Wouldn't your child learn more about the Taj Mahal if, instead of just reading about it in her history book, she actually visited the Taj? And suppose she could do so without leaving home?
The US microchip giant blends pragmatism with passion to redefine learning in India
Wouldn't your child learn more about the Taj Mahal if, instead of just reading about it in her history book, she actually visited the Taj? And suppose she could do so without leaving home?
At the website of microchip giant Intel Corporation, you can "virtually" visit the Taj. Part of Intel's education initiative, you can stroll through the Taj here, admire it from outside from every possible angle,on a sunny day or in shimmering moonlight, view it as Shah Jahan saw it in his dying days, learn its history.
Intel, which has a global near-monopoly on microprocessors that run desktop computers, spends more than $100 million a year trying to improve curricula and learning methods around the world. The reason, says Carlene Moore Ellis, vice-president and director, education programme, is both pragmatic and passion-driven. "The pragmatic is that our technology innovation cycles demand an extremely educated workforce-one solid in maths and science basics. So any country that's worried about the strength of its economy had better worry about education. As an information technologist, I do believe there's an education market." And the passion? "In every country, people say I do this just to sell products. But my position and my mission are not a part of sales and marketing. I get paid only to improve education on planet Earth to produce a stronger and better workforce."
Travelling through India last fortnight, Ellis met up and brainstormed with officials from the education ministry, National Council for Educational Research and Training (NCERT), school principals and hundreds of schoolchildren to develop a better and more enjoyable learning process. Says Ellis: "We intend making the Indian education system extremely technology-driven."
But is it possible? Of the 75,000 secondary schools in India, only 13 per cent have access to computers. Only 4 per cent of these use computers as teaching tools. Even within these, the student-computer ratio is 9:1 (in the US, it's 1:1). Many are primitive 386 or 486 PCs, which hamper speed and Net access. And 65 per cent of these haven't even graduated to Windows.
Experts feel the areas computer education in India stresses now may be wrong. Students are taught programming, though hardly any of them will ever write software. Says Ellis: "I don't need to make a watch to tell the time. Kids need to know how to use computers, not how to make them." Says Atul Vijaykar, Intel's director, South Asia: "Most Indian schools suffer from lack of relevant and affordable educational content, lack of knowhow, trained teachers, access to computers, infrastructure and finance. This has to be addressed at a higher level. The basic idea is thus to set up a new model, a new framework for studies and an education model for the next millennium."
Intel is working with teachers to devise PC-based teaching methods. It's donating CD-ROMs that bring subjects to life: after all, a child will understand what's taught far better if she can see it happening than just rote it from black-and-white textbooks.
Last fortnight, the company, along with the department of education, unveiled two initiatives under Project Vidya, its education project in India. The first will develop a technology-supported education system and study its impact on school teaching and learning processes. It has been started in three schools selected by the department of education in New Delhi, Indore and Hyderabad and two more will be added by the year-end to be extended to a maximum of 10 schools selected on the basis of language and region. Based on the results, it will be implemented throughout India.
The second initiative, again with the government, entails setting up an Educational Multimedia Centre. It will develop multimedia educational content in Hindi and English in CD-ROMs to be made available to schools at subsidised rates.
To make rural children aware of computer technology, the project is running mobile computer labs. This, Intel officials say, will expose those people to computers who have not had any chance of seeing the possibilities of computer use. The government, with Intel's help, is planning a nationwide educational website where different syllabi will be put up as an "anytime, anywhere model of education". Says Ellis: "This kind of website has been extremely successful in Shanghai, where the Education Board manages, writes content and updates educational material for children. NCERT, with more organised resources, can do much better."
In the second phase, Intel plans to reach smaller towns. However, in a country where more than 90 per cent of primary schools are run by government bodies and most are non-performing institutions, introducing computers may be low-priority. But, says Ellis: "The best way to get nothing done is to take up intractable problems which no one else has been able to solve in the centuries before you. Intel is aware of what it can't do. We know we can't change the condition of the poor and the illiterate but we can certainly expose them to possibilities." Even that would surely be a step forward.