Authored by Manish Mohta, Managing Director of Learning Spiral
The educational system of a country is the root of development. A well-developed education system empowers the youth to join the workforce and contribute towards adding value to the economy. India has the world’s second-largest education system and the nation is constantly chasing to become the foremost. Globally, around 220 million students pursuing higher education have been affected due to the pandemic disruption. Campus doors had closed and the continuous cancellation of semester exams resulted in learning loss and exam delays.
India’s traditional learning methods maintained a stronghold but the pandemic has battered the education systems around the world. According to UNICEF, 90% of the world’s student population has been affected due to pandemics.
To fight back the disruption and damage, educational institutes across the country embraced the digital mode of learning and examinations as a solution to fill the void left by traditional education delivery. Now, this has become the “new normal”. With this, digital education in India camecentre stage and is now increasingly getting integrated into the mainstream. Demand for Edu-Tech players has been raised due to increasing e-learning which led to the demand for online examinations. Holding online assessments became one of the challenging subjects when it comes to higher education.
What next?
According to updated statistics by the Union Health Ministry, India has registered a high number of new covid cases in the last few days, and also some new infections have been reported from a few states.
The experts say the increasing number of positive cases can be a knock of the arrival of the fourth wave. In such a situation, the experience of the past two years has prepared us for this.
Is e-learning and online assessment the future?
E-learning has become the future of new India, as Covid-19 has made online examinations become the buzzword. Commercial digital learning & examination solutions have received huge appreciation for providing the much-needed infrastructure for the digitization of education. The contribution of technology resolved the evaluation problem by offering advantages such as ease of use, time efficiency, enhanced adaptability, and so on. In between, fair Assessment has always been the main concern of higher educational bodies. Currently, remote proctoring options are not limited as they were and cheating rates have also decreased. Proctoring is easy to customize and also eliminates the chances of malpractice and cheating during examination.
In terms of higher education, the system has evolved and leads to the holistic development of students in the long term:
- Improvement in collaborative work using technology tools.
- A rise in digital literacy
- Efficient utilization of time
* Online examination and Assessments
- Distance learning
Based on these experiences, it can be said that in the future, we can continue the education system smoothly as maybe things can get further better with new updates in the system by the time.
Challenges?
Indian internet infrastructure is still far from ready to support the shift. According to a survey done by the Indian Government, only 24 per cent of households have access to the internet. In rural India, the numbers are far lower, with only 4 per cent of households having access. According to the reports of NITI Aayog (2018), 55,000 villages in India did not have mobile network coverage. A survey done by the ministry of rural development (2017-18) revealed that more than 36 per cent of schools in India operated without electricity.
Bharat net Project: A step forward
As e-learning becomes the “new normal”, the authorities have been taking steps to make the digitization of education accessible and affordable for all. The Union government is banking hugely on the “Bharatnet project”, which aims to provide broadband to 250,000-gram panchayats in the country through the optic fiber to improve connectivity. Broadband connectivity in gram panchayats is expected to help rural children who do not have internet access at home. Besides, building the digital infrastructure and familiarizing students with automated learning and evaluation tools should be prioritized. The fairness of exams will always be questioned and be the concerning part because learning in colleges varies from that in schools.
