In the background of Digital India project, Kerala has to get ready for a total knowledge revolution in the field of education.
I am drawing your attention to the basic facilities needed for this mission.
First, an information powerhouse, collecting all digital material needed by students for study and research at school, college and university levels, must be set up.
Second, put in place an optical fibre network that links all educational institutions to the information powerhouse.
Today, the National Knowledge Mission provides 10 Mbps broadband connectivity to all universities and colleges in India for e-learning and e-governance for an annual subscription fee of only Rs 22,000.
Using this facility, networks that distribute digital resources from the central learning portal to states and from state learning portals to universities and colleges through fibre optics must be created.
The third step is to set up local area networks (LANs) and Wi-fi routers to channel e-resources of the government and universities that reach colleges from the portals of universities to students in classrooms and in campuses at all time.
Video conferencing facilities must be set up in all colleges under a university. The aim is to take seminars, workshops and conferences held in university departments and colleges to all students and teachers of that university.
Also, students must be given the opportunity to join courses of foreign universities. A system that provides digital study material to students to improve their knowledge of English language and to develop their personality and soft skills through mobile service providers can be arranged.
Through these preparations, Kerala will be able to take the lead in total digital revolution of the country’s education sector. Our state, which has attained total literacy, must be the model for India in total digital revolution.
(The writer is the vice-chancellor of Mahatma Gandhi University)