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1

Higher Education / Higher education: New frontier for investments

« on: May 28, 2023, 10:31:20 AM »

There are immense gains, some pains, and hence some cautions related to investing in the education industry. Education is a domain of gainful investments as it is always in high demand, leads to economic growth, and creates a more skilled workforce. Technological advancements, government support, a stable industry, long-term investments, and a significant social impact are some reasons that make education a lucrative investment opportunity. Similarly, higher education can be a sector of gainful investment due to growing demand, technological advancements, government support, research and development opportunities, diverse investment options, and potential for high returns.

Today, not just revenue from admissions, almost 35 to 50 per cent of revenue of good private universities in Asian nations now come from research, consultancy, development, online and continuing education. Since governments focus more on primary and secondary education, private players have a better returns in tertiary and vocational education which are more job-oriented.

Asian nations provide a viable and lucrative area of investment for higher education due to a growing middle class, high demand, government support, and the potential for international students to join the institutions. Growth of the middle class in most Asian nations is a major reason behind push to private higher education.

The cautions include market saturation, lack of quality, and regulatory and political risks, that investors should consider before investing in the education industry.

Education Market Worldwide, in Asia

The education market worldwide is a vast industry that includes primary and secondary education, higher education, vocational training, and education technology. The global education market was valued at $5.9 trillion in 2020 and is expected to reach $10.2 trillion by 2026, growing at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 9.23 per cent during the forecast period. The Asia-Pacific education market size was valued at $1.09 trillion in 2020 and is expected to reach $2.05 trillion by 2026, growing at a CAGR of 10.35 per cent during the forecast period. The education market in South Asia was valued at $46.9 billion in 2020 and is expected to reach $96.6 billion by 2025, growing at a CAGR of 15.5 per cent.

The primary and secondary education segment is the largest segment of the global and Asia-Pacific education markets, accounting for around two-thirds and over 60 per cent of the total market, respectively. The higher education segment is the second-largest segment, accounting for around 25 per cent of the global and Asia-Pacific education markets. The vocational training and education technology segments are smaller but rapidly growing segments of the education market.

The global and Asia-Pacific education markets are driven by increasing demand for education, advancements in education technology, and the growing importance of vocational education and skill development. In South Asia, government initiatives to improve the quality of education are also driving market growth.

China is the largest education market in Asia, accounting for over half of the region’s education market, while India is the second-largest education market in Asia, accounting for around 10 per cent of the region’s education market. The education market in Asia is characterized by significant variations in the ways that education is delivered and financed across different countries in the region.

The South Asian education market is also characterized by significant variations in the ways that education is delivered and financed across different countries in the region. The primary and secondary education segment is the largest segment of the education market in South Asia, accounting for around 70 per cent of the total market. The higher education and vocational education and training segments are smaller but rapidly growing segments of the education market. The South Asian education market is driven by increasing demand for education, government initiatives to improve the quality of education, and advancements in education technology.

Right approach in investments in higher education in the developing Asian nations

Investing in higher education in smaller but developing Asian nations requires a thoughtful and strategic approach. Here are some factors that should be considered when investing in higher education in these countries:

Understanding local needs and priorities: It’s essential to understand the specific needs and priorities of the local population and the broader economic and social context in which higher education operates. For example, investing in programs that address the skills gap in a particular sector or region can have a significant impact on the local economy.

Collaboration with local partners: Partnering with local institutions, organizations, and communities can help ensure that investments are aligned with local needs and priorities and increase the chances of success. For example, the Australia Awards Scholarship program collaborates with local universities and organizations in Cambodia, Nepal, and Bangladesh to deliver scholarships and training programs that support the development of local leaders.

Developing programmes with global relevance: Developing programs that have global relevance can help attract international students and build partnerships with universities and organizations from other countries. For example, the Fulbright Program in Vietnam offers scholarships and exchanges that support research and teaching in areas of mutual interest and benefit to Vietnam and the United States.

Leveraging technology and innovation: Leveraging technology and innovation can help increase access to higher education, improve the quality of education, and reduce costs. For example, the SmartEdu University in Vietnam uses a blended learning model that combines online and in-person learning to provide flexible and affordable education to students.

Supporting research and innovation: Investing in research and innovation can help drive economic development and create new opportunities for growth. For example, the Bangladesh-India Friendship Centre for Information Technology and Electronics in Bangladesh supports research and innovation in the areas of information technology and electronics, with a focus on developing solutions that address local needs and challenges.

Investing in higher education in smaller but developing Asian nations requires a thoughtful and strategic approach that takes into account local needs and priorities, collaboration with local partners, programs with global relevance, leveraging technology and innovation, and supporting research and innovation. By taking a comprehensive and collaborative approach, investors can contribute to the development of a skilled workforce and the growth of the local economy.

Government Regulations Approach

The appropriate approach of government regulations in an Asian nation to expand Higher Education includes increasing public funding, creating a supportive regulatory environment, encouraging private investment, developing a skilled workforce, and fostering international collaboration. Successful examples of government initiatives in this regard include South Korea’s Brain Korea 21 Program, China’s 211 Project, and Malaysia’s Higher Education Blueprint.

4th and 5th Industrial Revolution, AI and Education

The 4th industrial revolution technologies include automation, robotics, artificial intelligence, and the Internet of Things (IoT), while the 5th industrial revolution technologies build upon the 4th industrial revolution and include advanced technologies like quantum computing, nanotechnology, and biotechnology. These technologies can be useful in the field of education, such as in creating interactive learning experiences and smart classrooms, personalizing learning experiences, and improving research capabilities.

These technologies, including AI-ML, have the capacity to revolutionize higher education in developing nations by improving access, affordability, and quality of education. AI can be used to personalize the learning experience for individual students, virtual and augmented reality technologies can be used to create immersive learning experiences, and blockchain technology can be used to provide secure and transparent verification of academic credentials. These technologies can also help address challenges such as the shortage of qualified teachers, limited access to education resources, and the high cost of education.

These technologies make gainful investments in higher education in Asian nations yet more lucrative.

The author is Executive Director of International Online University (Dubai) and Strategic Adviser and Professor of Daffodil International University (Dhaka).

2

Higher Education / Education In New Normal Age

« on: March 18, 2023, 09:23:48 PM »

Education In New Normal Age

Digital education is surely a valuable add-on, but education must primarily be face-to-face, encouraging collective peer learning, a sense of bonding and discipline, ensuring the mentors’ support and practical aspects being done productively. A pre-pandemic study in the US showed that students in online schools lose between 0.1 and 0.4 SDs (standard deviations) on standardised tests compared to students in traditional schools. Learning is a socio-human behaviour and engagement with peers is compulsory, aided by the mentors in a physical space, further amplified digitally.

Youngsters, on the other side of the spectrum with digital access are being pushed towards too much screen time without much thought for the repercussions this has on their health or the development of social skills. We are thus in a state of an education emergency.

Urgency to Restart Campuses

The Assam Education Minister, Ranoj Pegu, has announced the opening up of campuses on September 1. The West Bengal Chief Minister has called for reopening after Durga Puja by the end of October. The Telangana government has allowed schools to open with few restrictions. Delhi government has been collecting suggestions from students, teachers and parents on reopening, and shall take a decision suitably.

The most recent recommendation to open up schools comes from the Devi Shetty Committee Report, which uses international evidence and guidelines of the American and Indian Paediatric Associations to recommend the opening of schools and colleges wherever the positivity rate is low. Centralised decision-making won’t work here. Gram Panchayats and corporations must take localised decisions based on state government guidelines.

While it is indisputable that campuses must open now in the context of an education emergency, it needs to be done by maintaining physical distance.

New Education Policy Imperatives

The government of India, in the past, announced a New Education Policy, which focuses on transforming higher education institutions into large multi-disciplinary universities, colleges and HEI clusters/knowledge hubs.

The implementation of the policy has been tardy though, owing to non-availability of the promised 6 per cent of the union budget for education, lack of institutional incentives, absence of suitable regulatory changes as necessary, higher costs of executing the policy and thereby higher cost of learning for students, et al. Public policy exponent Bernardo Mueller argued that public policies are non-linear and emergent. Public policies do not settle in equilibria and are hard to predict.

Without establishing a New Education Policy Commission, without accountability of public officials in implementing the policy, without providing financial resources necessary for this task, and without further empowering of institutions of eminence and other institutions which have been granted some autonomy to function: it would be impossible to implement NEP.

Revamping of Programme Contents

New normal education must not focus on customary practices and traditional habits or routines, but purely on pre-determined learning objectives, learning outcomes, along with linkages with social utility and economic productivity. This would call for majoring in any subject or domain, but also minoring in some other related or unrelated domain paving way for higher education. It calls for self-learning and project-based learning.

Creating Learning Resources

A massive training and capacity building is needed today to nurture the new age mentors. For this, first, the mentor has to be a digital personality. Next, one has to learn how to create, deliver and engage in content across multiple online platforms. Third, one has to now learn to assess with open books through analysis and application, quiz, applied projects, phygital presentation and physical work in labs and studios after using virtual labs and studios.

With Artificial intelligence, robotics, automation, Machine Learning, and the internet of things being the other emerging realities, the skills for mass production or education to do the same work repeatedly, will be irrelevant when machines will replace more than three-fourth of all human work.

Evaluating & Assessing the Learners

Diversity in evaluation or assessment is the need of the hour. Assessment refers to learner performance, and evaluation refers to a systematic process of determining the merit value or worth of the instruction or programme.

Assessment and evaluation can be both formative (carried out during the course) and summative (carried out following the course).

When online, evaluation can be on the basis of proctored digital examination or open-book analytical and applied evaluation with non-google-able questions.

Bridging the Digital Divide

The most recent study by McKinsey states that learning loss is global and significant owing to technology haves and have-nots. Technology often exacerbates the divide, and not always bridging it, unless there is equity ensured. Data from the National Sample Survey Office (NSSO), 75th round, presents this divide starkly: less than 5 per cent of rural households have computers. The number barely touches 25 per cent in urban India. Hence, a majority of urban dwellers do not have access to computers. Leaving them with the only option of a mobile phone which does not ensure quality learning.

Bridging the digital divide is an urgent necessity. An economically divided society is bound to be digitally divided, more so when the digital divide becomes acute in the rural and tribal hinterlands of India irrespective of class positions.

The problem is so acute that one in every five students may have to go out of education if this situation continues for another six months.

What can be the way to tackle the divide? How can the #BridgeDigitalDivide movement start on the ground and who can and should take the lead?

What also needs to be understood is that the definition of literacy itself has to be changed from the ability to sign to the ability to read, write and connect digitally. So it is digital literacy, which is the literacy of the new normal.

It is pertinent to note that the last education policy during the rule of Rajiv Gandhi as Prime Minister also had promised 6 per cent, but never crossed half of it. We all live on hope, and we shall expect the current government to fulfil its promise given in 2020.

The additional 3 per cent allocation should be budgeted as early as possible and allocated for the first one or two years largely not much for expanding physical infrastructure, but surely for bolstering the digital outreach.

The company law in India has been amended some time earlier to make 2 per cent of profits to be contributed to corporate social responsibility by every company (CSR Act). While compliance with this is in progress, the impact in real life in many cases is debatable.

Alongside, the telecom companies must come up with new reduced packages of internet connectivity for bona fide teachers and students at all levels, especially in rural India.

Companies, organisations, and civil society leaders across India must also unleash a movement to donate old but usable smartphones, laptops, desktops to students, who cannot afford them. Initiatives like #MillionMobileCampaign needs to be aggressively taken up by the voluntary sector.

This is the new freedom movement ahead – freedom to be digitally connected in learning, in healthcare, in the purchase of essentials, and in entertainment.

The author is an educationist and columnist, former Pro-Vice Chancellor of Adamas University (Kolkata) and former Dean of Symbiosis and Amity Universities

Source: https://outlookmoney.com/magazine/story/education-in-new-normal-age-836

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Higher Education / Digital Divide Looms Large: Ensure Blended Learning With Higher Access

« on: March 18, 2023, 09:22:00 PM »

Digital Divide Looms Large: Ensure Blended Learning With Higher Access
Digital divide is here and is all poised to stay unless there is a radical change in policy and action on ground.

Acute Digital Divide among Learners Today

Some 283 million students are there in nearly a thousand universities, around forty thousand colleges and above ten lacs thirty thousand schools in India. A recent survey tells 28% of these number, i.e. approx. 82 million of students have come into the ambit of online education of any decent level. Some 21%, i.e. around 57 million of students have some digital access of education through WhatsApp and Facebook, though that is hardly of any major consequence. Remaining 14 crores of students, whopping 51% of the total, are completely outside any form of online educational outreach for the last six months. The last ten months simply do not exist in their lives educationally and this may continue further.

Digital divide is here and is all poised to stay unless there is a radical change in policy and action on ground. An economically divided society is bound to be digitally divided, more so when the digital divide becomes acute in the rural and tribal hinterland of India irrespective of class positions of sections of the population there.

The problem is so acute that one in every five students may have to go out of education if this situation goes on for another six months. And the axe will fall much more on the girl students in a nation obsessed with the boy-child. In case of meagre competing resources like smartphones or laptops or tabs, the boys are expected to be taken care of first before the girls in most poor rural homes and even many poor urban homes.

In this context, what can be the way to tackle the divide? How can #BridgeDigitalDivide movement start on ground and who can and should take the lead?

Digital Access as a Human Right:

Before making any attempt to fix responsibilities, what needs to be understood is that the definition of literacy itself has to be changed from the ability to sign to ability to read, write and connect digitally. So it is the digital literacy which is the literacy of the new normal. And along with food, shelter, clothes, basic health, basic education, digital access is the new human right for a dignified life. This has to be recognized and accepted in policy, in thought, in public life. From this will flow the responsibilities of all of us in the nation.

Bridging the Digital Divide: Government Role:

First is the onus of the government. It is heartening to see that the New Education Policy promises 6% of GDP for public education, while the current figures for the same is below 3%. It is a different thing that the last New Education Policy during the rule of Rajiv Gandhi as Prime Minister also had promised 6%, but never crossed half of it. We all live on hope, and we will expect the current government led by BJP to fulfil its promise given in the NEP.

The additional 3% allocation should as early as possible be budgeted and allocated for the first one or two years largely not for expanding physical infrastructure, but enlarging rather the digital outreach and connectivity across the length and breadth of the country which has to be a public policy and a government initiative.

Bridging the Digital Divide: Going beyond the Government:

The Company Act of India has been amended some time earlier to make 2% of profits to be contributed to corporate social responsibility by every company making CSR a must-do activity. While compliances of this is in progress, the impact in real life in many cases is debatable. However, the CSR of the corporate world now for at least two years needs to be focused on extending digital connectivity and providing digital tools to the digital have-nots going ahead.

Alongside the telecom companies must come with new reduced packages of internet connectivity for bona fide teachers and students at all levels, especially in rural India. This can be on the lines of students’ concessions in buses and trains during travel (Delhi has free travel for students and women in public transport).

Companies, organizations and the civil society leaders across India must also unleash a movement to donate old but usable smartphones, laptops, desktops and tabs to students who cannot afford to get them. Initiatives like #MillionMobileCampaign need to be aggressively taken up by the voluntary sector. Several NGOs have started similar initiatives and educational institutes with resources have started training young children on digital learning and teachers in online teaching from the schools and colleges which cannot easily afford these.

Blended/PhyGital Education Must Ahead:

But alongside, the schools, colleges and universities have to quickly move to a blended or hybrid mode of education asking only a section of the students to come to campus each day ensuring physical distancing for health safety and lesser burden of travel and expenses on the families, and continue education digitally on other days. If a student comes to campus only for two days, but can still study digitally for the other four days of the week (with all support of the eco-system as noted above to be digitally connected), digital divide can be reduced drastically and higher education of the sections on the verge of losing it can be ensured as well.

Blended learning will also need that all study materials and learning resources (aggregated by the mentor from open sources or prepared by the mentor as his/her proprietary content) must be given well in advance to the learners for self-study first, as per the flipped classroom concept, before the topic is taken up digitally or physically for discussion.

Face to face education can focus on group work, peer-based learning, lab and studio based practical learning, etc. However, conceptual, theoretical and knowledge-based learning can still go online with enhanced digital access. 

This is the new freedom movement ahead: freedom to be digitally connected in learning, and physically connected in practicing what is learnt online, going ahead. We may call it also as PhyGital Learning, where the digital gives the concept and continuation, and the physical gives the human touch, practical and group exposure in education.

Source: https://bweducation.businessworld.in/article/Digital-Divide-Looms-Large-Ensure-Blended-Learning-With-Higher-Access/11-01-2021-364014/

4

Higher Education / Digital to blended learning in post-covid world

« on: March 18, 2023, 09:18:54 PM »

Digital to blended learning in post-covid world
Good and bad education will not be decided by marks and numbers of degree certificates handed. It will be decided by the level of academic and related online and social media engagement of the learners, the quality of content shared by mentors, and the value and volume of content generated by engaged learners

What demonetization of late 2016 did to fintech in India, then covid-19 pandemic of early 2020 did that to edtech and healthtech world-over. There is a forced migration to digital learning which is laying bare the underbelly of the much touted Digital India campaign exactly five years ago.

World-over more than 770 million students have been disrupted by covid-19 and the consequent lockdowns globally. The United Nations has warned of the unparalleled scale and speed of the educational disruption being caused by coronavirus. India has over 37 million students enrolled in higher education. An interruption in the delivery of education has already caused a disruption that might be long-run.

Learning or academics or education broadly has three functions. They are creation of learning content through research, writing; packaging with visuals, dissemination of learning through classes, lectures, notes, self-study, discussions; and assessment and evaluation of the education of the learner by various methods. All these three have been majorly impacted by the self-isolation imposed to ensure social distancing so that the learners and the mentors may first be protected from the spread of the infection of covid-19. The lockdown across the world is simultaneously a boon and a bane for the teaching-learning community today.

Digital Haves and Have Nots' Dichotomy

Covid-19 is, in fact, amplifying the struggles that children are already facing globally to receive a quality education. Even before the outbreak of the virus, there were 258 million out-of-school children across the globe — principally due to poverty, poor governance, or living in or having fled an emergency or conflict. While there are programmes dedicated to ending the existing crisis in global education, the dramatic escalation that the covid-19 has introduced newer challenges for around 550 million children who were so far studying but do not have access to digital learning systems.

The digitally deprived large chunk of masses - being bereft of access to digital resources like a good internet connectivity, laptop or ipad for use, electricity and smart phone- across the globe is forced to waste productive learning time. The digital divide in every developing and under-developed society was never as glaring as it is now. Though more than 70% of Indian population has been covered now with mobile telephony, the resources needed for digital learning from distance or at home are not there with more than 1 out of 4 people in the country. Same is the case with youths in the formal learning age. This is the bane today.

India has been speaking of digital education for long but it has stayed on as a possibility and not a reality for more than a decade now. Even IITs and IIMs have used digital platforms on the side for sharing of content and debating on issues sporadically. The larger mass of 900 plus universities and some 44,000 colleges have actually not digitized their content, not made access to online learning mainstay of their teaching-learning process, except the distance learning universities. In fact, the old school educationists looked at online and distance education with some disdain all across South Asia. They are in for a major shock now.

Alongside, reality is that the digital penetration across India is still abysmally low beyond tier 1 and 2 cities and towns. It might keep whatsapp running and false content shared, but cannot truly replace face to face learning even remotely. The current pandemic has laid this bare so very poignantly. Hence, while the digital haves use zoom, Cisco webex, google meet class and other webinar platforms to talk, discuss, complete assignments, the digital have nots depend on occasional phone calls from their mentors and at the most a Facebook post or a whatsapp group chat with videos often not downloading.

Government Spending

It is clear that going ahead digital access will be a human right, and those in governance must wake up to the reality that youngsters need inexpensive tablets and easy data access. A nation that spends less than 3% of national budget for public education (lower than Tanzania, Angola and Ghana), with the states putting in 2.5 (Bihar) to 26% (Delhi), with Delhi being the only state in double digits, cannot ensure digital education for the masses.

The pandemic has made it imperative ahead that the entire education of India has to be a blended one with digital access and tools (device and internet) reaching the hands of learners in the most remote parts as well. This can only be aimed for with a minimum of 7% of budget for public education, upgradation on public education infra-structure, physically and digitally, and a massive retraining of the teachers at every level, letting the dinosaurs among teachers go in the interest of the learners.

If there was no enforced social distancing and students home-locked across the nation (and the globe), the transition of those with partial or full resources to complete digital learning pedagogy would not have been quickened. The process now has to move ahead to the next stage to bring in policy changes on allocation, training, infrastructure, pedagogy and evaluation process of education.

This will bring in unforeseen impact on public education. In a blended form, learners seek education voluntarily and collaboratively. Each lesson or skill or chapter is expected to lead to an outcome, a model, a design, a solution, a performance or an application, either simulated or real life. Education is not to be instructed, but explored organically, not to be imposed but experienced collectively fostering diversity, teamwork and mutual respect. These values today are only present by exception, which the current crisis may once again ignite. The post covid learners even in the public education system can be of a different breed fuelled by digital expectations.

Apart from government spending, there is also the need to allocate 2% of profits of corporate India for investing in creating digital access to India at large. Further, telecom companies need to come out with special packages for students and teachers with regards to internet access. And, in the people's sector, non government organizations should roll out voluntary support to digital access for all Indians through movements like 1 million mobiles (donating discarded but functioning older cell phones from every home to the less privileged) and donate computers and IT infrastructure hours of private educational institutes with good IT infrastructure. These all together, along with much higher government spending in public education, can make the entire nation digitally connected.

Digital Learning Tools Today

The pandemic requires universities to rapidly offer online learning to their students. Fortunately, technology and content are available to help universities transition online quickly and with high quality, especially on the digital plank, though at a cost and with the risk of several teachers and administrators being forced to go out of the system.

Digital learning on the go or from distance calls for tech-led holistic solutions. It requires several content pieces to be transmitted digitally. These content pieces can be in the form of pdfs, ppts, URLs, YouTube links, podcast links, and case-studies. There can also be e-books, audio-books, kindle based content, magzter sourced magazines, etc. Then this can involve learning without being face to face through boxes, as in Google Class, or learning face to face as in Zoom live audio-visual discussions. People may also use GoToMeetings or MicrosoftMeet sessions also. Attendance can be taken on Google Spreadsheet and through Whatsapp Group chat of a batch of students too.

There are other tools that can take digital go miles ahead. Flipped classroom method with an active learning classroom can have all study resources given a day or two in advance, and the actual session starting with a quick quiz, then doubts clearance, and thereafter a few issues of the future or counter points to what were given earlier, like possible different scenarios or new research findings not shared earlier. This is quite an effective way of learning, which is internalized, collaborative, experiential, bottom-up, as distinctly different from teaching, which is instructional, hierarchic and top-down.

Then there are MOOCs, collaborative distance learning, wikis, blogs etc. Individual resource-rich institutes develop their customized secured and IPR protected Learning Management Systems, through the use of BlackBoard or TCSion LMS. Other LMS options like Kaltura or Impartus allowing video recording of talks also are in use in many places. There are CourseEra courses, Swayam online lessons from UGC and similar other avenues to learn online.

Learning digitally can be further assisted with Virtual Reality (VR), Augmented Reality (AR) and Mixed Reality (MR) which can take the viewer to an enhanced experience even integrating scenarios which are yet to happen creatively bringing them within the learning experience. These are immersive and contextual experiences, and artificial intelligence driven chatbots can further enhance the digital interface of the learner and the mentor.

Digital Learning Value-adds

Incorporating big data analytics and content management, educators can develop an individualized curriculum that enhances how each student learns (e.g. playlist of learning content in WiseWire changing for each student). Many in the West have started the use of the millennials' language and style: Khan Academy video lessons, YouTube use, distinct style and language for young learners. Twitter, Tumblr, Snapchat, Imessage, Instagram, Facebook & Whatsapp are being creatively integrated with school education. There is a case of a management school in India, where the professor sends a 3 minutes interesting video on the subject he is taking up next through group whatsapp to increase interest in the batch towards the topic being taught.

In the US, the smart-phone applications like Socrative and Plickers are helping teachers interact and assess students’ progress, collaborate via cloud-based applications to work and solve a common goal. Teachers can publish real-time quizzes and polls for students via mobile devices to keep them engaged.

Further, using anything from iMovie to WeVideo, learners can create video as a learning resource. YouTube (with privacy settings) and SeeSaw or Flipgrid are also alternatives learners can make use of. The benefits of SeeSaw and Flipgrid are that students can add voice recordings or text sharing feedback with peers. Students became the co-creators of content and as a result, more engaged, including their parents. Useful apps like Book Creator, Explain Everything and EduCreations can be utilised towards this end.

There are various software used to create digital content, like Camtasia, Raptivity, Captivate, and Articulate Online.

Yes alongside, social media use extensively will support learning online. Facebook Page can broadcast updates and alerts. Facebook Group or Google Hangout with advanced features in G-suite can stream live lectures and host discussions. Twitter can act as a class message board. The 256 characters help to keep messages succinct. Instagram can be used for photo essays. One can create a class blog for discussions. There are many different platforms available, such as WordPress, SquareSpace, Wix, Blogger for that. And, one can create a class-specific Pinterest board as well.

Digital Assessment and Evaluation

Online quiz, open book examination with time-managed and proctored question paper delivered online, applied questions not based on memory but comprehension, telephonic interview etc have been the usual ways of digital assessment and evaluation of learning.

Assessment refers to learner performance; it helps us decide if students are learning and where improvement in that learning is needed.

Evaluation refers to a systematic process of determining the merit value or worth of the instruction or programme; it helps us determine if a course is effective (course goals) and informs our design efforts. Assessment and evaluation can be both formative (carried out during the course) and summative (carried out following the course). There can be many ways for the same. Mentors can make learners aware of expectations in advance (e.g. one week for feedback from deadline) and keep them posted (announcement: all projects have been marked). For example, one can create tests that are multiple choice, true/false, or short answer essays and one can set the assessments to automatically provide feedback.

Possibilities in Education beyond covid

Online learning is the big winner from this – across all education levels; so proving quality now is at centre stage. However, going ahead, in the post COVID times, blended learning will be the way to go. The biggest future benefits of virtual instruction will come after our professors and students return to their physical classrooms. The necessity of teaching and learning with asynchronous (Canvas, Blackboard, D2L) and synchronous (Zoom) platforms will yield significant benefits when these methods are layered into face-to-face instruction. We will come back from COVID-19 with a much more widely shared understanding that digital tools are complements, not substitutes, for the intimacy and immediacy of face-to-face learning. Since professors are now moving content online, precious classroom time will be more productively utilized for discussion, debate and guided practice.

Moving ahead in the New Normal, teachers may more be called a mentor now as information and knowledge are at the fingertips of the students faster than that of the teachers, especially the grown-up learners, post 16 years let's say. It was so early too, but even the facade of higher knowledge (read, degrees, age and experience) is not the greatest of value moving ahead. So mentors shall be needed to inspire, motivate, direct to a new domain of learning or action, bring in perspectives, lend shoulder to a grieving youth, but not just for knowledge and information which are anyways available.

Similarly, students can now be a true learner. They were always so. But the onus of learning is all the more on the learner now on (in the earlier regime teachers teach, students study). Students study for exams, marks and degrees, under the tutelage of teachers, with a structured syllabus. Learners learn within and beyond the classroom, from mentors and others, for lifetime use of knowledge for a career and life, within and beyond the syllabus, structured or unstructured, online or offline.

Engagement is the new currency in post covid education, as much as in entertainment. For a long time, the grievance in the classroom was that students are not present and neither interested to learn. That challenge is universal. But digital allows the learner to be engaged at his time, place and pace. And that is good enough. It is a qualitatively different world ahead. Good and bad education will not be decided by marks and numbers of degree certificates handed. It will be decided by the level of academic and related online and social media engagement of the learners, the quality of content shared by mentors, and the value and volume of content generated by engaged learners.

The author is Pro-Vice Chancellor of Adamas University, Kolkata. Views are personal.

Source: https://government.economictimes.indiatimes.com/amp/news/education/opinion-digital-to-blended-learning-in-post-covid-world/77048556?__twitter_impression=true

5

Higher Education / Education Redefined

« on: March 18, 2023, 09:15:53 PM »

Education Redefined

The pandemic has blended the physical with digital education to suit all. I would like to call it a ‘PhyGital’ model. There are challenges of digital access and entire South Asia needs a major connectivity movement for the same. Education, especially higher education in the university, is set to alter due to the New Education Policy announced by the government.

So what major changes do we expect to redefine higher education? Here is a list being attempted in brief.

1. Breakdown Of Walls

Most universities will be moving towards doing away with hitherto tight compartmentalised education, divided into streams and disciplines, like arts, sciences, commerce, law and engineering. They would bring in the concept of minor specialisation from micro-biology to music to photography. Young learners will have the option to pick a domain as their major, say engineering, and twin it up with a minor specialisation (not just an elective), which can be as diverse as photography or music from the heart, or management to go well with technology learning.

2. PhyGital Way Ahead

Education would now use content creation, content delivery, learners’ engagement and learners’ evaluation. Now this will have proprietary content (mentor’s slideshow, videos, podcasts, notes, info-graphics) coupled with aggregated content from diverse open sources including various Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs). The open sources can be free MOOCs like Swayam, videos from YouTube and Vimeo, podcasts, slideshare, pdfs of chapters and books, case-studies, animation and info-graphics. The mentor’s job is to aggregate all these diverse but relevant content in advance before discussed online or face-to-face. Delivery of content is done in diverse ways: face to face, digitally in advance, or through platforms. Even evaluation or assessment is changing from merely course-end written examination to a blended approach of multiple evaluations: open-book exams, written analytical and applied exams face to face or from remote, interview, quiz, case-study, verbal presentation, project-completion, prototype making, through which diverse skills and comprehension are evaluated. Every university education will move towards this blended diverse layered approach.

3. Internships And Field Projects

The next big change coming in higher education at the university level is getting internships in government or non-government organisations, MSMEs or large corporate houses, along with live projects with a client, as a compulsory part of the degrees, with credits and scores. Students have to do projects and internships, even if they are in liberal arts, literature, natural sciences, commerce and submit reports to complete their specific semesters.

4. World Is A Big University

The significance of enormous real estates of universities, the exclusivity of your faculty, the challenges of accessing learning resources from ivy league institutes or top class professors will soon be on a steady decline. The online education is allowing access to content and live sessions by top scholars of the world. An MOU between two universities from two continents is now allowing faculty member of one address learners from both the universities. Also, almost all universities are tying up with online education providers like Coursera, Upgrad, Unacademy, and adding another dimension to their usual and traditional teaching-learning pedagogy on campus.

5. One Life, Many Careers

Earlier generations were equipped for one career as a lifetime mission: being an engineer, business manager, doctor, communication professional, designer. Post pandemic, in the new furthermore VUCA world (volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous), the need for multiple careers and multi-skilling is on the rise. One has to learn ways and means to self-learn. Hence, the concept of a flipped classroom, where universities are creating components and exposure to ensure learning to learn.

6. Rise Of Skills

Some of the top new-age global corporate majors, like Facebook, Google had already announced they would recruit not by degrees, but by skills-sets, portfolio and competencies. Employers need usable skills and competencies and jobs moving out of the government departments, the trend is getting stronger by the day. Universities are realising that their degree-centricity in operations has a limited shelf-life, and hence focusing more on hands-on competencies based skill-learning.

7. Creativity And Problem-Solving

Since all repetitive work in the new VUCA world shall be taken away by automation and robotics, artificial intelligence and machine learning would easily predict steps or activities in a production chain. Hence, the youth will be expected to solve hitherto unknown or less predicted problems, find creative solutions to questions, develop a new template or model or sample, innovate production process or product usage, manage crises, and do team-work and give leadership to collective initiatives that create wealth and add value in society. All of these need an education, which bans rote learning, gives less premium to merely information or data but nurtures innovative thinking and practice, creativity and problem-solving among the learners. Pedagogy that creates a design-thinking capability in the higher education learners is being increasingly utilised.

8. Outcome-Based Education (OBE)

Quite often we hear about scores, grades, degrees, marks as the primary outcomes of education. Every university program and course now are finalising the learning objectives and outcomes of the specific programs and courses. They are mapping the content of the modules and the projects and assignments all to these objectives and outcomes. Such outcomes are qualitatively and quantitatively first formulated and after the delivery, are being assessed through mentor’s and learners’ feedback and evaluation. It is a very different scenario emerging in higher education through this OBE approach, which goes far beyond merely completing a course, taking a written examination, evaluating and giving a degree or diploma till the recent past.

9. Most Preferred

With automation and AI coming in and repetitive manufacturing or routine service jobs getting mechanised, the domains of life sciences research and development, business models and approaches, and liberal arts-communication skills and careers are becoming the focus of higher education in the universities. The demand in these subjects has gone up more than 23 per cent in 2020 by a recent estimate, while engineering in most places has been hit hard.

10. Must-For-All Masters

All good masters courses, irrespective of the major or minor specialisations, are now making soft and life skills as compulsory components of learning to make the learners equipped with better emotional intelligence and communication skills. They are also adding goal-focused career-planning, start-up culture and entrepreneurial skills more so because even those appointed as trainee managers or entry-level officers are expected to own up the tasks given and function with a custodian mind-set.

The author is the Pro Vice Chancellor of Kolkata-based Adamas University

Source: https://outlookmoney.com/magazine/story/education-redefined-607

6

Higher Education / Future Ready Campuses

« on: March 18, 2023, 09:13:35 PM »

Future Ready Campuses

For a future-ready campus, wifi linked with strong broadband connectivity available for all to use for multiple purposes 24×7 is a basic hygiene factor now. Another latest hygiene factor is that campuses should have compulsory sanitisation and facilities for hand-face wash. Also, these should ensure entry with a mask on. Further, campuses must ensure that big number of students are not huddled in small spaces. However, beyond these, a smart campus needs to have a mega blended approach – from course creation to delivery, from learners’ engagement to evaluation, from practical to internship, et al, writes Prof Ujjwal K Chowdhury, Pro Vice-Chancellor (PR & Media), Adamas University, Kolkata and Former Dean, Symbiosis and Amity Universities.

Mentors & Learners of Smart Campuses


The old school teachers were sages on the stage, they spoke the last word on syllabus and evaluation, introduced a topic in class, and interpreted it. The sole tasks of the teachers were classroom teaching and assessing answer scripts. They used the ‘Chalk and Talk’ approach and focused on a structured syllabus.

The mentors of smart campuses are friends, guides, motivators, and do not speak the last word. They create proprietary learning resources of their own, then aggregate learning resources and share, mentoring inside and beyond the classroom. They are adept at multiple evaluation systems. They begin from a structured syllabus and move on to an organic one

The students, in recent past, studied in the classrooms and from teachers, books and at times searched the internet. They studied majorly for exams, marks, grades, degrees, studied in a competitive environment and were limited to a given structured syllabus. Whereas, the learners of the smart campuses study in class, from mentors, peers, study outside class, from the internet, from experiences, study for life and application, and they self-study, learning to learn, and study in a collaborative environment. They start with a structured syllabus but organic learning things they love and want to pursue later becomes their goal.

Also Read: Leveraging Data Analytics to Optimise Revenue Through Transport: Shailabh Sahu

The smart campus mentors have four tasks

1.Creating learning resources & tools

With regards to his/her own proprietary learning resources, a mentor starts by setting learning objectives and outcomes at the outset, then moves to mentor’s self videos/ video talks on the subject-matter, his/her podcast/audio talks on the subject-matter, case-studies, power-point presentations, mentor’s written chapters/books/articles and developing infographics designed by the mentor.

Some mentors develop their part or full own online courses, including audio, video, text, slides, and assignments for the learners. Mentors also develop short and diverse micro-learning content.

Apart from these resources developed personally by the mentors, they also aggregate the relevant following resources from various sources for their learners: YouTube/Vimeo video (films) and audio (podcast) links, URLs of sites/ analyses/ cases, PDFs of chapters/ cases, available slide-share presentations, text and reference books, journal articles/ chapters, charts, infographics, relevant humour content, and massive open online courses (MOOCs) like Swayam. They also encourage the learners to complete a few paid online courses like those on Coursera or Upgrad, procure 3D, augmented reality and simulations content and aggregated diverse micro-learning content.

While all of the above may not be needed for every topic or for every batch, many of these in varying proportions must be kept ready to fulfil when required.

For the self-learning of the learners, the campus should have advanced digital library along with the traditional library. The focus has to be on the digital library. The US-based EBSCO, McGraw Hill Education and DELNET (Developing Library Network) with a repository of over 2.5 lakh e-resources, e-books, e-journals, etc, are great sources. So is Bangalore-based KopyKitab that has a digital collection of eight million ebooks and branded digital content. Then there are ebooks of National Digital Library through INFLIBNET, the South Asian Archive and the World ebook library. Together these will make a smart campus digital library infrastructure.

 2.Delivery of learning resources

With regards to the delivery of learning, the mentors must start by arranging all content in increasing order of difficulty level, creating interest level through the use of content to read, listen and watch. These must be delivered using Learning Management System (software for creating, distributing and managing educational content) to deliver content to learners. This will lead to the Flipped classroom approach for digital asynchronous learning of these learning resources, a week in advance, by the learners themselves. And then the mentors are to discuss the theme in the class with seamless integration with an online VC platform for digital synchronous sessions: Zoom, MS Teams, Webex, Google Meet, etc.

Also Read: MahaRERA parts ethical from unethical developers: Rohitashwa Poddar

The mentors use WhatsApp groups and e-groups to amplify content-share, and also Interactive Learning Technology, organising content for the organic learning of the active learners of each course or topic. Interactive Learning Technology, like Impartus, which offers interactive smart classes is also a good choice. Further, the mentors need to keep sharing engaging content to keep learners interested throughout their organic learning.

3.Learners’ engagement

The learners shall be engaged productively and interestingly using ILT and Volunteer Training Workflows for seamless experiences, integrating Social Networking in Learning Engagement Ecosystem (like Facebook or Instagram used in learning), using Google Forms Opinion Surveys, Poll and Quiz during and beyond synchronous sessions, debates and discussions in sessions (digital or physical). The mentors must enhance the practical engagement of learners through the use of virtual lab/studio experiences (online, synchronous, asynchronous) and then Actual Lab/Studio experiences (seamlessly integrated into the virtual). They must encourage field visits and report presentations, apart from thematic presentations by the learners.

Engagement of learners can be enhanced through video-conferencing tools (Zoom, Skype, Google Hangouts, Google Meet), instant messaging tools (WhatsApp, Telegram), breakout sessions within platforms like Zoom, along with educational apps (Google Classroom) and platforms such as Cisco WebEx, GoToMeeting and MS Teams.

Learners’ learning experience can be enhanced by applying artificial intelligence, machine learning, tracking cognitive behaviour and social data, adequately using the combined power of audio, video, graphics, and humour and formulating reports and recommendations for a better learning experience based on experience and evidence. Alongside, they must give components for organic learning.

There can be personalising the learning experience by using smartbooks by various publishers, like Tata McGraw Hill and Pearson. Further, AI bots can be used to monitor learners’ academic performance, proctor exams, suggest electives/specialisations, even track attendance. The university may also use analytics and AI/ML and augmented reality/virtual reality to help track learners’ engagement with the study materials given. Finally, a smart campus can engage gamification of learning, VR and AR applications to enhance outcome and ease of learning.

4.Learners’ evaluation

A smart campus will have a diverse blended evaluation system, assessing learning progress both during the course (formative) and after the course (summative). There shall be diagnostic quizzes, flexible online exams (open book: applied/analytical) with non-Google-able innovative questioning, along with proctored online exams, apart from field-based assignment and reports, research-based presentations, case-study presentations and syllabus and project-based presentations.

Also Read: Liquidity issues & low demands are major challenges: SVR Srinivas

The evaluation must include several modes like online/offline, internships/live projects, physical lab/studio-based assessment, other than written examinations, interview-based assessment, along time-bound task-based response assessment. Also, assessing performance in the dissertation through the viva voce test is another tool for evaluation. Diversity in evaluation will ensure unbiased assessment and will encourage diversity in learning.

Needless to say, technology-assisted sports, games, cultural activities, social outreach initiatives, etc. shall also be integral parts of a smart campus, which must have transparency in work, delegation, evaluation and reporting, all at the click of a button.

To truly make such a campus finally deliver for the learners, there must not be any form of a digital divide among the learners.

Source: https://egov.eletsonline.com/2021/07/future-ready-campuses/

7

Higher Education / Higher Education Ahead PART 3: Adding Value to Digital Learning

« on: March 18, 2023, 09:11:01 PM »

Higher Education Ahead PART 3
Adding Value to Digital Learning

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From the language of millennials to social media, mentors are integrating distinct styles into school education

Adding Value to Digital Learning
Adding Value to Digital Learning

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Incorporating big data analytics and content management, educators can develop an individualised curriculum that enhances how each student learns (e.g. playlist of learning content in WiseWire changing for each student). Many in the West have started the use of the millennials’ language and style like Khan Academy video lessons, YouTube use, distinct style and language for young learners. Twitter, Tumblr, Snapchat, Imessage, Instagram, Facebook and Whatsapp are being creatively integrated with school education. There is a case of a management school in India, where the professor sends a 3 minutes interesting video on the subject he is taking up next through group Whatsapp to increase interest in the batch towards the topic being taught.

In the US, smartphone applications like Socrative and Plickers are helping teachers interact and assess students’ progress, collaborate via cloud-based applications to work and solve a common goal. Teachers can publish real-time quizzes and polls for students via mobile devices to keep them engaged.

Further, using anything from iMovie to WeVideo, learners can create a video as a learning resource. YouTube (with privacy settings) and SeeSaw or Flipgrid are also alternatives learners can make use of. The benefits of SeeSaw and Flipgrid are that students can add voice recordings or text sharing feedback with peers. Students became the co-creators of content and as a result, more engaged, including their parents. Useful apps like Book Creator, Explain Everything and EduCreations can be utilised towards this end.

There are many softwares to create digital content, like Camtasia, Raptivity, Captivate, Articulate Online.

Yes alongside, social media use extensively will support learning online. Facebook Page can broadcast updates and alerts. Facebook Group or Google Hangout with advanced features in G-suite can stream live lectures and host discussions. Twitter can act as a class message board. The 256 characters help to keep messages succinct. Instagram can be used for photo essays. One can create a class blog for discussions. There are many different platforms available, such as WordPress, SquareSpace, Wix, Blogger that. And, one can create a class-specific Pinterest board as well.

Students to Learners

With mentors replacing teachers, the students cannot be the pre-Covid typical students anymore going ahead.

Students study in the classroom, are taught by teachers, are limited to the given syllabus, and study for marks, grades, degrees. Students give exams in writing and on the basis of suggestions or set patterns of evaluation.

Learners study within and beyond the classroom, from mentors, peers, personal experience, books, digitally aggregated content, through projects and through assignments. Learners learn for lifetime application, and hence learn to learn further as things learnt today are obsolete soon. Self-learning or learning to learn is hence a major cultivated skill for the present-day learners, especially in higher education, as techniques and technologies are changing in the workplace in less than five years now. Learners also learn organically. While a structured syllabus must be completed for foundation and examination, organic learning is about self-driven learning in a few chosen areas out of interest, assisted by the mentors.

Yes, for this, doubling public education expenditure, digital access to the hinterland, considering digital connectivity as a human right, digital literacy as a fundamental prerequisite in any work, providing cell phones and laptops or tablets en masse, announcing cheaper data packages for students, CSR in the field of the domain of digital connectivity by corporate houses, and more would be needed soonest to bridge the yawning digital divide in the otherwise class-divided society. According to UNESCO, only 48 per cent of the Indian learners’ community of 283 million is receiving some sort of online education today, the rest 52 per cent going bereft of any form of formal learning whatsoever for more than a year now! And among these 48 per cent, the girl-students are having a worse fate in the poorer families due to limited digital devices to which the sons have higher access than the daughters.

Conclusion

India has been speaking of digital education for a long but it has stayed on as a possibility and not a reality for more than a decade now. Even IITs and IIMs have used digital platforms on the side for sharing content and debating on issues sporadically. The larger mass of 900 plus universities and some 44,000 colleges have actually not digitised their content, not made access to online learning a mainstay of their teaching-learning process, except the distance learning universities. In fact, the old school educationists looked at online and distance education with some disdain all across South Asia. They are in for a major shock now. The digital divide needs fast bridging through the promise of 6 per cent of the GDP for public education, through 2 per cent of profits for CSR given here, and through civil society initiatives like getting smartphones, laptops, and tabs for the less privileged.

It is clear that going ahead with digital access will be a human right, and those in governance must wake up to the reality that youngsters need inexpensive tablets and easy data access. A nation that spends less than 3 per cent of the national budget for public education (lower than Tanzania, Angola, and Ghana, et al), with the states putting in 2.5 (Bihar) to 26 per cent (Delhi), with Delhi being the only state in double digits, cannot ensure digital education for the masses, unless allocation of funds and their transparent spending happen.

[concluded]

Read Part 1 Here

Read Part 2 Here

The author is the Pro-Vice-Chancellor of Adamas University, and earlier the Media Dean of Symbiosis and Amity Universities

Source: https://outlookmoney.com/education/adding-value-to-digital-learning-7980

8

Higher Education / Towards Participative Learning for Engagement & Evaluation

« on: March 18, 2023, 09:06:57 PM »

Higher Education Ahead PART 2
Towards Participative Learning for Engagement & Evaluation

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With AI, robotics, automation, ML, and IoT taking over, skills for education are changing drastically

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Towards Participative Learning for Engagement & Evaluation
Towards Participative Learning for Engagement & Evaluation

Education will now move from a system-imposed disciplined endeavour to a voluntarily participating and internalised process. It will be truly a learner-centric education now in the new normal and shall be far more participative than the past. The learner in the digital or blended mode is learning voluntarily and not based on an imposed discipline on campus through a web of rules and power dynamics. While voluntary learning will throw many non-interested or apathetic learners out of the learning circle, it will also make many focused learners internalise education better and apply it in a more focused manner at his or her level.

With Artificial Intelligence, robotics, automation, Machine Learning, and Internet of Things being the other emerging realities, the skills for mass production or education to do the same work repeatedly will be irrelevant ahead when machines will take over almost all such work (more than three-fourths of all human work today). Hence, new-age skills, apart from technology use, have to be in areas like creativity, innovation, incubation, problem-solving, teamwork, leadership, critical thinking, design thinking, empathy, emotional intelligence, and risk management. Each of these can be qualitatively and quantitatively mentored to any youth from an early age of say 15 years till 25 years of age and will become his or her second nature.

To deliver such learning, the learners’ engagement techniques have to be more tech-savvy (Google forms, polls, surveys, quiz, virtual lab and studio, AI tools) and also with higher emotional quotient (use of humour, videos, info-graphics, empathy in the class, allowing diversity of opinion, wellness conscious).

Even the evaluation or assessment has to be diverse. Assessment refers to learner performance; it helps us decide if students are learning and where improvement in that learning is needed. Evaluation refers to a systematic process of determining the merit value or worth of the instruction or programme; it helps us determine if a course is effective (course goals) and informs our design efforts. Assessment and evaluation can be both formative (carried out during the course) and summative (carried out following the course). There can be many ways for the same. Mentors can make learners aware of expectations in advance (e.g. one week for feedback from deadline) and keep them posted (announcement: all projects have been marked). For example, one can create tests that are multiple-choice, true or false, or short answer essays and one can set the assessments to automatically provide feedback.

When online, evaluation can be based on proctored digital examination or open-book analytical and applied evaluation with non-Google-able questions. And this is surely not an easy task for the mentors as teachers of the past were used to repeating past questions, had set patterns of questions, examinations were ‘suggestions’ and memory-based, and not application-based in general. Online quiz, open-book examination with time-managed and proctored question paper delivered online, applied questions not based on memory but comprehension, telephonic interviews have been the usual ways of digital assessment and evaluation of learning.

There will be an offline evaluation also. Here, the assessment can be based on offline written examinations, field-survey-based presentation or report writing, debates, lab/studio-based practical, or peer-group work, or submission of a long-term real-life or live project.

Digital Learning Tools Today

The pandemic requires universities to rapidly offer online learning to their students. Fortunately, technology and content are available to help universities transition online quickly and with high quality, especially on the digital plank, though at a cost and with the risk of several teachers and administrators being forced to go out of the system.

Digital learning on the go or from distance calls for tech-led holistic solutions. It requires several content pieces to be transmitted digitally. These content pieces can be in the form of PDFs, PPTs, URLs, YouTube links, podcast links, case studies. There can also be e-books, audiobooks, Kindle-based content, Magzter sourced magazines. Then this can involve learning without being face to face through boxes, as in Google Class, or learning face to face as in Zoom live audio-visual discussions. People may also use GoToMeeting or MicrosoftMeet sessions. Attendance can be taken on Google Spreadsheet and through Whatsapp group chat of a batch of students too.

Then there are MOOCs, collaborative distance learning, wikis, blogs. Individual resource-rich institutes develop their customized secured and IPR protected Learning Management Systems, through the use of BlackBoard or TCSion LMS. Other LMS options like Kaltura or Impartus allowing video recording of talks also are in use in many places. There are CourseEra courses, Swayam online lessons from UGC, and similar other avenues to learn online.

Learning digitally can be further assisted with Virtual Reality (VR), Augmented Reality (AR), and Mixed Reality (MR) which can take the viewer to an enhanced experience even integrating scenarios that are yet to happen creatively bringing them within the learning experience. These are immersive and contextual experiences, and artificial intelligence-driven chatbots can further enhance the digital interface of the learner and the mentor.

[to be continued]

Read Part 1 Here

Read Part 3 Here

The author is the Pro Vice-Chancellor of Adamas University, and earlier the Media Dean of Symbiosis and Amity Universities

Source: https://outlookmoney.com/education/towards-participative-learning-for-engagement-evaluation-7967

9

Higher Education / Higher Education Ahead PART 1: Teaching is Dead, Long Live the Teacher

« on: March 18, 2023, 09:01:36 PM »

Higher Education Ahead PART 1
Teaching is Dead, Long Live the Teacher

From the sage-on-stage to a co-learner, the instructor's role is changing

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Teaching is Dead, Long Live the Teacher
Teaching is Dead, Long Live the Teacher

With 15 months of campuses being closed and online learning being pursued, edtech push by Covid is now stronger than the fintech push by demonetisation. The teacher-student model has ceased to exist for ever now, and we are moving to a qualitatively different mentor-learner model not just in the current digital learning phase, but also in the post pandemic times ahead. Beyond this complete campus lockdown phase, during which time mentoring-learning-assessing has gone online globally, we shall be moving towards blended phygital education ahead, which will be the new normal ahead, and will make the new model of mentor-learner firmly entrenched.

Learning or academics or education broadly has three functions: creation of learning content through research, writing, packaging with visuals; dissemination of learning through classes, lectures, notes, self-study, discussions, assessment and evaluation of the education of the learner by various methods. All these three have been majorly impacted by the self-isolation imposed to ensure social distancing so that the learners and the mentors may first be protected from the spread of the infection of Covid-19. The lockdown across the world is simultaneously a boon and a bane for the teaching-learning community today.

Teacher to Mentor

The teacher was a sage on the stage, introducing every new topic, speaking the last word on it, sticking to a structured syllabus as prescribed, interpreting it as s/he deems right, finishing the syllabus and focusing on examination and evaluation to complete the cycle of delivery of education. He often demands respect, and relies on the power to punish to set things right (not always, though). Teacher teaches and often sermonizes.

Each premise noted above is changing now.

Mentor today is a co-learner, may be the first stimulus for a topic but never the last word, starts from a structured syllabus but is expected to move towards organic learning depending upon the variegated interest areas of groups of learners, aggregates learning resources from multiple sources and shares with the learners, is more a guide, second parent and agony shelter of sorts for the learners. Examination also is diverse and evaluation is just one more function and not the ultimate yardstick of learning and brilliance of the learner. Mentor may often be less informed about an issue, but with a better perspective to guide. Mentor engages and inspires.

Learning Resources Aggregation & Delivery

To begin with being the new age mentor, a massive train the trainer and capacity building is needed today. For this, first the mentor has to be a digital personality with smartphone and net connection, and with laptop and WiFi connection. Next, one has to learn how to create, deliver and engage in content across multiple online platforms, and how to take matter learnt online to matter practiced offline face to face. Third, one has to now learn assessment with open book through analysis and application, through quiz, through applied projects, through phygital presentation and actual work in labs and studios after using virtual labs and studios.

Creating the learning resources was quite easy earlier. There were the books, often called text and reference books, then the power-point presentation of the teacher, and then chalk and talk. And the topic was first introduced in a class, post which notes were given, books were mentioned, and later examination was conducted to check memory and a bit of understanding.

The game is changed now. And totally so.

The concept of proprietary content (the mentor’s own videos, audio or podcast content, power-points, cases, info-graphics etc), aggregated content (books, monographs, videos, podcasts, URLs, PDFs, cases, etc taken from the internet, YouTube and Vimeo, etc), and also massive open/closed online learning resources (free ones like Swayam or NAPTEL, paid ones like those of Coursera or LinkedIn, and the university’s own online courses): these three are the learning resources today.

The mentor is expected to make a mix of proprietary, aggregated and online learning resources, suitably arranging them from the easies one to the toughest one and offer to the learners digitally (using Google Class, emails, or better, Learning Management Systems like Canvas or TCSion, Blackboard or Collaborate, etc,) at least a week or more before they meet digitally or physically to discuss the content. This is called Flipped Classroom where the learners get learning content much in advance, read, watch or listen to the same asynchronously at their own time, place or pace, note down things they have not understood or have questions on, and come to the digital/physical classroom synchronously, to clarify doubts, discuss cases, debate on conclusions drawn and participate in quiz or analytical or applied assignments. Delivery of the online session can be on any platform: MS Teams, Zoom, Webex, Google Meet and can move from the synchronous digital classroom to asynchronous digital chatroom debates and discussions for further clarification.

This makes the task for content creation and content delivery for the mentors much more diverse, tech-savvy, and tougher than the traditional teacher’s job.

Read Part 2 Here

Read Part 3 Here

The author is the Pro Vice-Chancellor of Adamas University, and earlier the Media Dean of Symbiosis and Amity Universities.

Source: https://outlookmoney.com/education/teaching-is-dead-long-live-the-teacher-7934

10

Higher Education / Blended Learning in Bangladesh: Roadmap Ahead

« on: March 18, 2023, 08:58:13 PM »

Blended Learning in Bangladesh: Roadmap Ahead

Prof Ujjwal K Chowdhury
Learning shall not be any more only face-to-face, merely chalk and talk, from the books and teachers alone. Post-pandemic. Education now and ahead is all set to be blended: blending the physical with the digital, the creative with the logical, the structured with the organic, the mentor-led with self-learning.

Blended Learning Policy Ahead:

Bangladesh has already taken the first step, and is just one measure away from its leap of faith in blended learning. It embarked upon the process of formally creating a blended learning policy for the nation, with a Task Force created for this purpose led by the minister of education, Dr Deepu Moni MP, and with many leading educationists and all top functionaries of education focused bureaucracy in it, and a key role being played by the a2i program adviser with ICT Division, Anir Chowdhury. The Task Force has already submitted the report and draft policy to the Prime Minister’s Office and it is expected that a policy to this effect to bring about blended learning from school to university shall be legislated or promulgated through executive initiative. Perhaps it shall be the first ever such a policy on blended learning in Asia, and would envisage a complete overhaul of education in this country over the next decade which would be perhaps with an expenditure totalling some 2 lacs crores taka.
What does Blended Learning Entail?

The Blended Learning framework begins with the perspective of teachers evolving to mentors and students becoming modern-day learners. Mentors guide, support and inspire with their own proprietary learning resources (ppts, films, podcasts, infographics, books, cases and chapters) and also with aggregated learning resources found in open sources. They surely cover the structured syllabi, but also motivate good learners towards organic deep dive learning and self-learning.

Learners learn to internalize and practice knowledge acquired through projects, use it for life and productivity, and learn today from mentors, peers, experiences, digital resources and from books alike. Learning begins even before the class, through self-learning and flipped classroom, and evaluations are done in multiple ways during and at the end of the course (formative and summative assessments). Blended makes this entire experience seamlessly from online to physical, classroom to laboratory to the field, and finally further learnt through self-learning digitally.

 Blended learning is multi-dimensional

Institutional dimension: This dimension regards the organization’s preparedness in terms of administrative and academic matters and student services. The policy hence shall look into this which will encompass physical infrastructure, human resources and rules and compliances in place.

Pedagogical dimension: This dimension analyzes the consistency between course content and the learners’ needs. In addition, the appropriate method to deliver the content is chosen. The most accepted form today is about Outcome Based Education where every program and courses therein shall have specific learning objectives and outcomes which can be demonstrated or quantified, and delivered partly digitally and partly physically.
Technological dimension: This dimension examines aspects related to technological infrastructure (e.g., infrastructure planning as well as accessibility to necessary hardware and software). This calls for bridging the digital divide and bringing all stakeholders to a minimum level of access to device and broadband. This is indeed a battle for any society and government to ensure this in a developing nation. Interestingly, the University Grants Commission (UGC) of Bangladesh had taken some distinctive initiatives during the pandemic period in higher education in this regard, which include providing devices, zoom connection et al to the mentors to conduct online sessions better and keep quality delivery. But considering the entire nation, and from schools to the university, digital divide is a reality, and a major outlay of funds will be needed here.

Interface design: An interface is concerned with the overall look and feel of a blended learning program, such as page, site, and content design, and navigation that enables learners to use and switch between different delivery methods. One of the remarkable blended learning practices in Bangladesh in recent times has been that of the Blended Learning Centre (BLC) of the Daffodil International University, where all lecture videos, selected other video links, podcast links, pdfs, published work, lecture notes on a given theme is given in advance before the class (only lecture video added later) for advance learning and later revision.

Evaluation: This dimension focuses on the blended learning program’s usability. It includes assessing the learners as well as the instructor and learning environment. It will include formative assessment being done while one is learning a course, summative assessment done at the end. Here the evaluation is done online (through proctored or open book evaluation), in studio or lab for practical outcomes, on ground and in person as well, which can be written or viva face-to-face. It also evaluates the learning content through learners’ and peer feedback. Globally such seamless multi-dimensional blended evaluation has already taken centre-stage. It will be interesting to see how an aspiring Bangladesh evolves this through its learning institutes.

Management: This dimension denotes maintaining the learning environment and managing content delivery. So, customized Learning Management Systems (LMS) needed ideally, or at least using the easily available Google Class, MS Teams and other tools.

Resource support dimension: This dimension handles online support and the resources required to create meaningful learning environments. This can include Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), paid online courses (like Coursera), proprietary content of the mentors, aggregate open-source content as available in the internet, books, and many other sources. In an economically highly stratified nation like Bangladesh, resource support to the less privileged is an absolute necessity.

Ethical considerations: Such considerations are related to cultural and geographical diversity, etiquette, equal opportunity, and legal issues. Such issues are important in diverse developing nations with strong cultural, religious and ethical considerations, Bangladesh surely being included.

Train the Trainers:

In Bangladesh context, additionally, the policy is expected to envisage a major teachers’ professional development in all scenarios: no-tech (for smaller classes and in remote areas), low-tech (where electronic media like television and radio can be of great help), and high-tech (where high speed broadband availability with good quality laptops combine to bring the full force of digital learning), and all these seamlessly integrated with synchronous face-to-face learning.

The training and development of the teachers and professors will require first to understand competency levels and essential standards of the mentors, and at all levels of education, from school to university. The training manuals for effective mentoring and multi-dimensional assessment of the learners shall have to be developed. For higher education, industry integration in learning is also a major necessity.

Such training of the mentors shall be required even in Madrasahs where modern technology, courses and Islamic values and practices shall converge to create the new age learners. The mentors’ capacity enhancement must include preparing online courses through audio, video, infographics, power-point presentations, and case-studies or illustrations.

Innovations & Disruptions Needed:

The policy also needs to incorporate evidence-based research and development on blended pedagogy and creation of blended education accelerator to innovate on current educational practices from school to university. Just putting current learning resources online is not enough. Without disruptive new practices, cosmetic changes cannot revolutionize education, first on paper and then on ground.

Some of the new disruptive approaches could these. Application of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning to accelerate higher education, customize learning to a learner’s natural interests, and modernise the process is another necessity in the policy. EdTech integration for pace and quality, instructional design components to enhance interest of learners, and bringing in playfulness and aesthetics in education are some other needs as well.

To modernize education for a mid-level developed nation, Bangladesh surely has to completely solve the energy problem, encourage decentralized solar energy production and consumption, bring in full coverage of 5G telecom-internet connectivity, and make device availability easy and cheap from hinterland to the heartland of the country. Inclusive infrastructure at all levels of education through smart class, internet and campus network, tollfree learning helpline, low-cost learning devices, simulation lab & digital studio support for mentors and learners, etc, can lead to actualizing the vision of an advanced blended learning ecosystem in the country. World-over, virtual labs and studios are also in vogue now and are useful in times of limited access to campus infra-structure. This modernization process needs the bulk of the resources.

Going Beyond Digital-Physical Blending:

There is another important aspect of blended learning. We must consciously blend the right (the creative) and the left (the rational) brains through our education, and actively encourage learners to take science or commerce-based courses with liberal arts-based ones. Similarly, blending learning with applying and playing also necessary in our campuses.

For a large population, as in Bangladesh, even community based shared learning is a good start with inclusive infrastructure. Skills-focus at all levels is needed. Sharing learning resources, having common learning repository in a region or among multiple institutions, and collaborating rather contesting are other important and necessary measures to take education to the next level, towards which the policy needs active focus. Community outreach, peer-to-peer learning, assessment less by memory more by application, employability as a critical outcome and institutional assessment criterion, alternative learning systems, et al, shall also make critical components of such a Blended Learning Policy for Bangladesh.

Hope the nation gets the policy surely before or on the World Teachers’ Day on October 5, 2022.

 

The author is a Strategic Adviser and Professor associated with the Daffodil International University

source: https://www.daily-sun.com/printversion/details/628019/Blended-Learning-in-Bangladesh:-Roadmap-Ahead

11

Higher Education / Tracking revenue streams of higher education

« on: March 18, 2023, 08:54:39 PM »

Tracking revenue streams of higher education

Source: https://businesspostbd.com/epaper/post/2023/02/04/04/04_102

12

Multimedia Section / South Asian media and entertainment: An overview

« on: March 18, 2023, 08:47:07 PM »

South Asian media and entertainment: An overview

Source: https://businesspostbd.com/epaper/post/2022/06/16/05/05_101

13

Common Forum/Request/Suggestions / Case for inter-university collaboration in Asia

« on: March 16, 2023, 12:52:09 PM »

Case for inter-university collaboration in Asia

Asia and the Pacific region has around 5990 universities, though they vary very much among themselves and more than half of them are funded and managed privately, like in other continents of the world, albeit following the laid out principles of the governments of the nations.

The global rating and ranking of universities have some preferred areas of focus. There are quite a few of them of which Times Higher Education and QS Ranking are the most famous and widely accepted. Most such rankings look at a few parameters very favourably with high scores. First, academic research is a major outcome of universities, more particularly if the research is in fundamental areas of seeking knowledge or explaining natural and social phenomena.

Second, academic excellence is looked from learner to professor ratio, which is usually preferred to be within 20:1. Third, academic leadership is valued in terms of personal achievements, degrees and research, published work in academic journals, and years in academics. Fourth, infrastructure in terms of large real estate and elaborate machinery is another highly preferred area of evaluation. Fifth, the cost of education is not a major focus of ranking while the outcome of high investments in terms of infrastructure, expensive faculty, advanced laboratories, etc, is surely a major focus. Sixth, there is a strong emphasis on internationalization as to how many foreign students are studying in the university being ranked and rated, how many foreign teachers are there, how many tie-ups with foreign, read Western, universities exist, etc.


How the developing world universities are different

All these parameters are important ones in a globalized world, but are primarily suited for the advanced economies and universities in the developed West, more than the under-developed and developing Asia and Africa. While academic research on fundamental issues is extremely important for advancement of knowledge, poorer nations have to invest their scarce resources for applied research that solves their immediate economic, social, cultural, ecological and technological problems in their immediate environments and give them immediate or mid-term succor. Also, as an outcome, employability quotient and entrepreneurship skills, technological skills for their learners is the most outstanding outcome for universities in Asia and Africa. The universities in Asia will survive based on their performance in this outcome. Most of these come at ease in the developed Western economies with lesser proportion of youth in their societies, and with higher standard of living along with techno-savviness and access.

It is extremely expensive to have 20:1 learner to professor ratio in developing nations and focus on huge infrastructure. The governments do not have the capacity to invest on these parameters in public universities, and if the private ones do so, their cost of education goes extremely high and beyond the reach of the huge majority of their countrymen. Hence, universities in the developing world have to focus primarily on their resources to ensure the minimum required infrastructure, faculty members and learning resources. The developing Asian and African nations are usually densely populated and they need cheaper higher education with reasonably good quality more than international students seeking expensive high quality education. While international tie-ups are important for Asian universities, they cannot be a primary parameter to ascertain their quality and ranking.

In such a scenario, the rationale for a different paradigm of rating and ranking of universities in the developing world is perhaps necessary, and to evolve that a much more intense collaboration among Asian universities is needed.


Pan Asian university brotherhood

There are several reasons why a pan-Asian university brotherhood and intense collaboration among universities would be beneficial. This is going beyond merely signing MOUs and speaking in platitudes.

Enhancing educational quality

Collaboration among universities can lead to the sharing of knowledge, resources, and best practices, which can help improve the quality of education offered by each institution. This can benefit students by providing them with a more comprehensive and high-quality education. These best practices shall be more suited for developing societies with lower per capita income, lesser learning resources and investments available, and technology still being much lesser than the developed Western universities of the US, UK, Canada, Australia et al.

Promoting applied research and real-life innovation

Collaboration among universities can also foster innovation and promote research in different fields. By pooling resources, expertise, and infrastructure, universities can undertake more ambitious research projects and make more significant scientific breakthroughs. And these research can be in applied areas of development in these nations, and in close collaboration with their governments and their fledgling MSME sector of the economy. The innovations can be those which can be put into practice fast making a positive economic contribution. Universities can play a significant role in developing new technologies and solutions that can address social, economic, and environmental challenges facing Asia. An association of universities can promote collaboration on research and development, as well as provide funding for innovative projects that can spur growth and development.

Building cultural bridges

A pan-Asian university brotherhood can help build bridges between different cultures and promote mutual understanding and respect among developing nations of Asia with similar or relatable history and traditions. This can lead to increased collaboration and exchange between universities and learners, facilitating cross-cultural learning and the sharing of different perspectives. By fostering academic and cultural exchange programs, universities can facilitate the exchange of ideas, perspectives, and experiences, which can contribute to greater mutual understanding and respect among Asian nations.

Addressing societal challenges

Collaborative efforts among universities can also help address societal challenges facing Asia, such as climate change, poverty, and inequality. By working together, universities can identify and tackle complex challenges that require multidisciplinary and cross-sectoral solutions. For example, tackling soil erosion, repeated mega storms and cold waves in South and Southeast Asia is a common challenge which universities can take up collaboratively for research, innovation, and solutions etc.

Strengthening regional integration

A pan-Asian university brotherhood can help strengthen regional integration by promoting collaboration and cooperation across borders. This can lead to increased economic and social integration, as well as the development of a common regional identity and shared values. An association of universities can facilitate knowledge exchange and collaboration among universities across Asia, which can help universities learn from each other's experiences, share best practices, and build partnerships. This can lead to the development of joint research programs, student and faculty exchanges, and collaborative projects that can have a positive impact on the region.

Asian Universities for Asian Development:

An association of universities of Asia can support the development of Asian nations in several ways:

Developing human capital: Universities are critical institutions for producing highly skilled and educated individuals who can contribute to the growth and development of their nations. An association of universities can collaborate on employability oriented curriculum development, mentors’ training, and applied research programs that can enhance the quality of education and provide a highly skilled workforce for the region.

Providing policy advice: Universities can also provide independent policy advice and analysis to policymakers, which can help shape policies and strategies that promote sustainable development and address key challenges facing Asia. The association can contribute to this in various nations.

It is high time that Asian Universities look at themselves as equals and collaborate as partners, rather than looking at only the Western nations for crumbs of unequal relations. Competition is a discredited 20th century concept. This is the time for collaboration, and the pandemic has proven it like never before.

The writer is Executive Director of International Online University, and the Strategic Adviser of Dhaka based Daffodil International University. He can be contacted at ujjwalk.chowdhury@gmail.com

Sources: https://businesspostbd.com/editorial/2023-03-16/case-for-inter-university-collaboration-in-asia-2023-03-16