In a smart initiative to modernise education, 750 single teacher schools in Bikaner have been equipped with smart TVs to teach children through the digital medium. Under a state initiative for quality education, 43 bhamashahs (donators) have already contributed Rs. 1.25 crore to this end. The smart TVs have been installed in schools so that studies can be carried out through uploaded programmes.
Not just schools, madarsas, too, have been modernised with similar smart classes, with 28 madarsas having been already equipped with smart TVs.
Indian Masterminds interacted with 2011-batch IAS officer and the District Collector of Bikaner, Bhagwati Prasad Kalal, to get more details about this initiative.
SMART CLASSES
Laying out the details, Mr. Bhagwati Prasad Kalal told Indian Masterminds, “Under the right to education, there is a fix teacher-student ratio. The first requirement is to have two teachers at least in every school. But, there were many schools with a single teacher and it was getting very difficult for them to take so many classes. So, to address that problem and tackle the imbalance of teacher-student ratio, we took this initiative to provide smart TVs to schools for smart classes.”
PLAN LAYOUT
According to the plan, there is online portal for class 1-12, where online tutorials are available for every chapter. The TVs can be connected through wi-fi, but, there is a provision for hard disk as well, where tutorials are already downloaded. Two TB storage hard disks were provided to more than 350 schools, which have all the study material inside. So, if there is no teacher for a particular subject, the whole class will study that subject through the smart TV.
Mr. Kalal further said, “During visits to rural areas, it was found that educational activities were affected due to just a single teacher in many schools. Keeping this in mind, the initiative was taken. In the schools facing shortage of subject teachers, it will be ensured that the syllabus is completed on time through this medium. Besides the students, the parents are also happy about the availability of digital education for the bright future of their children.”
SOURCING FUNDS
Under the ‘Digital Initiative for Quality Education’ campaign, the people of Bikaner were motivated by the district administration to donate for the cause. During the Covid-19 pandemic, when offline classes were disrupted, online classes proved to be very beneficial. To maintain the continuity of education in that difficult period, the state government, in an exemplary move, had made education available through the online medium.
“Bikaner has a rich tradition of cooperation. So many companies came forward with their CSR funds to help us in the education sector,” said Mr. Kalal.
Now that the smart classes are in place, a proper monitoring system has also been set up to see to it that everthing runs smoothly. Most prominently, block-wise WhatsApp groups have been created to monitor the functioning of the smart TVs so that classes do not get disrupted.
Indeed, the whole initiative is a remarkable leap towards modernisation of education, where children studying in single teacher schools are now getting to study through the digital medium.
