IT in Education
In a span of 60 plus years since independence, India has managed to make its presence felt in the global arena, and for all the right reasons. People say it's the IT boom or the outsourcing industry which has catapulted our nation's economy. True to some extent, the statement however ignores the real or the underlying reasons for success. Advancements in Education is the real reason why we have so many engineers, doctors and millions of other professionals, who are together taking our country forward. A lot of people would want to complain, but at the end, like it or not our education system has played an important role in bringing progress and prosperity to our country. For quite some time now, IT has been a critical component of the educational experience, creating opportunities for students. Many software companies are developing educational software to facilitate teaching. On the other hand, there are companies working towards innovative hardware solutions while keeping in mind, the costs and the target audience. All said and done, the country has realized the importance of IT in the education sector, which is a multi-billion dollar industry and remains recession proof. Let's take a look at what role IT can play in this domain.
Where do we stand?
No matter what the need, teaching techniques or the administration of educational institutes, people have realized a lot of benefits from IT implementations. How institutes function, has changed over the years and new technologies continue to penetrate deeper. Evidence for the same can be found right from the start of the admission process, to daily classes, admin chores, to conducting exams and declaring results. Also some institutes now have wireless connectivity throughout their campuses while many are considering ERP solutions and smart classrooms. But still, majority of institutes remain far from being high tech and are in need of innovative solutions that can meet their needs and resources.
Roadblocks
Blackboards, desks, chalks and dusters, slates and registers remain modus operandi for imparting education in most institutes. It is clear that the potential for investments in this sector is immense as most of the schools and colleges still use primitive means for teaching and running back-end processes. Though the importance of IT is well understood, the need for low cost easy to maintain and easy to use solutions needs to be met. Unlike big organizations, where IT hardware might be changed every second year, most educational institutes don't intend to splurge that often.
