century until mid-20th century required basic literacy and numeracy as the workforce transitioned from agrarian to the industrial age. As the 20th century progressed, the growth of formal education paralleled expansion of the economy necessitating a shift towards acquisition of technical and managerial skills to navigate the complexities of an industrialised world. The value placed on higher education escalated, reflecting the changing dynamics of work and society. By the late 20th to early 21st centuries, the rise of ICT (information communication technologies) and globalisation of commerce mandated acquisition of new skill-sets of employability — IT proficiency, soft skills, and understanding of global markets. This era also marked a significant pivot towards skills of adaptability and cross-cultural communication. Today, we find ourselves in a new landscape of radical disruptions in industry because of the march of technology complicated by climate change damage limitation. Government, historically one of the largest employers of any country, has also experienced dramatic transformations due to technology enablement. These changes have prompted demand for professionals with special skillsets. Application of digital and green skills to a wide range of unprecedented situations demands critical thinking and creative solutions. For instance, the rise of renewable energy industries requires engineers skilled in green technologies; data analysts need to interpret mountains of information to ideate sustainable practices. Cybersecurity experts must protect vast quantities of digital information and public administrators must leverage technology to improve governance and public services. Adaptability, innovation and continuous education have become essential for professionals to thrive in this rapidly evolving environment. This necessary transformation from aspiration into action mandates new success habits. Regular reading of industry publications, books, and reputable online resources, setting clear…
Indifference to the dawn of the AI age is a disservice to children. It is incumbent upon school managements to ensure learners are equipped with skill sets to navitage the new AI-powered world As rapid growth in Artificial Intelligence (AI) continues to reshape industries worldwide, it’s also transforming education. The dramatic emergence of three distinct categories of AI — Artificial Narrow Intelligence (ANI), Artificial General Intelligence (AGI), and Artificial Super Intelligence (ASI) — is set to make a significant impact on the future of school curricula and the way students prepare for careers. A noteworthy example of this transformation is underway in Kerala, where 80,000 school teachers are set to receive training to utilise AI in their classrooms. This initiative is expected to revolutionise the education scenario in the state, and emerge as a model for states countrywide. Goal-oriented Artificial Narrow Intelligence (ANI) powers much of the technology we interact with daily — Google Assistant, Alexa, Siri, and Google Translate. However while highly proficient in specific tasks, ANI has limited scope. It requires school managements to train students to manage such software. In several countries, schools are already integrating ANI-powered teaching assistants and personalised learning platforms to enhance the educational experience of students. Tools such as Alexa for Education and Google’s AI-powered grading systems are discharging routine tasks such as providing information and personalised learning paths in classrooms, allowing teachers to provide individual attention to every learner. A government school in Kerala has recently introduced Alexa in the classroom for minor instructional purposes. Iris, India’s first AI-generated saree-clad school teacher robot, has also been unveiled in a school in the state. Some private sector schools in other states also have robot assistants for teachers. The next level Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) is where the true revolution in education is imminent. AGI utilises the power of computers to plan, reason, assimilate abstract ideas and provide alternative solutions. AGI integrates human cognitive capabilities in software, enabling AGI powered programs to find solutions to unfamiliar tasks such as data analysis. Once we reach the AGI stage, education will need to shift towards cultivating the critical thinking, creativity, and adaptability of students, as these skills will become essential for them to utilise AGI-powered programs. A prominent example of AGI is Sophia, an advanced human-like robot which can recognize faces, maintain eye contact, engage in conversation, use facial expressions, gestures and speech to communicate. Artificial Super Intelligence (ASI) is at the pinnacle of AI development, when computers are invested with intellectual capacity greater than of average human beings. Integrating ASI in healthcare, finance, and communication industries will drastically alter the jobs market. Schools must prepare students with learning that complements and harnesses the capabilities of ASI — data analysis, AI programming, and ethical AI development are good examples. Many contemporary tech visionaries including Elon Musk, Frank Wilczek, and the late Stephen Hawking, have expressed misgivings about ASI. Hawking and Wilczek have argued that the short-term impact of ASI depends on who controls it, while the…
By integrating alternative energy education into school curricula we must raise a generation with an informed and proactive mindset towards environmental stewardship In the wake of escalating greenhouse emissions and climate change impacts, as Planet Earth inches closer to the critical temperature rise threshold of 1.5oC above pre-industrial levels, the urgency to pivot towards sustainable practices has never been more pronounced. An urgent requirement is introduction of alternative energy as a core subject in schools, emphasizing not just the importance of sustainability but ingraining it as a way of life for future generations. Urgency of climate action. Breach of the 1.5oC threshold is not a distant threat but a looming reality, signalling a red alert for humanity’s impact on Earth. This milestone, once considered a limit to avoid catastrophic climate change, is now a benchmark we are dangerously close to surpassing. The urgency for immediate and sustained action has become imperative especially for the younger generation, who will inherit the consequences of today’s decisions. Understanding alternative energy. Alternative energy means generating electricity from renewable sources such as solar, wind, hydroelectric, biomass etc. These sources not only offer an endless supply of energy but also present a pathway to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, combat global warming, and safeguard the planet. Educating students about alternative energy sources, their benefits, and critical role in combating climate change is a necessary first step towards a sustainable future. Need for early education in sustainability. Youth is the springboard of change. Training students early ensures that sustainability is embedded in all forms of their lifestyle and comes naturally to them. By integrating alternative energy education into school curricula, we can raise a generation with an informed and proactive mindset towards environmental stewardship. Such education goes beyond textbooks, encouraging students to think critically about energy consumption, conservation, and the impact of their actions on the health of Planet Earth. Curriculum integration: a multidisciplinary approach. Inclusion of alternative energy education in the curriculum requires adoption of a multidisciplinary approach, integrating STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) with social studies, economics, and ethics. Such a comprehensive framework allows students to explore the technical mechanics of solar panels, wind turbines, and hydroelectric power plants, conterminously with study of environmental ethics of energy consumption and economic principles underpinning a green economy. Hands-on projects and experiments can bring these concepts to life, allowing students to experience the tangible impact of alternative energy solutions. Through project-based learning and community initiatives, students can experience the tangible benefits of sustainable practices, inspiring them to adopt and advocate green solutions to communities and society. Career pathways and skill development. Introducing alternative energy as a subject in K-12 education will not only raise awareness, it will also create new career pathways for students. The renewable energy industry is rapidly growing and is poised to become a major employer in future decades. By acquiring early exposure to this subject, students can develop the skills and knowledge necessary to pursue careers in renewable energy, environmental sciences and sustainability. The…
A Learning Experience Designer (LXD) is a professional working in education and instructional design, specialising in developing effective and engaging learning experiences for students Education is undergoing radical change, driven by technological advances that are propelling us towards a dramatically different future for learning. Metaverse Learning, Generative Artificial Intelligence, Learning Experience Platforms (LXP) are high-potential technologies that compel adoption of experiential teaching-learning. And even as game-changing technologies play a pivotal role in this transformation, the Learning Experience Designer will become a central player in the creation of innovative learning experiences. A Learning Experience Designer (LXD) is a professional working in education and instructional design, specialising in developing effective and engaging learning experiences for students. The primary role of an LXD is to design learning environments to enable learners to achieve their educational objectives as effectively as possible. An LXD ensures that an engaging learning experience is underpinned by extensive research to provide a deeper understanding to the learner and fulfilment of her objectives. As educational developers, remaining at the forefront of change is not only beneficial, it is essential. One of the most transformative changes in recent years has been the shift from conventional pedagogies to holistic learning experiences. Learning Metaverses: Using neuroscience and experiential learning to power the learning process. Often associated with provision of interactive digital environments — Virtual and Augmented Reality — a Learning Metaverse provides students with opportunities to interact with each other and with virtual objects in an immersive way, enabling lesson content to be personalised in accordance with their individual learning objectives. However, these virtual worlds or metaverses become effective only when a LXD steps in to assist with development of meaningful, emotional learning experiences, and neuroscience is harnessed to optimise knowledge retention. Advances in neuroscience have resulted in better understanding of how the brain functions in learning situations. As such, Learning Metaverses, combined with this knowledge, offer unique opportunities to design learning environments that are in harmony with cognitive mechanisms. The role of the LXD and neuroscience in building Learning Metaverses is critical. Together, they create digital environments that optimise learner participation by combining the principles of cognition. As a result, the cognitive potential of learners is fully aroused making the learning experience highly effective and memorable. LXDs combine instructional design, immersive storytelling, and ease of interaction to optimise the learning experience. Generative Artificial Intelligence: Creating high-quality educational content. Generative AI, based on large language models (LLM) such as GPT-3 and GPT-4, is revolutionising the way in which educational content is developed. To harness its full potential, LXDs ‘collaborate’ closely with AI programs. They discharge a critical role in customising AI-generated content to the specific needs of each learner. In collaboration with teachers and AI programs, they create pedagogy scenarios that incorporate contextually generated content, enabling students to derive maximum benefit from automated programs. Professional LXDs leverage their expertise to design learning scenarios that seamlessly incorporate AI-generated content. They create stimulating learning environments, drawing on the powers of AI, to personalise the experience…
Education is not merely about knowledge delivery… Conscious learning is a new-age pedagogy that prompts students to develop deep awareness of their thoughts, emotions and action In the fast-evolving education landscape, there is a notable shift towards a holistic approach to nurturing young minds. Education is not merely about knowledge delivery but also about shaping students into well-balanced, resilient individuals attuned with their inner selves. Conscious learning is a new age pedagogy that prompts students to develop deep awareness of their thoughts, emotions, and action. Good education requires more than reading textbooks and taking tests. It should include cultivating children’s emotional intelligence and developing their self-awareness and cognitive skills. In response to ever-increasing pressures of contemporary life, there’s rising interest in conscious learning that incorporates yoga, mindfulness and spirituality. Currently, a large and growing number of parents and educators are expressing preference for conscious learning pedagogy for their children. Mindfulness has been introduced into education to enhance children’s well-being, mental health, social and emotional skills, resilience, pro-social behaviour — all of which enhances academic performance. By teaching mindfulness techniques, educators can empower students to manage stress, improve concentration, and cultivate their emotional intelligence. These skills are becoming increasingly valuable in academic settings to prepare students for the complex challenges they are certain to experience in higher education and adult life. Let’s examine why schools, educators and parents are choosing conscious learning education pathways for their children. Emotional intelligence — the heart of conscious learning. In addition to enhancing academic performance, conscious learning develops the emotional intelligence of children. Through yoga and mindfulness, children develop self-awareness, compassion and communication skills. These are the prerequisites of nurturing emotional intelligence and social skills. Stress reduction and mental well-being. With the explosion of social media, 21st century children are experiencing high levels of stress and anxiety in today’s fast-paced world. Conscious learning practices, comprising mindfulness and yoga, equip children with the skills to navigate life’s challenges. Conscious learning promotes stress reduction, emotional resilience, and overall mental well-being, inducing positive, balanced mindsets. Mind-body connection. Mind-body connection is crucial for children’s holistic development. From time immemorial educators have connected mental and physical health (mens sana in corpore sano). To establish the mind-body connection some schools subscribe to online physical education programs, yoga and mindfulness sessions, which are incorporated into the curriculum. Not only do these programmes encourage physical fitness, they also teach students how to manage stress, focus better and improve self-management. Self-awareness. Self-awareness is the foundation of all holistic development. Capability to recognise one’s strengths, weaknesses, and values, enables students to make better decisions to tackle life’s formidable challenges. Intelligent educators develop their students’ self-awareness by encouraging them to introspect to discover their interests and passions and follow them. Cultivating focus and concentration. In an era when children are bombarded with digital distractions, discerning parents worry about their children’s ability to focus and remain focused for adequate time periods. By incorporating meditation into children’s learning, teachers and parents help them develop concentration capabilities and skill-sets.…
Lina Ashar, Founder, Dreamtime Learning School Introduction to Conscious Learning: In the fast-evolving education landscape there is a notable shift towards a holistic approach to nurturing of young minds. Education is not merely about knowledge delivery but also necessitates shaping students into well-balanced, resilient individuals attuned with their inner selves. Conscious learning is a new age pedagogy that develops a deep awareness of students’ thinking, emotions, and action. A good education requires more than reading textbooks and taking tests. It should include cultivating children’s emotional intelligence and developing their self-awareness and cognitive skills. In response to ever-increasing pressures of contemporary life, there’s rising interest in conscious learning, yoga, mindfulness and spirituality. Currently, a large and growing number of parents and educators are expressing preference for conscious learning techniques for their children. Mindfulness has been introduced into education to enhance children’ well-being, mental health, social and emotional skills, resilience, pro-social behaviour — all of which enhances academic performance. This integral part of my education philosophy encourages students to develop keen awareness of their thoughts and emotions. By teaching mindfulness techniques, educators can empower students to manage stress, improve concentration, and cultivate their emotional intelligence. These skills are becoming increasingly valuable in academic settings to prepare students for the complex challenges they are certain to experience in higher education and adult life. To enable students to connect their minds and bodies holistic learning is the best option. It addresses all aspects of individual growth — intellectual, emotional, physical, social, and spiritual. It acknowledges that a student is more than the sum total of her academic achievements and that personal and emotional development play an equally significant role in shaping her future. Let’s examine why schools, educators and parents are choosing conscious learning educational pathways for their children. Emotional intelligence: The heart of conscious learning. In addition to enhancing academic performance conscious learning develops the emotional intelligence of children. Through yoga and mindfulness, children can develop self-awareness, compassion and communication skills. These are the prerequisites of nurturing emotional intelligence and social skills. Stress reduction and mental well-being. With the explosion of social media, 21st century children are experiencing high levels of stress and anxiety in today’s fast-paced world. Conscious learning practices, such as mindfulness and yoga, equip children with tools to navigate life’s challenges. Conscious learning promotes stress reduction, emotional resilience, and overall mental wellbeing, inducing positive, balanced mindsets. Mind-body connection. Mind-body connection is crucial for children’s holistic development. From time immemorial educators have connected mental and physical health (mens sana in corpore sano). To establish the mind-body connection some schools subscribe to online physical education programs, yoga and mindfulness sessions, which are incorporated into the curriculum. Not only do these programmes encourage physical fitness, they also teach students how to manage stress, focus and improve self-management. Self-awareness. Self-awareness is the foundation of all holistic development. Capability to recognise one’s strengths, weaknesses, and values, enable students make better decisions to tackle life’s formidable challenges. Intelligent educators develop their students’ self-awareness by encouraging them to introspect to…
2024 is promising in terms of work-life balance, greater workplace diversity, incremental adoption of artificial intelligence and climate change practices. This trend is likely to continue. In 2023, the world pushed aside the ghosts of the pandemic, and rebooted. However, remote-work habits acquired in the pandemic have survived. In addition, economies the world over have been confronted with geopolitical unrest and high inflation, even as artificial intelligence has made shattering advancements and headlines. What does the ‘Future of Work’ look like in the new year onward? Flexible and hybrid work. Thanks to the pandemic, work from home became the norm. However with restoration of normalcy, people are not eager to return to the pre-pandemic full-time work at office model. Hybrid seems to be the way of the future with options to work full-time from remote locations. Numerous research studies indicate two-three days in the office is the optimal hybrid working arrangement. A State of Remote Work Study 2023 by Buffer, a US-based online marketing software firm, says that 98 percent would like to work remotely, at least for some of the time, for the rest of their careers. Generative AI will get the nod for workplace adoption. Generative AI tools like Facebook’s Llama and OpenAI’s ChatGPT has made a big impact on knowledge work, increasing productivity multi-fold. Employees in education, marketing, law, technology, arts, architecture will increasingly be able to access AI tools in their workplaces. For example, Generative AI tools can be readily used for written copy, image, video, audio, and code generation. While companies were still learning and figuring out how to skilfully use the technology in 2023, it’s likely we’ll see an adoption leap in 2024, as workers and companies become more comfortable and confident about Generative AI, right from the CEO to newly recruited college graduates. Employee health costs will push preventive measures and outcomes. The current state of high inflation, labour shortages, and developments in the healthcare industry will sharpen focus on employee healthcare. For employers, this will mean offering higher-quality care options as well as greater emphasis on preventive care. Offering programs to better manage specific health conditions, reducing specialty prescription drugs and focusing on generic options, virtual care, and providing self-help and education tools, are on the cards. Workplace employee health extends beyond physical healthcare. The pandemic, recession, wars, and general social unrest have spiralled anxiety levels worldwide. Therefore, mental health and general well-being will also receive greater attention in the future. Climate change will continue to pressure companies to be part of the solution. Big business was responsible for 71 percent of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions over the past three decades. Increasingly consumers, investors and government regulatory boards are demanding business and industry to reduce carbon emissions. In 2024, organisations will start to slow climate change and support health of the planet. EU corporates are already complying with mandatory environmental, social, and governance (ESG) disclosure requirements and reporting their impact on nature under a Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive. It is expected…
Education has already undergone a remarkable transformation with the advent of the internet, but the integration of AI-powered chatbots such as ChatGPT has revolutionised teaching-learning (Shivam Dutta is promoter-CEO of Alma Better, a Bengaluru-based AI and data science company) Devyani Mungali It’s no longer a secret that artificial intelligence (AI) is taking over every aspect of human existence. It is making huge strides in finance, healthcare, transportation and education. Once limited to fiction movies, this new-age technology is being used to develop intelligent systems that can function with little or no human intervention. Education has already undergone a remarkable transformation with the advent of the internet, but the integration of AI-powered chatbots such as ChatGPT has revolutionised teaching-learning. Moreover, the integration of AI-powered, ChatGPT-infused content into curriculums has numerous benefits, ushering in a new era of personalised, engaging, and accessible learning experiences. Let’s discuss some benefits of using ChatGPT in school curriculums. Personalised learning. Tailoring education to individual needs. One of the prime advantages of incorporating AI-powered ChatGPT into education is personalised learning experiences. By analysing every student’s progress and learning style, this technology can deliver content and feedback tailored to every student’s unique needs and learning capabilities. This personalisation empowers students to learn at their own pace, and teachers intervene to address specific weaknesses. Enhanced engagement. Fostering motivation through interactivity. ChatGPT’s capability to create interactive and engaging educational content contributes significantly to increased student motivation and interest. From quizzes and interactive lessons to simulations, the dynamic and immersive nature of this tool captivates students, leading to better retention and understanding of subject matter. 24/7 accessibility. Learning anytime, anywhere. AI-powered educational content breaks down the barriers of traditional learning environments. With 24/7 accessibility, students can engage with the study material at their convenience, whether in the classroom, at home, or on the go. This flexibility promotes lifelong learning and widens accessibility for diverse student populations, promoting the culture of continuous education. Data-driven insights. Informed decision-making for educators. The integration of AI enables the collection and analysis of data on students’ learning styles and outcomes. Educators can leverage these insights to identify areas for improvement, adjust pedagogy, and make data-informed decisions to enhance and refine the curriculum. Virtual tutors. Round-the-clock support. While virtual classrooms have become mainstream in the education sector, assimilation of AI is making the concept of virtual tutors a reality. AI-powered chatbots are changing how learners engage with online courses, promoting self-directed learning, personalised experiences, instant feedback, and round-the-clock support. Technology fluency. Navigating the digital age. In the contemporary jobs market, technical fluency is of prime importance. AI-powered educational content exposes students to cutting-edge technology and artificial intelligence applications, making them tech-savvy and comfortable with digital tools. This fluency enhances their competitiveness and adaptability in various career paths. Problem-solving and critical thinking. Building essential skills. AI-infused content stimulates critical thinking and problem-solving skills, essential attributes in modern-day careers. Students are encouraged to analyse information, make data-informed decisions, and find innovative solutions — skillsets highly transferable to diverse professional…
In the absence of safe, nurturing neighbourhoods there is a sudden void. Schools need to step forward to ensure the well-being of parents, children and educators (Devyani Mungali is founder of the Sanskriti Group of Schools, Pune, which has 9,000 students and 500 teachers on its muster rolls) The old adage which professed, “it takes a village to raise a child” is still relevant in the modern world. The challenge is that there has been rapid fraying of the supportive social structures which existed earlier. There is vanishing support of large, extended families which provided a safety net for young parents and children to grow and blossom into healthy, well-rounded individuals. In the absence of safe, nurturing neighbourhoods there is a sudden void. It is imperative that schools step forward to ensure well-being of all three stakeholders — parents, children and educators. Schools have a significant responsibility to plan and create safe and secure learning spaces and provide ample opportunities for engagement, free expression, experimentation and collaboration between children, parents and educators. Hitherto, the primary role of schools was to provide education, while the emotional, behavioural and social well-being needs of children were fulfilled by families, neighbourhoods, and communities, which were strongly interwoven in the fabric of society. In modern times parents are often working in bustling towns and cities, far from the places they grew up in. They are juggling the responsibilities of being good providers and parents simultaneously. They are constantly anxious about their jobs, families and want to provide the best education to their children. Isolationism caused by social media and long hours spent online are other challenges which pose danger to the emotional welfare of children. Increasingly, children are spending less time in face-to-face interaction with family and friends. Unfortunately, not only children but even care-giving adults are being blindsided by creeping normalization of adult time being spent on social media, resulting in neglect of emotional and mental comfort of children. Therefore the onus has devolved upon school managements to provide children, parents and educators opportunities to work collaboratively for the benefit of children. These opportunities could be working on science projects, co-curricular education, music, dance, art, pottery and creative writing. Enabling sports education provides a great fillip to not just children’s physical well-being but also their mental health. Schools have the wherewithal, infrastructure and personnel to guide children, parents and educators to learn through hands-on experiences. Opportunities can be created by teachers for children and parents to learn how to discuss, express differing opinions, and respect differences of opinion. Spaces and platforms have to be created to resolve differences and manage emotions of sadness, joy, anger, frustration, and disappointment. Only schools have the capability to create bridges to build rapport among parents, children and teachers — the school community. Working together they can develop children’s soft skills, resilience, empathy, collaborative learning and team building capabilities. Healthy parent-teacher collaboration will enable children to learn the vitally important skill of communication — what to say, where to…
At a time when NEP 2020 is being rolled out, it would be a good idea to mandate a dedicated sports class starting an hour before academic classes commence, or after school gets over (Puru Singh is founder-director of the Push Sports Academy, Delhi) Recalling his early years in his autobiography My Life, legendary basketball player Earvin ‘Magic’ Johnson says that his senior school years at a predominantly white school, where he was in the basketball team, was probably the best thing that ever happened to him. Humiliated by his team-mates even during practice to the extent they wouldn’t even pass the ball to him, Johnson says that those years taught him “how to understand white people, how to communicate and deal with them.” This life skill could have been learned only on a basketball court in a sea of racism that Johnson experienced as a student, and not from any other place. This is as true of basketball as it is for any other sport, as lessons learnt on playing fields are indelible. This is why sports education needs to be an integral part of school curriculums — rather than limited to one or two 45-minute classes per week — when young children can start learning life skills. Therefore, at a time when the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 is being rolled out, it would be a good idea to mandate a dedicated daily sports class, which could either start an hour before the academic classes commence, or after school gets over. Moreover, sports classes in schools are usually under the charge of a physical education teacher who’s more academic than an individual with experience in a sports arena. To derive full value from sports education only individuals who have experience of competitive play if not internationally, at least in national games, should be selected to teach sports and games. Indeed it’s advisable that schools invest in specialist coaches for specific sports. Just as an English teacher can’t teach algebra or trigonometry, a swimming coach can’t effectively coach a football team. This is to not discount the importance of academics. In the US to qualify for inclusion in a school or college athletics or sports team, students have to score a minimum grade point average (GPA) in academics. And to maintain minimum scores to retain their places in an athletics squad or field games team. Therefore, coaches work in tandem with fellow teachers in academic disciplines to ensure that star athletes understand that sports and academics are not mutually exclusive. A similar model needs to be adopted in India to ensure students playing for school or varsity teams maintain minimal academic grades. Sports stars should be made aware of minimum grades required if they wish to continue playing on school or college teams. After winning India’s first ever gold medal for pistol shooting at the Beijing Olympics 2008, Abhinav Bindra stressed that if teaching life-skills to sportspersons was mandatory as in the US, “none out of 10 athletes will…
Through their contrasting narratives, two movies compel us to reflect on the condition of K-12 education in India. They force us to confront uncomfortable truths and inspire us to strive for change Dr. Prashant Narang, Senior Fellow (Research & Training Programs) at the Centre for Civil Society, Delhi Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.” This quote by W.B. Yeats sets the stage for exploration of two Indian films — Maassab (2018) and Roughbook (2016). These cinematic narratives, while set in the backdrop of classrooms, transcend the confines of K-12 education to reflect larger societal paradoxes. In the heart of rural India, in Khurhand village of Banda district, Bundelkhand, we meet Ashish Kumar, the protagonist of Maassab. A Dalit who has sacrificed the allure of the Indian Administrative Service, Ashish chooses the path less travelled to teach in a government school. His character is a throwback to the patriotic heroes of the 1970s, brimming with idealism. He is the type of teacher who works on Sundays, spends his salary on midday meals, and brings a laptop to the classroom. Yet, his efforts are like a single lamp trying to illuminate a cavernous abyss of systemic corruption and apathy. The government school system, as portrayed in Maassab, is a hollow shell. Funds meant for education are routinely misappropriated, teachers are absent or send proxies, and students are deprived of basic amenities, including midday meals. The system is so broken that it seems beyond repair. It’s a grim picture that leaves viewers with a sense of despair and disillusionment. The transformation of such a system hinges on the arrival of a messianic figure, the exceptional teacher. But reliance on extraordinary individuals is not only unrealistic, but also unsustainable. It’s akin to waiting for a superhero while the city burns. Contrast this with the bustling cityscape of Roughbook, where we encounter Santoshi, a physics teacher in a private school. She is a rebel in her own right, prioritising concept clarity over syllabus completion. Yet, she is caught in the crosshairs of a system that values market demands over education ideals. During her interview, the principal solicits her opinion of the education system and then justifies demand-driven focus on exams and grades. But the question that haunts her — and us — is why parents want what they want. The answer, though not discussed in the movie, ironically, lies in the government’s creation of high stakes board and entrance exams, shaping parental expectations, pressure and perpetuating the cycle of rote learning.The private education system, as depicted in Roughbook, is a well-oiled machine. It functions efficiently, but at the cost of genuine learning. It’s a system that churns out students well-versed in the art of passing exams, but without deep understanding of subjects they study. It’s a system that caters to the demands of the market, but fails to ignite curiosity and creativity in students. However, Roughbook concludes on a hopeful note, with the teacher and students carving…
“Education is the passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to those who prepare for it today” — Malcolm X (1925-1965) American Black power activist Malcolm X’s insightful words resonate deeply in the realm of education, underscoring the importance of preparing students for the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead. In the context of the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 and its focus on enabling every student to access quality education, the best among India’s schools are designing curriculum innovations to ensure that students are equipped with the skills and knowledge needed to succeed in an ever-changing world. Some of them are set out below. Cohesion between curriculum and reality. The most progressive schools possess deep awareness of the paramount importance of harmonising their curriculums with the varying and evolving demands of higher education and dynamic job markets. In India, top-ranked boarding schools, in particular, equip students with a robust academic framework, essential life skills and sports education necessary to thrive in higher education and, subsequently, in the world of work. Proficiency, professionalism and perceptiveness. These are the three ‘Ps’ fundamental to good quality education. With institutional focus on proficiency, students are encouraged to develop strong foundational knowledge and skills in various subjects. Through inspiring professionalism, best schools equip students with essential qualities such as discipline, integrity, and effective communication. And, fostering perceptiveness enables students to think critically, empathise and adapt to different situations. By nurturing these three Ps, best schools create environments in which students can thrive academically, socially, culturally and personally, thereby preparing them to excel in their future endeavours. Moreover, contemporary education institutions provide high-quality infrastructure and guidance to enable students to explore their interests, passions, talents, and potential career paths. Internship programmes with local industry and businesses enable students to derive valuable real-world experience and rise above mere theory to practical application of knowledge. Fostering lifelong love for learning and adaptability. An important obligation of school managements is to instill lifelong passion for upskilling, knowledge, and its applicability in students. Students in the best boarding schools have an additional advantage inasmuch as their immersive education experience stimulates intellectual curiosity. Usually well-equipped and amply resourced, these schools with vast libraries, contemporary laboratories and quiet reading spaces removed from the bustle of noisy cities, also offer nurturing pastoral care from experienced house mentors and opportunities for peer learning. Technology will help the tectonic shift to the future. In acknowledgement of the transformative power of technology, progressive schools worldwide have accelerated technology integration into their curriculums. By incorporating AI, lab work, interactive digital learning, virtual labs, innovation spaces, online resources, and collaborative platforms, avant-garde schools create dynamic and engaging learning environments for students. As renowned philosopher and educator John Dewey observed: “Education is not preparation for life; education is life itself.” This statement underscores the importance of curriculum innovations in preparing students for the future. By infusing K-12 education with latest technological advancements and fostering critical thinking, problem-solving, and collaboration skills they prepare students to confront the challenges…
All school teachers must become familiar with Chat GPT as soon as possible. They should utilise its speedy capability to produce lesson plans, worksheets and assessments writes Lawrence Fray Nations are vying for Artificial Intelligence (AI) supremacy, businesses are harnessing it for their own ends and educators need to come to terms with it. It’s clear that its potential benefits can revolutionise teaching-learning processes, improve learning outcomes, and facilitate student success. It can help teachers plan, assess and evaluate learners as groups and individuals, and enable them to draw important inferences from student data to inform their own teaching and formulate plans for whole school development. Chat GPT. Chat GPT is an AI chatbot that provides conversational responses based on its immediate evaluation of the user’s requirements. However, the responses need to be checked before incorporating them into any official communication as Chat GPT can, and does, make mistakes although it continues to learn and improve. Download it to your computer and your phone and ask it what you will; it’s always ready to help. And, at the time of writing, it’s free-of-charge. Chat GPT is becoming popular because it can interact with students as smoothly as a human. It can match its communication level to the learner’s so there are no barriers to comprehension. Better still, the learner’s self-confidence increases as she is in charge of terminating the conversation at the click of a mouse. Students can certainly use AI to improve learning. It has become the quintessential tutor with an ever-expanding database greater than any individual could have hoped for. Inevitably, there is a downside. Chat GPT could be used to sidestep the learning process by commanding it to churn out essays and solutions without the student making the necessary effort to engage with the teacher’s lessons. Yet a basic law of education, which states that ‘effective learning is proportional to effort’ cannot be circumvented. True, in a matter of seconds, Chat GPT can provide a completed assignment that otherwise would take a student substantial time and effort to research and produce. But such misuse of AI-based learning platforms not only replaces proper learning with easy solutions (with disaster looming when examination time comes around), it also hampers the development of critical thinking and problem-solving skills of students. More seditiously, it can trivialise the importance of teacher-student interaction. In short, there are great differences between a student’s use of Chat GPT to clear doubts and another who deploys it as a homework-generator. Like all discoveries throughout history, it is the user’s intention, rather than the creation itself, which determines the consequences. Against this backdrop, let’s examine the role of AI in four main areas of the teaching-learning transaction. Planning for learning. All school teachers must become familiar with Chat GPT as soon as possible. They should utilise its speedy capability to produce lesson plans, worksheets and assessments for specific age groups on any topic when properly prompted. Moreover as a lesson planning tool, it is truly a blessing.…
With appropriate tools and strategies, educators have the opportunity to harness the power of AI to provide personalised, engaging and effective learning experiences for children writes Robinson Philipose In recent years, artificial intelligence (AI) has made headlines around the world and scared educationists with alarmist predictions of widespread testing malpractice. But on the other side, AI has great potential to transform traditional teaching and enable teachers and students in K-12 education. Teaching has traditionally been a manual and human-intensive vocation in which teachers must design lesson plans, develop course material and deliver lectures. While this pedagogy has worked in the past, it is time consuming and leaves little room for innovation and experimentation. It’s a one-size-fits-all pedagogy. India’s normative 1:40 teacher-pupil ratio makes it difficult to personalise the education of every student. Like a doctor attending many patients prescribes medicines based on individualised lab reports, similarly a teacher should be able to address the learning deficit of every child in her classroom. AI makes this possible. With the advent of AI, educators now have powerful tools and technologies to create personal, engaging, effective and customised learning experiences for their students. Here are some ways AI can transform teaching-learning in K-12 education: Diagnostics. The first step in personalising education is to diagnose every child’s learning deficit in each subject, not possible within a 40-minutes period. This humanly impossible task is made easy with an AI-powered common test in every subject which will immediately disclose the learning deficit of every child in a classroom of 40 students in just three minutes. Personalised learning. AI can report the progress and performance of every student to enable customised teaching to suit individual needs and preferences. Traditional pedagogies oblige educators to take a one-size-fits-all approach, delivering the same content to all students, regardless of individual learning style or pace. On the other hand, AI algorithms can assess the strengths and weaknesses of every child and prescribe lesson plans accordingly, enabling her to learn at her own pace for better retention and comprehension. Smart tutoring systems. AI can also be used to develop smart tutoring systems (STS) that provide instant feedback and guidance to students as they learn and adapt to their learning styles and capabilities, thus providing more personalised and effective learning experiences. These tutoring systems use AI algorithms which provide personalised feedback and guidance to students throughout their learning. Natural language processing. AI chatbots can be used to answer students’ queries in real time, providing instant guidance and assistance. This is particularly useful for students who have difficulty understanding certain concepts and need help at home. AI-powered chatbots can answer routine student questions and clear assignment doubts. Natural language processing (NLP) is the backbone of chatbots, allowing them to understand and respond to human speech. Automated grading. Furthermore, AI can automate the assessment process, freeing teachers to attend to necessary admin duties. Simultaneously, it provides students faster assignment feedback thus enabling them to improve their grades. Moreover, AI assessments are entirely based on data and…
Studio pedagogy takes a very different approach. A substantial number of contact hours and credits are given to undergrads to resolve live workplace problems individually or in team writes Pratyush Shankar Traditionally, engineering education has been perceived to be a higher education discipline that requires good grasp of theoretical concepts and a fair amount of workshop or practical exposure during the time spent in a bachelor’s degree programme. This traditional pedagogy succeeded to a certain extent in creating a generation of engineers and technocrats who have participated in nation-building and also contributed to building excellent engineering companies. However in recent times, there is a felt need to equip students with more real life and shopfloor experiences while they are still studying. Studio pedagogy, successfully used in numerous architecture and design schools worldwide, offers a good model for application in engineering education as well. In traditional engineering colleges, theoretical inputs in the form of lectures are given to students on the assumption that when confronted with practical workplace problems, graduates will apply this knowledge to solve them. However, there’s no dearth of evidence that chalk-n-talk pedagogy discourages creativity and innovation that is sadly missing in fresh engineering graduates. Studio pedagogy takes a very different approach. A substantial number of contact hours and credits are given to undergraduates to resolve live workplace problems individually or in teams. Over the course of every semester, students try and find the most innovative solutions to complex problems by applying access theory, case studies and tinkering with differing ideas. The role of faculty is transformed from ‘sage on stage’ to facilitators to whom students turn to for assistance. This pedagogy transforms students from passive to active learning participants in classrooms. Moreover, students develop strong ownership of their ideas when a project ends with an innovative solution. In most design schools, the studio course has the maximum number of credits and hence the maximum contact hours. It is not unusual to find a studio course having 9-12 credits in a given semester. A typical five-year architecture programme would have nine to ten studio modules. Each module poses a live or practical problem to be solved by students following discussion and debate. The studio model is designed to compel students to apply theoretical inputs they have been taught in study programmes. In this pedagogy the studio is a learning hub that demands holistic understanding of a problem, be it the quantum of resources used, technology deployed, or user behaviour. This stimulates creative thinking and fresh ideas, and provides a connect between theory and practice. Studio learning also generates high interest among students and there is a great amount of learning when students witness peers ideate differing solutions to common problems. This pedagogy if applied to core engineering subjects such as civil, mechanical and electrical, can lead to an enriching learning process. Navrachana University has implemented studio-based courses in these core disciplines of engineering with excellent results. Projects are designed and given to students to complete during a 16-week semester.…
Liberal arts students learn to use imagination, experiences and sensitivity to create new knowledge, learn to empathise to understand human sensitivities, and learn for the joy of learning writes Sanjay Padode The industrial age was dominated by concepts of division of labour and specialisation. This was the most efficient strategy for achieving scale and efficiency in the production of goods and services. The work environment was hierarchical and driven by working in shifts in which cooperation between different sets of human resources played a critical role. It was always about a few humans leading many and instructions from the top played a key role in driving the workforce. Managers were trained by the education system to master the art of giving instructions, and the workforce was trained to follow instructions and execute. Innovation and development of products were the function of research and development, constraining the human mind to concentrate on project completion. With the advent of the information age, hierarchies were flattened and a lot of work done previously by humans began to be done by machines. Human resources were developed to instruct machines that have no cognitive capabilities but can perform repetitive tasks efficiently. This fuelled the growth of STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) education. Capability to understand the use of machines coupled with knowledge to design systems and machines for efficient work delivery became necessary for successful project execution. In turn, education systems evolved to deliver just that. Ideation and imagination was confined to the creative arts. Education systems and curricula evolved to apply scientific principles of quantification and measurement in every field and, the theory of knowledge took a back seat. However, standardisation and globalisation became omnipresent and with the advent of the Internet the knowledge required to produce goods and services became easily accessible. The arbitrage in cost of living worldwide led to offshoring of work. These opportunities became available to all making the world a more competitive place. The new efficiencies added to the prosperity of the world but introduced volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity in the workplace. Technologies started to evolve rapidly, and markets became more dynamic. Differentiating products and services started to emerge as a challenge. All this change suddenly created a huge gap between education outcomes focussed on development of the left brain, and the emerging right brain needs of society. Critical thinking and problem-solving gained prominence in education. ‘Innovate or die’ emerged as the new mantra for survival. Legacy education systems designed to develop instruction followers began to feel the heat, and evolution of education became inevitable. The word ‘liberal’ has many connotations and is better understood in the Western context. Liberation from laws, customs, and strict norms of society through protests and agitations, defying set norms started to become a way of life as societies continued to democratise. Since their genesis Asian and African societies had been quite liberal in their way of life, but their liberal sense was distorted by westernisation during the colonisation era. Here the…
While some learning loss is inevitable because of switch to online teaching-learning, many assumptions about learning loss suffered by students during the pandemic lockdown are exaggerated writes Rajesh Khanna India’s education sector experienced a tectonic shift during the pandemic that forced schools and higher education institutions (HEIs) to re-think and re-invent the way mainstream education is delivered. During the prolonged lockdown and emergence of new issues such as social distancing, education institutions across the country were compelled to switch to the online mode of teaching-learning. While this new pedagogy did serve the all-important purpose of faculty-student engagement, it has limitations. According to a recent survey conducted by the staffing and recruitment company TeamLease, students countrywide experienced considerable learning loss. While students believe that their loss varied between 40-60 percent of what they would have learnt if institutional lockdown had not happened, HEI leaders estimate it to be at 30-40 percent. Moreover, the sudden shift to online education has raised concerns about the quality of online education itself. While some learning loss is inevitable, many assumptions about the extent of learning loss suffered by students during the pandemic lockdown are exaggerated because of several misconceptions. Among them: Learning loss is same for all students. The pandemic has undoubtedly affected students at all levels, but not to the same extent. Indeed, it’s quite likely that some students improved their learning outcomes because of the forced switch to avant garde digital technologies and close supervision of family elders. However, the majority experienced learning loss due to logistical, social and emotional adversity because of lack of resources, excessive interference from family and above all anxiety generated by the pandemic. In my opinion, the prime cause of learning loss is lack of preparation rather than subject knowledge delivery — deficit of maturity and self-sufficiency, rather than changed circumstances forced by the pandemic. Online learning is ineffective. This is the most common misconception based on widespread belief that if nobody monitors students, learning loss is inevitable. However, it’s important to note that these days best universities and HEIs encourage academic integrity while lightly monitoring students’ progress online. The upside of online learning is that it offers flexibility to students, allowing them to learn at their own pace and develop deep understanding of their subjects. The online learning revolution has taken away the constraints of time and space and improved access to learning material. Moreover, online learning material is enriched by easy integration of multimedia content. Online learning is not cohesive. Progressive, contemporary universities offer technology platforms allowing students to network and engage in peer-to-peer learning which is becoming increasingly important in the new digital age. Students can interact with teachers and peers via discussion boards, online chats, and videoconferencing. Admittedly this is easier in conventional classrooms and more difficult in online learning environments. However lately, HEIs use various stratagems to encourage students to work collectively on group projects and assignments. Instructors are mindful of using holistic approaches to teaching, assigning projects that focus on the aptitude of…
-Jessica Cavallaro The agile classroom is built on the foundation of people, process, collaboration and problem-solving through practice of 21st century skills OUR CURRENT EDUCATION SYSTEM WAS designed during the first industrial revolution (1760-1820). In that era, the general public was largely uneducated, unable to read and knowledge was in short supply. If you wanted to learn about the world, history, math and science, someone needed to collate that information and present it to you. With knowledge stuffed into books, which were not readily available to most, lessons needed to be memorised to hold forever. Accessing information wasn’t easy and most people didn’t have the time. Knowledge needed to be memorised to be applied later. Time in school was short and therefore, pacing of the curriculum needed to be controlled. The teacher’s job was to control the flow of information with students learning passively, expected to absorb as much as possible because tomorrow they might have to start working. The needs of contemporary students are radically different from those of past generations. Through leaps in technology, we have access to all human history at our fingertips. We can look up random facts, dates, and unrelated trivia. High-performing artificial intelligence (AI) can do the rote jobs that bore us, and is quickly taking over more complex tasks. What was considered ‘educated’ in the past — memorisation and rote execution of tasks — is not what students need to navigate an increasingly ambiguous and complex future. Evolution that has transformed every segment of society has largely by-passed education. Generally speaking, schools still function as they did in the past. In any country, you can walk into classrooms where students are at desks, passively taking notes. Students are still taking recall-based standardised tests as a measurement of ‘education’. Not much has changed in this sphere even though so much has changed in the world. Several paradigm shifts have occurred in the past few decades. We are experiencing a technological revolution moving at hyperspeed in the past few years. The majority of the world is online, with people working in diverse teams in different time zones. The change is not just in the way we work. Work that needs to be completed has changed as well. With AI growing more intelligent, jobs that can be completed by following directions or through rote memorisation are being automated. The Dell Corporation estimates that 85 percent of the jobs that our students will do have not even been created yet. To truly prepare students for the uncertain future, we need to focus on keeping up with the evolving landscape. This means equipping children with skills that are transferable, flexible, and adaptive. For children spending 12 years in school, it is our responsibility to provide them with the tools necessary to succeed in the world that awaits them. As teachers, we must be ready to answer their questions to keep our students engaged. Therefore, we must shift our focus. Content is important, but it is not the most…
Alokesh Sen THE DESCRIPTIVE ‘LEARNING SPACE’ EVOKES the image of classrooms in which teachers and students are involved in face-to-face interaction. Undoubtedly, classrooms are the principal theatres of teaching-learning. However, in present times of internet connectivity and hybrid education, learning spaces need to be more broadly defined. In my school, students sitting by a pond or in our meditation centre are in a learning space. Therefore, it follows that a well-designed and landscaped school will provide numerous spaces conducive to knowledge transference and absorption to improve students’ learning outcomes. Promoters of greenfield schools in particular, as also principals supervising renovation and expansion of schools, should bear in mind that designing campuses to create multiple learning spaces for pupils is a matter of great importance. Design and landscaping has to be simultaneously visionary and practical. Therefore, selecting architects/designers with in-depth knowledge of educational psychology, who take pains to understand the philosophy of specific educational institutions for whom they construct infrastructure and buildings, requires careful consideration. For instance, in the Birla Public School, Pilani, the junior school was designed by the legendary Dr. Maria Montessori herself. The design and layout of the building provides ample evidence that Dr. Montessori understood the sensory impact of diverse learning spaces and how they develop cognitive processes.
To be useful, feedback has to be timely, specific and actionable. Teachers are often buried under day-to-day demands of the profession. But delayed feedback loses its power and utility for students, writes Tara Quigley OVER THE COURSE OF MY 24-YEAR TEACHING career, I have assessed and provided feedback to students on countless assignments. But only after I learned about how our brains work as we learn, that made the biggest difference to how I provide feedback. Knowing the end goal of an assignment is critical for providing useful feedback. According to educationists Hattie and Timperley, in their essay The Power of Feedback (2007), “effective feedback must answer three major questions asked by a teacher and/or student: Where am I going? (What are the goals?), How am I going? (what progress is being made towards the goal?), and Where to next? (what actions need to be undertaken to make better progress?). These questions correspond to feed up, feedback, and feed forward.” There are two types of feedback, formative and summative. The first provides guidance about how a student is progressing towards a summative goal and what she can do to improve her performance. It also informs a teacher how she can provide corrective instruction to individual students or the whole class.
As the world begins to recover from the Covid-19 pandemic which severely disrupted K-12 schooling, the challenges confronting India’s education system need to be urgently addressed, writes Elisabeth Evi Indian education was severely disrupted by the Covid-19 pandemic. While many children missed school altogether during the world’s most prolonged schools lockdown — averaging 82 weeks — among major countries, partnerships between the public and private sectors and incremental use of educational technology permitted a minority of children to continue their schooling. As the world begins to recover in the aftermath of this calamity, the challenges confronting India’s education system need to be urgently addressed. Making good learning loss of primary children. E-learning facilitated continuation of learning for a substantial number of children, especially in urban India. However, the positive effect was mostly for secondary school students. The overwhelming majority of preschool and primary (K-II) children have never attended school. These children need to be acclimatised to daily routines and expectations of the education system. Additionally, they need to learn the basics of reading, writing and math, while learning age-appropriate and grade-level content. Any strategy for moving forward must include plans for remediation that also address progress in students’ current grade learning outcomes.
Under the mentorship model unthrea-tened by audit-style evaluation teachers are likely to experiment, innovate and improve classroom management and lessons planning and delivery, Prachi Bhardwaj Upgrading the quality of teaching-learning in India’s 17,000 teacher training colleges is one of the most important prerequisites of introducing academic rigour and improving students’ learning outcomes. This is acknowledged in the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020. Under the new policy, every school teacher is obliged to undergo professional development training for at least 50 hours per year. This necessity is also recognised by the country’s 9-million-strong educators’ community. According to Union education ministry data, 1.72 million principals and teachers have already signed up for continuous professional development programmes and 2.3 million educators have enrolled in online programmes. Yet there is no clarity about who is accountable for the quality and sustained implementation of these programmes. In the circumstances, there’s a urgent need to examine the quality of teacher development programmes and the methodology of assessing teachers’ learning outcomes. In their book Continuous Professional Development (2003), David Megginson and Vivian Whitaker describe continuous professional development as “a process by which individuals take control of their own learning and development, by engaging in an ongoing process of reflection and action. This process is empowering and exciting and can stimulate people to achieve their aspirations and move towards their dreams”. It’s important to note the key words “ongoing process of reflection”.
In this age of rudderless drift towards liberalism fuelled by mobile phones and social media apps, educators need to confront new threats posed by the internet and dangerous apps, writes Lawrence Fray During the past two decades, progressive schools have successfully moved from the treadmill of lecture-based instruction to more personalised forms of learning where students construct knowledge, develop skills and, through efficient formative assessment, participate in directing their own learning. Their teachers have progressed from being ‘sages on stages’ to ‘guides by the side’. However, there is no shortage of people — including educators — who view the educational pathway as a well-defined functional process where the most praiseworthy hallmark of a successful school is delivery of high board examination scores leading to a seat in a renowned university which, in turn, leads to a high-flying career. Hence, excessive summative testing and intensive and (sometimes detrimental) tutoring and high university admission cut-offs buttress a pedagogy that leaves little space for orderly personal development.
– Sanjay Viswanathan, an alum of University of Strathclyde and Harvard Business School and founder-chairman of the London-based Adi Group and Ed4All In the 21st century India will overtake the US and China to become the most prosperous nation in the world again. To attain this objective we need a National Doctrine starting with mindset change In the seventh century CE, Xuanzang (602-664 CE, also known as Hiuen Tsang), a peripatetic Chinese Buddhist monk, scholar, traveller, and translator, defied his kingdom’s ban on travel abroad and came overland to India. Over 16 years (629-645 CE), his travels in India took him to Kashmir, Mathura, Ayodhya, Prayagraj, Varanasi, and Nalanda among other seats of learning. At the famous Nalanda Univesrity, he schooled with Buddhist masters including Silabhadra. When he returned to China, he shipped 657 Sanskrit texts centred on Mahayana and Hinayana Buddhism on 20 packhorses. To his surprise, Emperor Taizong welcomed him as a national hero and set up a large centre of learning in Xi’an. Over 2000 years before Xuanzang set foot in India, we had shown the world our academic brilliance through Sushrutha, Kanada, Aryabhatta, Chanakya, Adi Shankara and Madhvacharya, among other eminent scholars. Maharishi Kanada developed the foundations of atomistic approach to physics and philosophy and wrote of anu or atom and its indestructible nature in the Sanskrit text Vaisesika Sutra2200 years before John Dalton propounded atomic theory. My prediction is that in the 21st century, India will overtake the US and China to become the world’s most prosperous nation again. So, how can we regain our intellectual leadership and vigour and emerge once again as a global pioneer and inventor nation that will drive human civilisation and progress? For this, India needs a National Doctrine comprising elements — Mindset, Structure, Building Blocks, and Values. In this essay, let’s start with Mindset.
Vedant Thadani, an alum of Goldsmiths College, University of London and works with Muskan Productions, Delhi The crisis in Ukraine has alerted many Indians to the plight of their fellow countrymen who were stranded in that country. The overwhelming majority of them were medical students who had left India to pursue undergrad degrees. Ukraine isn’t a global leader in education like the US or UK, but still over 20,000 Indians were enrolled in universities there. Over a million Indian students go abroad for higher education annually. That number is projected to reach 1.8 million by 2024. While there are a host of reasons for this annual exodus, the most glaring is the lack of higher education options in India. As of 2016, only 8.15 percent of citizens held a college degree — an embarrassingly low figure for a country proclaiming itself a rising power. Admission into Indian universities is notoriously difficult. The competition is ridiculously severe and, in some cases, less than 2 percent of admission applications are accepted. This leaves young Indians with no option but to look elsewhere. There is a huge demand-supply gap in acceptable quality higher education, and this has been the case for at least the past two decades. Education in India isn’t a free market — the vast majority of schools and universities cannot operate a profit-making model. The University Grants Commission (UGC) Act, 1956 does not explicitly restrict for-profit education. But s. 26 (1) (g) of the Act grants UGC the power to regulate the “maintenance of standards and the coordination of work or facilities in universities.” This allows the commission to regulate fees in higher education institutions.
Allan Andersen When students return to school following the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown, the focus of institutional managements shouldn’t just be on academics. They will also need to help children with the transition back to in-person classes while supporting their mental health and well-being. According to several authoritative studies, anxiety and unhappiness rose among youngsters throughout the pandemic. Hence, it’s vital for school managements to devise well-defined procedures to protect their students’ social and emotional wellness when they return to normative schooling. This is especially important during the transition period when students migrate from online learning to in-class schooling. Students have differing emotional responses. Learning loss apart, your students will have endured a range of losses during the prolonged period when schools were under lockdown. Therefore, back on campus children and teenagers will react to difficult situations in differing ways. It’s critical to address every student’s emotional needs in a personal way after she returns to school. Create a safe environment for students. As children return to on-campus schooling, the institution must provide a secure environment within which to communicate their anxieties and experiences. This is critical for their emotional well-being and personal development. In our school, we have launched a Mentoring Initiative which recognises that children returning after a lengthy absence from classrooms will bring a baggage of problems. A mentor is a grown-up ‘buddy’ for youngsters, forming a link between teachers and pupils that extends beyond classrooms. Students can express any problem they are encountering with the mentor/facilitator. Not only will the child be able to express herself in a non-judgemental space, she will also be reassured that she has a friend she can rely on. In this programme, the role of teachers and facilitators must not be confused. The teacher still remains an authoritative figure — one who instructs and guides. But the teacher who assumes the role of a facilitator/mentor must be an individual who doesn’t give direct instruction to the child. For instance, senior school teachers could mentor students of junior classes. This programme is the outcome of the school’s objective to nurture leaders who are emotionally stable and capable of dealing with the problems that life throws at them. Several professional development workshops were held prior to the programme’s commencement to train facilitators for this position. Facilitators received extensive training on how to become enabling listeners to diagnose students’ problems and create a meaningful environment for every child. Despite the fact that the connection is informal, it has a serious goal. Completion of lessons can be secondary. After return to in-person classes, students may exhibit disruptive behaviour if they don’t acclimatise quickly. Children and teens who have suffered grief such as the death or prolonged illness of a loved one will have focus difficulties. Teachers need to make allowance for this, giving them time to manage their experiences before they get back on the academic track. Moreover, it’s also vital for teachers to acknowledge that certain students, particularly those approaching school-leaving exams, may be impatient…
– Aadya Sharma, Kunal Jaluka and Suresh C Joshi, Jindal School of Psychology and Counselling, OP Jindal Global University, Sonipat, Haryana. Graduating from high school is the first step into adult life for a student, and choosing a career path is never easy for teenagers confronted with multitudes of possibilities and opportunities. This essay focuses on students who go to college after graduating high school and are confronted with multifaceted problems. Making the choice of college is always hard at any age, even more so during teenage because young adults are experiencing many hormonal and emotional changes that might affect their impulsivity and decisions. Nevertheless, it is a choice that determines the path they pave for themselves and is of utmost importance because the trajectory of their lives depends on it. Problems faced by freshmen at college. While graduating from school is exciting and the prospect of college and a new lifestyle is attractive, the practical aspects of collegiate life could be new and surprising, and at times, overwhelming. It is smart to be informed of the challenges and problems you might face in the first few semesters in college and be prepared for them! Problems faced by students as they go through this transition aren’t just related to academics, as a matter of fact, various other factors could stress out students and these problems are multifaceted. They could be broadly categorised as academic, social, emotional, financial, and legal challenges. Academic challenges. When students are in school, teachers remind them of their grades, academic performance, co-curricular activity, and academic well-being is usually looked after by an adult that they know — a favourite teacher, counselor, coach, or other authoritative figure at school. But in undergrad education, there’s no hand-holding. In college/university students are responsible and accountable for their own progress and failure. No one keeping track of their falling grades and especially their extra-curricular activities. This could be a major stressor for many freshmen in college with the mental burden of always maintaining track of their academics making notes and meeting deadlines having devolved on them. One solution is to maintain uniformity and consistency in keeping up and falling behind. Moreover, the pace of teaching is usually faster at university levels so it is advisable to be in touch with peers and professors not to fall behind. Allow oneself to be helped, don’t hesitate to ask your professors for help when you require it. Go to the counselor if you feel lost, they will help you with things like time management and help you get organised. Another problem is that the academic schedule is usually less structured in college than it is in school. One should always note down the class syllabus and the books that they might require at the starting of a semester. Students should join and organise study groups that can help one to socialise as well as get academic help. And even after working on everything perfectly, some students won’t score well, leading to grade shock.…
In March 2020, schools in India and worldwide came to an abrupt halt because of the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic. Surprisingly despite the massive disruption, quite a number of schools managed to cope well, taking teachers, students and parents on an online adventure! As with most adventures, there were teething troubles but eventually things settled down. Children’s return to school campuses is likely to be phased and will be driven by local government regulations and parental preferences. Meanwhile, teachers and administrators should reflect upon frequency (daily or alternate days) and embrace and improve the blended learning model — an amalgam of in-class and digital education — that’s here to stay. If school managements build a consensus with parents, students and teachers being on the same page, the learning loss of the past 60-64 weeks when schools were shuttered can be quickly remedied. I have always trusted teachers to be the best judges of situations at school. Going forward, they need to manage in-person and virtual teaching with equal intensity and rigour. The past 18 months have given educators (and parents) a good idea of how thousands of teachers responded creatively to the prolonged closure of schools during the pandemic. Driven by creativity, sense of purpose, skill and positive mindsets, a minority of teachers were motivated to do the extraordinary. Yet today, we have to re-think what students have missed in online classes and bridge the gaps. We need to double down on learning-by doing in the form of hands-on experiences/experimental lab work, collaborative activities and sports during the initial months of resumed in-school classes. School managements have to be flexible about allowing online students to join sports sessions and engaging them to address soft skills gaps. Pedagogy, assessment, and the daily routine are all critical for enriching children’s learning experiences. Teachers have to re-design assessments and focus on long-term projects, internships and in-depth research rather than grades. The post-pandemic era requires schools where children focus on learning-by-doing. Assignments and projects must be aligned to real world challenges to which young students should apply their minds. The priority should be to encourage our students to create, invent, discover, and collaborate. “Don’t just consume things, create things,” advises former US president Barack Obama. However, care needs to be taken that the gradual — perhaps too gradual — return to on-campus learning doesn’t result in abandonment of the many upsides of online education that school managements have experienced, even if unwittingly. The hybrid or blended teaching-learning model is certain to become normative in primary-secondary education. Teachers and institutional managements need to be vigilant that valuable gains of the pandemic era — supplementary and explanatory education through digital media — aren’t lost. With the spurt and improvement of Internet connectivity, high quality content from around the world available on Moocs and digital online platforms can be incorporated into institutional teaching-learning programmes. For instance, through our Singhania Education Services, we have created our own holistic learning app, Singhania Quest+. This app enables learners to…
Gitanjali Surendran Despite politicians endlessly debating the rights and wrongs of history and the country’s towns and cities hosting large numbers of monuments of historical importance, India’s education institutions don’t encourage historical thinking. Historical thinking or thinking with history mandates a sense of time and change over time. Second, it requires careful understanding of context and putting ourselves in the shoes of historical actors. Third, it requires teachers to present evidence for our propositions or arguments and to carefully examine it. Conversely, thinking with history prompts — or should prompt — scholars to ask for evidence in support of a proposition, argument or theory. Fourth, historical thinking requires teachers and students to be open to counter arguments and weigh different perspectives on a given issue. Therefore, historical thinking necessitates critical thinking. The internet is flooded with interesting advice and guidance on online class planning. The Union government’s advice to teachers is to follow the Pragyata scheme (see www.education.gov.in/sites/upload_files/mhrd/files/pragyata-guidelines_0.pdf), i.e, plan, review, arrange, guide, yak/talk, assign, track, appreciate. Based on my experience of online history teaching this past year and earlier, I recommended PRAJNATA — an acronym for play, repartee, archive, journal, native, access, teamwork and aesthetics. One of the most underrated aspects of learning in classrooms is play. The rewards for students of all ages flowing from playful tones, playful activities and story-telling in classrooms are bountiful. The study of history is a serious matter, but the material lends itself well to storytelling possibilities and play. For example, why not use the short stories of Saadat Hasan Manto to teach about the partition of India? Or taking a leaf out of Turkish writer Orhan Pamuk’s celebrated novel My Name is Red, ask students to write their own fictional pieces from the perspective of different elements in a Mughal painting like the emperor, throne, war elephant, a tree, courtier etc. ‘R’ in PRAJNATA stands for repartee which translates to comfortable and inclusive dialogue with our students. Classrooms should be safe spaces for children to air divergent opinions including ones we don’t agree with, subject to their being expressed without rude or foul language. We could call on them to read a passage aloud, prepare a statement on a subject or issue or enact a historical figure. In synchronous or asynchronous teaching-learning, getting students to speak up potentially sets the stage for greater participation in the future. Archives are central to the study of history. To nurture archival minds students should collect newspaper clippings, images and artifacts that represent their particular moment in history. Discussing primary sources like a media clipping from August 15, 1947 or Gandhi’s letter to Hitler, will give them a taste of material historians use to construct their stories. Ask them to think about presence and absence in archives to promote critical thinking. The therapeutic effects of journaling (‘J’ in PRAJNATA) are well-documented. Asking students to maintain journals, written or recorded, helps develop archival thinking. To get them started, you could read excerpts from journals of Winston Churchill,…
The sustained preference for study abroad is due to the variety of electives, degree options, specialisations, better research platforms and diverse pedagogies that universities abroad offer, says Ramananda S.G. As the pandemic continues to wreak havoc leaving uncertainty in its wake with travel restrictions by most countries firmly in place, Indian students are turning to twinning programmes or looking at newer study abroad destinations. In March 2020 with the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, most students from India with study abroad plans decided to postpone them to the next academic year. This decision made sense because of pandemic-associated health risks, mobility and visa restrictions, and financial pressures caused by the global economic slowdown. However, towards the latter part of last year, as pandemic fears began to abate given the positive vaccine results, and destination countries gradually re-opening their borders and easing travel restrictions, some students resurrected study abroad plans. Now, months later, following the second wave of the pandemic and an imminent third, determined students have had to revise their foreign higher education plans again. Among the options currently available are twinning, synchronous blended learning programmes and shift to countries with lower Covid risks which are still allowing Indian students. Some foreign universities have also reduced tuition fees to woo international students. One of the most conspicuous study abroad trends this year is an unprecedented large number of applications to foreign universities as students who had cancelled plans for admission this autumn (2021) are applying for admission in January 2022, together with the fresh batches of students. This has not only led to intensified competition for admission into popular universities, but also created a shortage of seats in sought-after courses such as MBA, data science and digital marketing. Consequently, some students have begun applying to less popular streams like humanities, music, food technology and luxury brands management, among others. Moreover, students are also applying to several universities in multiple countries simultaneously. This has turned the spotlight on a set of lesser-known varsities because it makes sense for students to cast their nets wider when choosing offshore universities. A second factor pushing students to study abroad is that professional skills development study programmes tend to be qualitatively superior in foreign higher education institutions. Acquisition of good skill sets will help to land better jobs in the post-pandemic era. Research studies of the Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC) indicate that MBA, Ph D and STEM courses have been gaining popularity after breakout of the Covid-19 pandemic. Thirdly, to attract high-fees paying foreign students tests like GRE/GMAT/TOEFL/LSAT which are a precondition of admission to respectable universities abroad, can now also be taken online. Moreover by signing up for wholly online study programmes, Indian students can learn at globally acclaimed institutions, with quality teaching and access to leading academic experts, and an international community. The fourth trend is the rising preference for newer study abroad destinations. The US and UK temporarily fell off the list of most sought-after higher education destinations because of Covid…
Explosive grades inflation has jeopardised the credibility of school board exams. Therefore the criterion referenced assessment (CRA) system is receiving new traction, says Venunadhan Pillai In many countries around the world including India, examination boards have cancelled or postponed exams because of the Covid-19 pandemic. This decision has not been taken lightly. Public board exam scores are the most important determinant for undergrad college and university admission. Therefore with exams cancelled for the pandemic years, examination boards have been compelled to devise alternative methodologies to measure students’ learning outcomes. In the pandemic year 2019-20, national boards unable to conduct their full set of exams, permitted managements of affiliated schools to use their judgement to award grades/marks to school-leaving class X and XII students. Some schools acted ethically and awarded grades/marks based on the historical progress of students. However, not a few availed the opportunity to award highly inflated marks to their students. The resultant grades inflation has further jeopardised the suspect credibility of school exam boards. Therefore, the criterion-referenced assessment (CRA) system proposed by American educators Robert Glaser (1963) and Popham and Husek (1969) who devised this alternative assessment system to measure academic learning outcomes, is receiving new traction. According to University of California academics, “criterion-referenced assessment is the process of evaluating learning outcomes of students against a set of pre-specified qualities or criteria, without reference to the achievement of others”. Under this methodology, students are expected to cross specified learning milestones without comparison with others in their cohort. On the other hand, the norm-referenced assessment system measures the performance of every student relative to others writing the same test. Before 1835 when British educationist Lord Macaulay wrote his famous ‘minute on Indian education’ and uprooted “the beautiful tree” of India’s ancient gurukul school education system, although it was not described as such, the CRA system was normative in primary-secondary education in the subcontinent. The gurukuls prescribed a set of criteria, and attainment of these criteria resulted in the end of gurukul life. Significantly, the performance of students was unrelated to other students. The system didn’t rank students because the gurukul was not competitive but designed to prepare children to live their lives according to the four ashramas of the dharma concept, i.e, develop the physical, spiritual, aesthetic and intellectual capabilities of children combined with high sense of civic duty which students would devotedly carry back to their families and communities. This tried, tested and proven school education system flourished until 1813 when the East India Company was forced by London to accept the responsibility for education in its territories as a precondition of renewal of its charter. Following Macaulay’s minute, governance of the subcontinent was subsequently taken over by the Crown in 1857, and the norm-referenced assessment system of standardised tests which compared students’ performance interse was introduced. This learning outcomes-based assessment system prevailed, as the primary purpose of education became filtration due to limited seats in higher education and employment after graduation. It’s instructive to note that as…
Political will is required to grasp several thorny nettles and radically restructure India’s isolationist higher education system to improve the ranking of our universities in global league tables, says Amarendra Sahoo The London-based Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) which publishes its World University Rankings rating the world’s Top 1,000 universities, recently released its 2021 list. Only 21 Indian institutions are included in this authoritative, diligently compiled and globally respected league table of the world’s most respected higher education institutions (HEIs), against 24 last year. Of them only three feature among the global Top 200 — Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay ranked #172 followed by the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore (185) and IIT-Delhi (193). However, all three have lost rank compared to last year. The next respectably ranked Indian HEI is IIT-Madras at #275. Neighbouring China on the other hand has 84 universities featured in the 2021 QS Top 1000 league table with four ranked in the Top 50. This despite India hosting four of the oldest modern era universities — Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee (estb. 1847), University of Mumbai (1857), University of Calcutta (1857) and University of Madras (1857). It’s somewhat chastening to learn that the globally top-ranked Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), USA was established in 1861. The reasons behind the poor academic standing of India’s HEIs and universities in particular are numerous ranging from chronic under-funding, excessive government control and lack of autonomy, over-subsidisation of tuition fees, to poor academy-industry interface and a conspicuous deficit of research culture. However, one of the major causes of the poor ranking of Indian higher education institutions in the QS (and Times Higher Education) annual league tables is that they have remained closed, insular organisations shut off from the global academic community. They have made little effort to collaborate and interface with academics and universities in other countries. In the QS 2021 rankings even India’s top-ranked HEIs are awarded rock-bottom scores under the parameter of internationalisation, i.e, ratio of international faculty and students. Unlike China which has invited acclaimed American universities including Yale, UC Berkeley, Johns Hopkins, Duke and New York universities and Nottingham University, UK, to establish full-fledged bricks-n-mortar campuses in that country, neither the Congress-led UPA-I and II governments (2004-2014) nor the incumbent BJP-led NDA government has yet permitted foreign universities to plant their flags on Indian soil. Nor has it allowed any meaningful collaboration between Indian and foreign universities. Although several private universities have signed academic exchanges and dual-degree programmes with second rung universities abroad, none of the Central and state government-run universities have been permitted to sign full-fledged collaboration agreements. That there is strong public demand for superior, high-quality education dispensed by foreign universities is in-controvertible. Every year, an estimated 600,000 school and college leavers from India travel abroad to study in top-ranked universities in the US, UK, Singapore and Australia despite their levying higher tuition fees— astronomical by Indian standards. Fortunately, even if belatedly, the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 released on July 29 last year, takes…
In its recommendations the Kasturirangan Committee identified faculty capacity building as a critical prerequisite of improving HEIs. But NEP 2020 makes only a passing reference to it – Dr. R.S. Grewal THE NEW NATIONAL EDUCATION POLICY (NEP) 2020 was presented to the country and public on July 29 last year. But as was the case with NEP 1968 and NEP-1986, progress in implementing it is very slow. NEP 2020 is substantially the outcome of the 484-page report of the K. Kasturirangan Committee presented to the Union HRD (now education) ministry on December 15, 2018. In its recommendations for higher education the KR committee had identified faculty capacity building as a critical prerequisite of strengthening and improving HEIs (higher education institutions). Regrettably, apart from generic platitudes, NEP 2020 makes only a passing reference to faculty capacity building in the country’s also-ran HEIs, none of whom are ranked among the global Top 200 in the authoritative WUR (World University Rankings) of the highly-respected HEIs assessment and ranking agencies QS and Times Higher Education. Although it’s universally accepted that high-quality faculty is critical for excellence in teaching-learning and research, NEP 2020 contains no constructive solutions — let alone a roadmap — for faculty capacity building in India’s 55,000 colleges and almost 1,100 universities. Unfortunately, for the past several decades, the brightest graduates and postgrads seldom opted to enter the teaching profession. That’s because instead of valuing teachers as national assets, schools and HEIs tend to treat them as mere employees. Not only are teachers and professors modestly remunerated, they are accorded low status in Indian society. There was a time in our country when kings rose from their thrones to welcome learned teachers who were venerated as fonts and disseminators of wisdom. But today they are tolerated, rather than respected in Indian society. A major share of the blame for this unsatisfactory situation has to be laid at the collective door of teachers themselves. Their mindsets and pedagogies are of the 1930s. The academic community, and this includes assistant professors, associate professors and professors in HEIs, is nowhere near as competent — especially in the area of original and innovative research — as their counterparts in top-ranked Western universities. Worse, they seem quite satisfied with the status quo and show little interest and inclination for self-improvement. Therefore training and professional development of 1.45 million highered faculty is a major challenge facing contemporary India. Sustained neglect of formal teacher training and professional development now demands special measures for capacity building comprising motivation and coercion. Self evidently, remuneration and service conditions of faculty in HEIs need to be overhauled to attract academic toppers with idealism and positive value-premises to teach in the country’s colleges and universities. The precondition of this is that government and the middle class must shed the notion that high-quality education can be availed at low price. HEIs can increase the remuneration of faculty only if they are allowed to charge realistic fees from students. College and university fees have been frozen…
Sarojini Rao is the principal of Indus International School & advisor, Indus Startup School, Bengaluru 21st century India is re-discovering its entrepreneurial roots. It is now among the world’s top 5 countries for the number of start-up enterprises. However, according to a 2017 IBM Institute for Business Value and Oxford Economics Study, 90 percent of Indian startups fail within five years. Though most promoters ascribe this high failure rate to inadequate funding, the majority of them fail because of deficiency of entrepreneurial competencies, particularly creativity, risk-taking and ‘antifragility’. The resilient entrepreneur bounces back to square one. On the contrary, antifragile entrepreneurs thrive in chaos and emerge stronger than before. Although politicians and bureaucrats who have promoted over 500 public sector commercial enterprises countrywide seem unaware, every business enterprise is a risk-bearing venture. Therefore, fear of failure is not unusual. But the distinguishing feature of successful entrepreneurs is that they have risk-bearing capability, and aren’t afraid to fail. They understand that the first rule of business — or indeed any enterprise — is ‘nothing ventured, nothing gained’. Unfortunately, despite the subcontinent’s long and successful history of private enterprise, in contemporary Indian society there’s considerable stigma attached to failure arising from risk taking. Therefore, the general preference of the middle class is for safe and secure employment, especially in government jobs where long tenure, steady promotion and inflation-proof salaries and perquisites adding to several multiples of per capita income, are guaranteed. Yet the national development effort requires a large and ever growing number of entrepreneurs — job creators rather than seekers — to step forward to promote greenfield enterprises, philanthropic trusts and charities and social welfare organisations. In the 21st century milieu, the country’s schools and colleges must foster an entrepreneurial culture to encourage children to become risk-taking entrepreneurs unafraid of failure. Case studies need to be collated and entrepreneurial stories celebrated and disseminated. The first step towards resuscitating our historically strong tradition of private enterprise is to overcome fear of failure which is pervasive in Indian society. School managements should encourage students to practice design thinking and to apply knowledge to real-life situations to creatively and collaboratively solve problems. Design thinking is a solutions-based pedagogy developed to find innovative solutions to problems. It was developed by IDEO (an international design company) based on models ideated in the Stanford Design School. In simple terms, design thinking means collaborative effort to identify problems, and generating creative solutions. I believe the design thinking process (DTP) should be integrated into every subject in all classes, starting with one subject per grade. By practicing DTP, teachers can compact several periods of teacher and textbook-driven teaching into meaningful experiences for students. As a result, the latter will be stimulated to research, collaborate, brainstorm, ideate, reflect and develop valuable life competencies. DTP is a life skill at the macro level and an instructional strategy at the micro level. To create an ecosystem that encourages students to become risk-takers and overcome fear of failure, evolved educationists recommend heterogeneous teams…
Sumesh Nair is the Mumbai-based co-founder and CEO of Board Infinity, a career exploration platform In recent years, larger budgets for digital learning programmes, new tech innovations, enhancement of virtual training tools and rising popularity of social media, have given a huge stimulus to e-learning. According to a 2016 report by US-based Statista Research Department, the global market size for e-learning was $150 million (Rs.1,095 crore) and is projected to grow by 5 percent per year in the 2017-24 period. Some of the reasons why the e-learning business has witnessed impressive growth is the recent pandemic-driven demand for digital solutions, its learning flexibility and effectiveness, easy availability of virtual training tools, boost in employee productivity and rising interest in distance learning. In addition, the global executive e-learning market is also growing at a fast pace. According to a 2020 survey by Technavio, a UK-based market research firm, the global market for e-learning will expand by $1,890 million (Rs.1,400 crore) in revenue terms by 2024. Social media, mobile phones and analytics technologies have accelerated the adoption of e-learning which ensures that study programmes can reach massive numbers of students at a fraction of the cost of the traditional education process. Self-driven career advancement and training are other factors spurring global demand for e-learning programmes. In India, several top tier B-schools including IIM-Nagpur, XLRI and IIM-Kashipur are shifting their graduate placement preparation processes online, and have tied up with edtech platforms such as Board Infinity to provide personalised 1:1 professional education. Students connect with experts based on their profiles and interests to receive actionable feedback and insights. These B-schools are saving time and cost while making sure students are prepared for placement interviews. A 2016 Pew Research Centre survey indicates that 63 percent of working adults classify themselves as professional learners. These are professionals who sign up for online programmes to improve their job and life skills for career advancement. Increasingly, young graduates believe that continuous learning and upskilling is necessary in an increasingly VUCA (volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity) world, and are signing up in droves for in-service e-learning programmes after securing employment in industry and business. These students learn from devices such as tablets, computers, mobiles, etc and want faculty to record content and post it online as course material. For teachers and faculty, the challenge is to create high-quality video, text and animation content that engages students. The great advantage of e-learning and online study programmes is that it traverses geographical barriers, has no time constraints or age limit. Increasingly, edtech platforms are providing courses at nominal prices for everyone as infrastructure costs are falling daily. The upshot of the new e-learning revolution that’s sweeping the world is that globally top-ranked universities including Harvard and MIT are making their degree programmes available and accessible online. More recently, the Harvard Business Review enabled business management students to access quality content, networking opportunities and case-based learning online. Moreover, several top-ranked American universities are collaborating with ed-tech platforms such as Coursera and…
– Dr. D. Srikanth Rao is director of the Manipal Institute of Technology The global Covid-19 pandemic which has taken a toll of more than 1.79 million lives worldwide and has shutdown academia for over eight months, has confronted every domain of engineering with unprecedented challenges. Academics and corporates the world over are exploring how these challenges will impact traditional jobs in the new age of digital transaction, Internet of things, artificial intelligence, augmented and virtual reality and cloud data storage. Simultaneously, e-commerce corporations and platforms such as Amazon, Flipkart, MakeMyTrip, Uber, Swiggy have precipitated a services revolution by directly connecting producers and service providers with end-users. These new age corporations are continuously innovating processes to reduce the time gap between order and delivery, and delivering the right product to the right customer at the right time. For engineers, a plethora of new challenges and opportunities have arisen out of these new business models. With profit margins being squeezed, manufacturers can no longer afford high inventory and storage costs. Therefore, they are relying on engineers to develop machines augmented with wireless connectivity and sensors, connected to systems that can visualise the entire production process and make decisions on their own. Automobile showrooms are going virtual. Consequently, instead of holding huge inventories, factories can initiate production as soon as a customer places an online order. These are the manufacturing processes being increasingly demanded. Moreover in additive manufacturing and construction, 3-D printing is becoming pervasive. Recently, a Hyderabad-based startup named Skyroot Aerospace won the 2020 Startup Award, for designing launch vehicles with fully 3D printed upper stage liquid engines, which slashed manufacturing cost by 40 percent. Although currently these breakthroughs in digital technologies are happening in developed OECD countries, and ominously in neighbouring China, India is also heading for unprecedented change in the next ten-20 years, especially in infrastructure development. With assets value diminishing in importance, the country is transforming from an assets creation to a knowledge-development economy. With assembled and 3-D printed buildings, architects innovating construction designs are challenging civil engineers. Moreover, digital programmes are radically transforming the civil engineer’s vocation. Soon he/she will be able to monitor the progress of construction projects without leaving office and multiply the number of project contracts. In the medical sector as well, engineers are likely to outnumber doctors as technology is developed for wearable devices, artificial intelligence and machine learning, and AR & VR technologies become ubiquitous. Likewise, self-driven cars, 5G and 6G technology, fibre to home to OTT platforms are set to generate massive demand for electronics, media, animation and data science engineers. Even the neglected agriculture sector is being rapidly modernised with machines replacing humans for soil analysis, crop monitoring, optimising water and fertilizer usage and weather forecasts, market prediction, cold storage and for connecting farmers directly with consumers through tech interventions. Young graduates with specialisation in biomedical, biotechnology, instrumentation, electronics, data science and chemical engineering are likely to find new opportunities in agriculture and allied activities. In the defence sector as…
Students are the leaders of tomorrow. They need to be empowered by new technologies-enabled learning systems that will shape them into competent, confident and proactive adults. Rajiv Bansal, Director-Operations, Global Indian International School (GIIS) India Rapid technological advancement stimulated by the challenges of the Covid-19 pandemic has spurred the evolution of education faster than ever before. With machine learning and artificial intelligence influencing every dimension of future workplaces, it is imperative that we equip students with the appropriate competencies to cope with challenges of the future. This is the motive force driving educators to ideate and implement advanced pedagogies that will transform K-12 education and prepare students for careers that don’t exist today. The Survey of Formal Education 2021 of the Unesco Institute of Statistics, an initiative aligned with the UN Sustainable Development Goals, will soon provide us with a clearer picture of what to expect in the near future. Meanwhile, let’s take a look at some new developments that will redefine education in 2021. The advent of integrated learning solutions. The adoption of unconventional pedagogies does not warrant discarding traditional curriculums. Instead, the objective should be to upscale existing academics with innovative learning tools. This is best exemplified with new-age blended and flipped learning pedagogies that enable students to access audio and video lectures at home, followed by active discussions on course material with teachers and peers inside school classrooms. Classrooms equipped with wi-fi connectivity and smartboards are ideal for such learning systems, where students can freely exchange ideas and gain deeper insight into subjects. Recently, as part of a pilot project of the ministry of education of the UAE, 20 schools across the emirates integrated VR (virtual reality) headsets into their classrooms. The objective is to enable students to experience and learn about places that would be difficult to visit in real life, including underwater exploration, space tours, or walks through historic sites. Personalised learning the new norm. Integration of digital tools into teaching-learning has also conferred the advantage of enabling study from any place, any time. Its value has been proven recently as the Coronavirus pandemic has validated the success of virtual classrooms. Students continue to make the most of online and offline learning modules as they pursue their lessons from the safety of their homes. Such personalised learning also greatly benefits students who lag behind in certain subjects. They can now work on their shortcomings through self-paced learning. For instance, a student can rewatch a video lesson any number of times to get a grasp of it. Such tech-enabled lessons have an edge over conventional classrooms, where teachers can give limited attention to every student. Greater focus on Artificial Intelligence. Artificial intelligence can be defined as an extension of human understanding of the world. Just like our brains, AI is self-evolving, able to adapt to its surrounding environment. AI-based solutions are hyper-personalised to students’ levels of knowledge and engineered to provide customised courses and evaluations to enhance their capabilities. For instance, a student can use AI…
