 It
is a regular training session in progress for 400-odd sales personnel
of a multinational corporation in India. The lecture is followed
by a lively question and answer session with the participants.
The only difference is that while the instructor is stationed
in a studio in Gurgaon, the executives are located in nine cities
across the country, all connected via satellite communication.-
Students enrolled for bachelor of software systems course of a
prestigious university have an additional module, apart from the
regular theoretical and practical classes. The curriculum requires
them to attend a number of “interactive classroom” sessions
conducted by expert faculty via a dedicated VSAT network.
Real-time
interactive learning through satellite networks is all set to become
a highpoint of the convergence era. Delivery of quality education
via the best of faculty, irrespective of location, might change
the mode of learning for all times to come. A combination of “physical”
and “interactive” sessions, it is the closest one can
get to classroom training while retaining the advantages of collaborative
group learning, using video, voice and data. When ZILS (Zee Interactive
Learning Systems) started its ambitious i-cell project in February
2001, with its studio in Noida connected with 300 ZedCA academies
all over the country, it was beset with major problems. Dilip Mahapatra,
chief executive officer, ZILS, admits that i-cell did not do too
well because many people could not understand the power of the technology.
“We
were the first to start and therefore had many ground level and
infrastructure problems. The value of the proposition was also not
seen in the market.” Mahapatra however adds that in the last
year-and- a-half they did a lot of learning, understood the technology
and improved upon it. “We were not aggressive till a few months
back as ground realities were not in our favour, but now everything
has stabilised and things are looking up. Many technical hitches
have also been sorted,” he says.
I-cell
sessions are mandatory in the L4 course series (both long term and
short-term), offered by ZedCA. Besides this, ZILS also offers the
Bachelor of Software Systems (BSS) and Bachelor of E-commerce (BE-com)
courses for Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University, which include
24 hours and 12 hours of i-cell sessions, respectively.
The
technology, which was not marketed as recent as six months back,
is now being aggressively targeted at the corporate sector. “
We have the technology, content alliances with partners and the
sales team all ready,” says Mahapatra with optimism. He adds
that the market, which was not ready for the technology more than
one and a half years ago, has now understood its power and the value
proposition in the last six months. “The fact that more players
are entering the market actually augurs well as competition helps
understand the opportunities. We have the advantage of being a first-timer
and have understood, assimilated and improved upon the technology
and content. This may have taken us one and a half years, but it
will take the others at least six months to catch up,” he asserts.
The
Indian Institute of Management, Kozhikode, recently launched India’s
first interactive management education programme through Hughes
Escorts Communications Limited (HECL)’s DirecWay broadband
satellite based education and training service. The Executive Management
Education Programme (eMEP) is a-year-long postgraduate certificate
programme being delivered in nine Indian cities. The 240-hour course
will be held twice a week and students can interact with experts
during class through voice or emails. It will initially be conducted
from the HECL studio at Gurgaon and later from the IIM campus so
that the professors do not have to travel all the distance.
 HECL
also has a tie-up with Apollo International in the US and has been
offering its MBA programme in India. It is also in the process of
partnering with XLRI Jamshedpur to deliver courses using the DirecWay
platform. Amit Tripathi, vice president, HECL, also informed that
this platform is being successfully used by many organisations for
executive education. “Many of these companies have booked the
studio for days together. So far we have six to seven customers
including HP, SITA and TISCO,” he points out. According to
Prashant Shenoy, regional sales manager, West and South, HECL, the
market response from the corporate sector has been very positive
because of the cost and efficiency of delivering executive education
programmes. Corporate training happens during daytime, that is 9:30
am to 5:30 pm, while the evenings are reserved for delivering academic
courses. The content for the programmes is provided by the clients,
which are both corporates and academic institutions, and company
officials believe that it is to their advantage that they are only
providing the delivery platform. The company plans to open many
more centres all over the country, including franchisee network.
IGNOU’s
virtual campus initiative, was initially delivered via VSAT, is
now majorly Web-based, apart from using the teleconferencing facility
of the Gyan Darshan education TV channel. The courses being conducted
through tele-learning centres in different cities are Bachelor of
Information Technology (BIT) which includes a certification from
EdExel Foundation, UK and the Advanced Diploma in Information Technology
(ADIT). Reminding that such interactive distance education programmes
are beneficial who are employed and want to pursue parallel education,
Megha P Gawde, head of computer department, St Xavier’s Technical
School in Mumbai, however warns that an effective campus support
system is essential.
A
major constraint of Internet based learning is the passive attitude
of learners who have been pre-condition to classroom type of environment.
Satellite-linked interactive education provides a livelier alternative
bringing traditional classroom environment using next generation
learning technologies.
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PEOPLE
