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IT in Education

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PCQ Bureau
New Update

In a span of 60 plus years since independence, India has managed to make its

presence felt in the global arena, and for all the right reasons. People say

it's the IT boom or the outsourcing industry which has catapulted our nation's

economy. True to some extent, the statement however ignores the real or the

underlying reasons for success. Advancements in Education is the real reason why

we have so many engineers, doctors and millions of other professionals, who are

together taking our country forward. A lot of people would want to complain, but

at the end, like it or not our education system has played an important role in

bringing progress and prosperity to our country. For quite some time now, IT has

been a critical component of the educational experience, creating opportunities

for students. Many software companies are developing educational software to

facilitate teaching. On the other hand, there are companies working towards

innovative hardware solutions while keeping in mind, the costs and the target

audience. All said and done, the country has realized the importance of IT in

the education sector, which is a multi-billion dollar industry and remains

recession proof. Let's take a look at what role IT can play in this domain.

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Where do we stand?



No matter what the need, teaching techniques or the administration of

educational institutes, people have realized a lot of benefits from IT

implementations. How institutes function, has changed over the years and new

technologies continue to penetrate deeper. Evidence for the same can be found

right from the start of the admission process, to daily classes, admin chores,

to conducting exams and declaring results. Making admission processes easier and

more efficient, most of the private players already have a website in place.

Also some institutes now have wireless connectivity throughout their campuses

while many are considering ERP solutions and smart classrooms. But still,

majority of institutes remain far from being high tech and are in need of

innovative solutions that can meet their needs and resources.

Prof Bharat

Bhasker,
Professor of Information Technology and Systems, IIM

Lucknow

The automation of student registration

processes, admissions, placement, accounting systems has been in place at

IIM Lucknow for more than a decade. It is due to the high degree of reliance

on IT infrastructure that we have been able to scale, upto three times, the

increase in PGP intake, and obtain a multi-fold increase in training and

launch of several programs with marginal change in support staff strength.

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Roadblocks



Blackboards, desks, chalks and dusters, slates and registers remain modus

operandi for imparting education in most institutes. It is clear that the

potential for investments in this sector is immense as most of the schools and

colleges still use primitive means for teaching and running back-end processes.

The main reasons stopping them from going high tech tools remain to be monetary.

Though the importance of IT is well understood, the need for low cost easy to

maintain and easy to use solutions needs to be met. Unlike big organizations,

where IT hardware might be changed every second year, most educational

institutes don't intend to splurge that often.

Another roadblock remains the scarcity of employee training. Many schools and

colleges would first require the faculty and other staff to learn how these

technologies work. Therefore new solutions should be easy to grasp and should

require minimal training. Also, what remains absent in many institutes, is lack

of a dedicated IT team or a knowledgeable IT head.

“Technology

has helped the learning sector to expand the scope and depth of penetration

of quality education across the country. Educational technology has enabled

students to access more information and connect with more people than ever

before. Learning can now be more individualized and students can access

resources that will enable them to drive their own learning.

Computer aided instructions or e-learning can be

used in and out of the classroom. Concepts like virtual classroom where a

student can learn at his own time, pace & space, distance learning,

computer-based training, and social networking tools are just a few

examples.

The immediate responsiveness of computer

based programs can help in increasing motivation and inspiring students to

connect with others with whom they share similar interests. Entire classes

can participate in video conferences through the use of multimedia

technology.”

Mayank Gupta, Director-Business

Development & Support, Institute of Computer and Finance Executives (ICFe)

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Another major roadblock remains infrastructure. Apart from bandwidths,

something as basic as electricity is hard to get as you move further from the

urban areas. Institutes in such areas need solutions which together with the

above reasons should consume as low a power as possible in order to be run by

tiny generators when required.

Technology has

changed the face of education in the country. All sixteen campuses of Amity

University across India are interconnected via IT, so any center can easily

be updated with the activities of the other. Innovative techniques such as

'Live class room transmission' for conducting multiple live telecasts and

'Live telecast over Internet' have not only cut the costs of physical

communication but also led us to an era where IT is taking the entire

education system into unending possibilities. The 'live class room

transmission,' ensures uniformity of education throughout our campuses. The

lectures are recorded and archived for future references.

Due to efficient IT infrastructure, the

university is also able to provide backup for upto twelve thousand laptops

and around five thousand desktops. We have 50 Mbps bandwidth backup as well

as ISP optical fiber-based structured cabling, blade servers, a fully

automated intranet portal, bulk messaging solutions,VLAN, CISCO 4500

switches to make our university a pioneer in IT based learning. Other

solutions such as smart cards for students, video conferencing, etc are used

to make Amity a 'smarter campus'.

Our campus is Wi-Fi enabled and so only

domain login is allowed to make the University secure. Amity is a ISO 27001

certified university and the IT department is taken care of by a separate

group known as AKC Datasystems.

Further,the virtualization of education can

always act as an additional facilitator to class room teaching and thus

accelerate the learning process for students. IT will no doubt go a long way

in spiking the growth of education.

Dr J S SODHI, Assistant vice

president, Amity University

IT at its Best: Turning one PC into many



The importance of computers in the education sector is well known. Everyone
understands the need of computer labs in schools and colleges. However, even

though the need is real, for a large part of this sector, initial investments

and catching up with technology might not sound feasible. Desktop

virtualization, which has become a hot topic in the past few years can if not

completely, solve this issue to a certain extent. Ncomputing, an organization

that provides such solutions uses virtualization in order to utilize the

horsepower of a single PC. The concept works on the the fact that when we talk

of everyday computing needs, users are not even close to utilizing all the

processing power that computers offer. A typical solution, can use one CPU in

order to provide 5-10 PCs depending upon the nature of computing needs. Now for

instance, when setting up a new computer lab or upgrading an older one, you

might not need ten different computers. Using one CPU, typically a Core 2 Duo,

with 3GB RAM and an HDD that suits your storage requirements, you can have ten

different PCs. Only a monitor, keyboard and mouse along with a tiny access

device is needed for each user instead of ten complete PCs having ten separate

CPUs. Savings is the word to describe the advantages in such a scenario. First,

on the hardware costs, secondly on power consumption and finally on other

equipment like the UPS.

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Jayant

Bhadauria,




Head Education Solutions, Adobe India

e-Learning

“You need more of synchronous as well as

asynchronous mode when it comes to elearning. The instructor has to be

present even if he is only present online to make the learning more

engaging.

When talking of elearning what we lack is

standardization and quality content. Tools like Captivate and Presenter can

be used by any instructor to generate quality content.”

Shailesh

Mehta
CEO GurukulOnline on advantages of elearning

“Generation, transmission and distribution of

every megawatt of power generated requires around seven people. There is a

huge shortage of trained professionals in many such sectors. By leveraging

the power of Internet along with technologies like simulations and video

conferencing, it is possible to deliver a wide variety of courses and train

people for specific functions.”

Manish

Sharma
Vice President — APAC, NComputing Inc

“The core applications being used have not

changed much in the past ten or so years. Everyday computing involves web

browsing, word processing, spreadsheets apps, etc. But what has dramatically

changed is hardware capabilities. A daily user usually don't use more than 5

or 10 percent of his desktop's processing power. This is where our solutions

step in. They take the surplus power from any computer and create multiple,

independent computers out of it. This way, the cost per desktop user comes

down significantly. Using our desktop virtualization software called Vspace

and other access devices, one can have ten independent desktop users using

one CPU.”

G.P. Gupta

NIFM

The application of IT in day to day service

domains like payroll, time table management, accounts management, result

declaration etc. is yielding its fruits in the form of effective delivery

and high beneficiary satisfaction. The State of Art Lecture Halls with

Interactive Boards and LCD projectors provide a conducive environment for

learning. Besides, we have fully automated library for the convenience of

both the trainee officers and the faculty.”

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ERP for educational institutes



We all are aware of advantages that ERP solutions bring to enterprises. With

different modules, a typical ERP solution in an institute can ease the pain of

manual data entry and the conventional register maintaining practices. From

maintaining the enrollment process to everyday attendance tracking, ERP

solutions for schools and colleges can even take care of library and laboratory

management. When online, you can take the parent teacher student interaction to

a new degree. Online forums and discussions become possible and so does regular

updates for parents like results, attendance and other information. Features

like time table and curriculum management come as standard in such ERP

solutions. The main advantage of deploying an ERP solution also remains that you

can have one customized according to your needs depending on the number of

classrooms, students and other key things. Advanced features can be RFID tags

and Biometric identification for students and staff access control and

attendance tracking depending upon budgets as these tend to cost more.

Sushil

Sharma
Director, Dream Team

ERP solutions that we offer are open source

solutions. Based on Linux, apache, MySQL and php, these solutions have an

option of online, off line or a combination of both. Unlike previous

applications which were used to automate the admin side, solutions available

these days have modules for knowledge management. Users of such solutions

include students, teachers, parents, management, other staff, alumni and

guests. Features like online examinations for students, online discussions

and forums for parents have also been made possible. “

The e-Degree



Everyone knows what stamp papers are. Remember documents on which property

transactions used to be done with different currency notes printed on it. There

have been a number of scams related to such documents as forging them is not as

difficult as forging a currency note. Crimson Logic is the company that

introduced the concept of e-Stamping in our country. It came up with a portal,

which replaces the use of stamp papers. Typically, a user comes to this portal

choses the kind of transaction, enters the details of the transaction like names

of the parties, amount etc. Based on these details, the portal will

automatically calculate the stamp duty to be paid. Once you are done paying for

the stamp duty, a stamp certificate would get printed using a normal laser

printer and normal sheet of paper and is still impossible to forge. Optical

document security is the technology which makes this possible. It uses various

features like optical watermark, microprint etc. The beauty in this technology

being there is no need for a special paper, ink or printer. The same concept is

in the pipeline in the education sector. If implemented, it would make it very

difficult for people who try to forge important documents like marksheets and

degrees.

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At Gautam

Buddha University(GBU), we are in process of revamping our web site to make

it more user friendly, with the option of online application for admission

into various programs with online payment option. We also plan to put lots

of information in an easily navigable way,



so that the prospective students and other stakeholders do not have to
personally get in touch with the university administration regarding



different aspects. In addition, we are in the process of making our
website more interactive. Teachers, administration staff can log in to

access their own accounts for HR, for details about the fee payments, course

details, examination details, exams online, etc.

We are also exploring the possibility of

implementing a customized ERP solution for the ease of the complete

administrative processes in the University. This will increase speed as well

as reliability of administrative decisions/processes. All the classrooms

already have  connectivity



and state of the art IT infrastructure - including high-end PCs, and
projection systems. In the classrooms, we plan to install Interactive boards

so that teachers can be more effective as compared to using only the PPTs. We

already have the facility of video conferencing. We have started using

Google Apps which helps us in communicating with our students and share

documents. Students get to create their own sites which can be shared with

other students/faculty.”

Prof. Sushil Kumar, Dean School of

Management, Gautam Buddha University(GBU)

Simple implementations, Great Benefits GPS enabled transportation



The biggest asset of any institute is its students. Therefore, their safety

is mission critical specially when traveling in school/college buses. Using GPS

based navigation devices, routes can be stored for each bus and the traveling

speeds can be kept under check. In fact, the entire transportation system can be

automated, right from storing info on students, drivers, bus details, etc to

even tracking their movement using GPS navigation devices. The authorities can

keep a tab on the speed at which a driver is moving and also locate a bus

whenever required. Regular instructions can be handed over to the driver and his

route diverted in case there's some blockade or disruption in traffic on the

way. Most of the radio cabs have such solutions implemented.

Netbooks



With a little less horsepower than the conventional laptops, these computing

devices can be of great advantage to both, students and the faculty. Key

features of these devices include a small form factor, very less weight and

20-25k price tags. The Intel Atom processor running these computers is a perfect

match for basic productivity apps and Internet browsing and multimedia playback.

If not for everyone institutes can consider such options for its teachers. Also

available are desktop PCs priced around 15k being run by the same engine.

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Interactive whiteboards and projectors



Not typically for institutes with tight IT budgets, Interactive whiteboards

and projectors are meant for those with basic IT infrastructure in place. An

interactive white board is typically a two way interaction solution. In simple

words, whatever you write on the board will be seen on the computer screen as

well. Combined with a projector, the solution can make the classroom the most

fun place to be in, as the interaction level goes high. The teacher can share

presentations, audio and video clips and a whole lot of other things with

students.

SMS Buy 130508 to 56677

NEC WT610



When talking of projectors in classrooms, the presenter should be able to

stand in front of the screen without blocking the light from projector in order

to avoid shadows on screen. Short throw projectors, which use aspheric mirrors

might be a good option. The WT 610 from NEC is one such projector. It can

project a 60 degree image from less than 11” throw distance and also comes with

an optional LAN card.

SMS Buy 130509 to 56677

“There have

been a number of cases where degree forgeries have come to knowledge. This

is the area where we are trying to pitch this solution across universities.

Advantages of this technology include easy ways to verify such documents.

One can send the document to our mail or fax server for instant

verification. Also available is a tiny software which can be loaded on a

mobile phone to do the same. The software does so by scanning the bar code

printed on the marksheet/degree. Also, the moment one tries to photocopy a

document printed using the technology, the original watermark disappears and

copy can be read in a huge font. Also the microprint gets smudged and

becomes a straight line making it more difficult to forge. “

Navneet Chauhan Regional Director- South

Asia, CrimsonLogic

Netop School



With features like sharing your computer screen with the class, supervising
student computer work, lend a hand when needed, control application and Internet

use, distribute and collect documents, create tests and evaluate student

progress, Netop school6 is a powerful teaching and management software for the

new age networked classroom. New dynamic teaching methods like demonstrating on

student computer screens, broadcasting multimedia along with policy control like

limiting Internet activity and application usage can also be performed using

this solution. For grabbing attention and improving productivity one can also

block keyboards and mice on the fly. The solution also helps in improving

collaborative learning and evaluation of student progress.

SMS Buy 130510 to 56677

Varun Jaitly with inputs from Mastufa Ahmed and Archana Singh

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