India’s Education Policy Updates After 30 Years: 4 Experts Share What It Really Means

by India Development Review (IDR) August 6, 2019, 11:00 am

• On 31 May 2019, the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) released a draft of the National Education Policy (NEP).
• This is the first update to India’s education policy in nearly 30 years, and there has been plenty of debate on the recommendations, and it was open to the public for feedback and suggestions till July 31.

Central Square Foundation’s (CSF) monthly newsletter The EDge asked eminent names from the education sector to share their thoughts on some key aspects of the policy.

1. Ashish Dhawan, Founder and Chairman, Central Square Foundation

Ashish Dhawan. Source: Central Square Foundation

What is your initial response to the draft NEP? If implemented, how do you see the impact of the policy on our education system?

The draft NEP was a long time coming, but it has made some bold and welcome recommendations to shift the focus of the education system towards quality, and improving student learning outcomes. It takes a long-term view in terms of the emphasis on flexibility and skills to ensure that our children are equipped for a rapidly changing job scenario.

When I read it, my immediate thought was that we now have a policy document, even though it’s a draft, that explicitly recognizes that we are currently in a severe learning crisis, and that this crisis starts in the early years. This is significant. If we were to focus and get this one thing right, i.e., ensure all children have foundational literacy and numeracy skills, this in itself would have a tremendous impact on the education system.

What are some of the key steps the government can take for the successful implementation of the policy? How can the policy translate into real action?

The challenge is that current state capacity to deliver quality education is weak, and we do not have the resources to focus on so many things at the same time. My one advice to the government would be that they should almost ruthlessly prioritise–they should first focus on ensuring that all children achieve foundational literacy and numeracy, and then phase in other priorities, as needed.

Separately, I think it’s important to remember that implementation rests with states. The centre’s role is primarily one of catalysing demand for critical reforms with the states, setting broader policy goals, providing funding to states, and so on. The centre cannot be too prescriptive in terms of ‘how’ states need to implement. In fact, it needs to give states the autonomy to choose the most cost-effective pathways, while maintaining accountability for the right outcomes. The centre should also think about enabling states to develop 3-5 year plans, and not annual plans.

What, according to you, are the big misses of the draft NEP, if any?

One of the key concerns with the draft education policy is that like many other policies, it may be attempting to do too much. As a system, we first need to focus on getting the basics right–ensure that all our children achieve foundational literacy and numeracy by class 3. Without this prioritisation, the system will continue to grapple with multiple competing priorities.

We cannot hope to achieve foundational learning for all our children if we don’t measure it correctly. Therefore, one of the biggest areas of reform in this regard, which is not adequately addressed by the policy in its current form, is the need to ensure independent and reliable learning data to measure early grade learning outcomes.

While the NEP does call out regular adaptive assessments, there is a need to have a large-scale, independent, household-based, government-backed assessment, which measures outcomes for children attending public and private schools. This survey must be housed in and administered by an autonomous institution, which is at arm’s length from the delivery ministry, ensuring there is no conflict of interest. This learning data is critical for the government to meaningfully hold the system accountable and keep us honest.

Read CSF’s full interview with Ashish Dhawan, here.

2. Geeta Gandhi Kingdon, Professor, University College London and President, City Montessori School, Lucknow

Geeta Gandhi Kingdon. Source: Central Square Foundation

The NEP refers to the creation of an independent agency to gather and analyse data for the education system. What are crucial data gaps on private schools that the government should strive to fill?

There is hardly any data on private schools because they are rarely included in studies or surveys done by the government. It is as if private school students belong to another country. For example, the National Achievement Survey (NAS) is conducted only in government and aided schools and excludes private unaided schools. We need more information about private schools to get a fuller picture of the education sector.

What do you think of the proposition to separate regulation, provision, and policy-making in the NEP? How do overlapping interests between these functions presently impact private schools?

The idea of separating roles is very good, because if the government performs all the roles–funder, provider, regulator, policy maker, assessor–it leads to many conflicts of interest. However, the NEP does not go far enough because it does not separate funding and provision–the government is both the funder and producer of education, i.e., it runs schools itself.

The NEP does not consider public funding for privately produced education (public-private partnerships). It is a myth that in educationally developed countries, all schools are state-run. Actually, they are only publicly funded, not publicly run. This is an important distinction that many in government are unaware of.

In India, there is an entrenched belief that the government shouldn’t just fund education, it must also produce it (i.e., run the schools)–even when it has struggled to deliver quality. Our main focus should be to ensure that all elementary education is publicly funded, so that parents do not have to pay to send their children to school. But the operation of the schools could be in private hands if they are deemed to be more efficient, i.e., to deliver better child outcomes at lower costs.

The NEP has also proposed the establishment of an independent State School Regulatory Authority (SSRA) for each state, to handle all aspects of school regulation and accreditation. It recommends reducing the burden of over-regulation on private schools, and regulating public and private schools within the same framework/benchmarks. These are welcome proposals. Much depends, however, on how the SSRA will operate. Will it subject public schools to accountability pressures? Will government schools go through a process of recognition like private schools? And will they also be closed down if they do not comply with the norms of the RTE Act? The NEP doesn’t clarify this, leaving open the possibility of the continuation of non-accountable public schools and resultant poor learning outcomes.

Read CSF’s full interview with Geeta Gandhi Kingdon, here.

3. Rukmini Banerji, CEO, Pratham Education Foundation

Rukmini Banerji. Source: Central Square Foundation

The draft NEP includes pre-primary education as part of the ‘foundational stage’ (ages 3-8) and strongly recommends that this stage must be a continuum. Do you agree? How should we approach this?

I welcome the strong focus on the early years. Building strong foundations in the early years allows children to ‘leap forward’. The widespread phenomena of ‘falling behind’ that we see today, happens because the right things are not done at the right time.

The draft policy states that children in the 3-8 year age group should receive a flexible, “play-based, activity-based, and discovery-based” education. However, it is fair to say that the educational establishment in India, including the government bodies at the central, state, and district levels have little or no experience with the preschool age group.

Pre-primary classes are often part of primary schools in the private sector and much of the student intake happens in lower or upper kindergarten. However, research studies show that most activities in these institutions in the early age group are ‘school-like’ and do not provide the flexible, play-based, and developmentally appropriate activities that are suited for supporting the development of young minds. So, despite several years of preschool education, such children are still not ‘ready’ for class 1.

At the same time, the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) system run by the Ministry of Women & Child Development (MWCD) is typically overwhelmed by responsibilities in health, immunisation, and nutrition. So, in the anganwadis, early childhood stimulation or development has not received the high priority it needs.

Bringing these two ministries together, all the way from the centre to the states, districts, and villages, will be a huge and challenging task, but one that is certainly worth undertaking. Clear financial calculations will be needed to support this convergence exercise in a sustained way.

One of the objectives the draft NEP states is that every child in grade 5 and beyond should achieve foundational literacy and numeracy – can you talk about some of the specifics with regard to the pedagogical and curricular changes that will be needed to achieve this goal?

According to ASER data, only about 50 percent of class five children are able to read in class 2 (or higher). The other half is spread across several reading levels, starting from not being able to recognise letters to just about coping with simple sentences. This is one of the biggest challenges in primary schools, the wide dispersion of learning levels. The teacher’s daily dilemma is to figure out what to teach and to whom. To complete the curriculum guided by grade-level textbooks, teachers usually choose to focus on the ‘top of the class’, leaving others to catch up on their own. Even the RTE Act prescribes that teachers “must complete entire curriculum within specified time”.

The draft NEP highlights several causes for the learning crisis, including the lack of school readiness, but it doesn’t address the negative consequences of overambitious curricula or the common practice of teaching to the top of the class. The real challenge is, therefore, to schedule ‘catch-up’ routines into the regular school schedule. Given the size, depth, and magnitude of the ‘catch-up’ required, we will need a persistent and high-priority effort for at least five years or more.

The alignment of key elements of the school system such as teacher training, teaching-learning material, ongoing teacher support, mentoring-monitoring, assessment, and course correction towards achieving stated goals is critical. Perhaps this alignment for foundational learning will now be possible, given the overarching direction of the new policy.

Read CSF’s full interview with Rukmini Banerji, here.

4. Sridhar Rajagopalan, President and Chief Learning Officer, Educational Initiatives

Sridhar Rajagopalan. Source: Central Square Foundation

The draft NEP calls for the appropriate integration of technology into all levels of education. What is your initial response to the draft in terms of how it envisions the role of technology in education?

The draft policy mentions India’s unique leadership in the technology space and acknowledges that the right policy and implementation can help India become a global leader in EdTech. Overall, the policy seems to have its heart in the right place, yet many challenges plague the successful implementation of EdTech in our country.

For example, one of the most common issues with all EdTech projects is the disproportionate focus on hardware as compared to the software or content.

One big miss. without a doubt, is that it fails to recognise the role of the private, for-profit players and their international experience. It would have been useful to look into what has been tried already in EdTech and the challenges those efforts faced. While the collective goal should be to strengthen state resources and capacities and help curate high-quality open resources, there should be an effort to learn from the for-profit EdTech players and view them as providers of co-existing and complementing solutions.

Again, for implementation of suggestions made in the policy, do you think we have adequate infrastructure and capacity in our schools and state systems? What could be the challenges in creating that infrastructure and capacity?

The infrastructure and capacity do not exist, but like with anything new, they can be developed over time as these projects expand. However, problems arise if the approach tends to focus more on scaling than on quality. Ironing out all possible issues at the scale of 20-100 schools is very important, and a disproportionate focus at this scale will ensure fewer challenges at a larger scale of say 1,000 or 2,000 schools.

What is important in all this is generating effective assessment solutions and protocols to provide learning feedback. Again, this should be done in a low-stake, quality-focused manner while gradually scaling up and taking key players and partners along.

Read CSF’s full interview with Sridhar Rajagopalan, here.

Source: https://www.thebetterindia.com/190770/national-education-policy-draft-update-recommendation-india/

Chasing students: Naspers Ventures into online education

Chasing students: Naspers Ventures into online education

• Online education is the next big thing for technology giant Naspers, judging from its recent investments.
• The company has announced a $30m investment into Brainly, an online learning community for students, parents and teachers, along with two other funders.

30th July 2019 by Stuart Lowman

It’s no secret Naspers trades at discount to the value of its Tencent stake. So much so that this discount was deemed part of the reason the technology giant pushed for its offshore listing on the Euronext in Amsterdam. Naspers is also at odds to defy this one-trick pony tag, with investments across sectors from online classifieds to food delivery. Education is another such topic, online in particular, which has seen investments range from $30m to $383m, from the United States to India. But not enough is made of these investments. In the Business Maverick article below, Sasha Planting maps out the group’s investments into online education. – Stuart Lowman

Naspers rides the education wave

By Sasha Planting

Online education is the next big thing for technology giant Naspers, judging from its recent investments. The company has announced a $30m investment into Brainly, an online learning community for students, parents and teachers, along with two other funders.

This is its second investment into the company, which has headquarters in Krakow and New York. The first was a $15m investment in 2016.

Brainly’s “crowd learning” model combines online education, social media and machine learning, and is disrupting the education market on a global level. From 2018 to 2019 it has grown from 100 million to 150 million active monthly users.

In December 2018 Naspers invested $383m in Indian online tutorial start-up Byju’s, which develops online learning materials. It is the world’s most prized EdTech company, having recently been valued at $5.7bn.

Online learning is booming thanks to exploding internet usage around the world, largely because of the ubiquity of cheap smartphones and decreasing internet costs.

While this trend is catching on in both developing and developed markets, Naspers is particularly excited about opportunities in India. It notes in its recently released annual report that India is the world’s fastest-growing large economy, with more than 1.3 billion people and some of the planet’s most talented entrepreneurs.

“We’ve been investing in India for more than a decade – over $2bn, or around 20% of our worldwide investment in the last decade,” says CEO Bob van Dijk in the report.

Prior to this, in September, Naspers invested in SoloLearn, a social platform that helps individuals become better coders as they consume, create and share bits of code-related content with peers around the world.

Naspers’ first investment in the EdTech space was in June 2016 when it invested $60m in Udemy, an online learning marketplace for adults. The growth in the platform has been nothing short of extraordinary with 40 million students making the most of the 130,000 courses offered in more than 60 languages.

The investments are housed in Naspers Ventures, which is dedicated to seeking out, investing in and nurturing companies that will generate the next wave of growth for the tech company. This is the type of thinking that saw Naspers transform itself from a South African print media business in 1915 to today’s global consumer internet group.

“Naspers Ventures’ remit is to find investment opportunities for Naspers beyond our traditional market segments, but that are a strategic fit for the company,” Naspers Ventures CEO Larry Illg said at the time of its investment in Udemy.

“We are looking for companies and leaders with high potential and the ambition to have significant global impact. Education is a sizeable market that has not yet seen the technology impacts we have seen in other sectors, but we are now seeing dramatic innovations appearing. That makes EdTech a perfect fit for Naspers Ventures.”

Certainly, it seems that the online learning market has limitless potential. According to an article in Forbes magazine, it was predicted that â€œe-learning” would reach $107bn in 2015 – and it did. Now, Research and Markets forecasts show that this figure will triple in the coming years – in other words, it will grow to $325bn by 2025.

“The brilliant aspect about marrying learning with technology is that it enables all kinds of innovative ways for more and more people to add to their skills and knowledge: often more quickly, effectively and enjoyably than before. This is an opportunity that can make a real difference to people’s lives around the world and there is still much more to be done. So for us, it ticks all the right boxes,” says Illg in the annual report.

In the 2018-19 financial year, Naspers’ food-delivery businesses (Swiggy, Delivery Hero, Mr D Food and iFood) reached a size and level of profitability that saw it graduate from Ventures to become a core standalone Naspers segment alongside Classifieds and Payments & Fintech. While not yet a profitable business, online food delivery is growing at 30% a year and is already a $75bn plus global market.

As a result, Naspers has dramatically upped the level of investment in this space. During the year, it committed, along with Innova, to invest an additional $400m in iFood to enable the business to accelerate growth. It also invested $716m in Indian food-delivery leader Swiggy during the year.

It is a matter of time before its online education business reaches a similar scale. BM

Source: https://www.biznews.com/sa-investing/2019/07/30/naspers-education-wave-students

[Funding alert] Edtech platform Brainly raises $30M led by Naspers; plans to expand user base in India

The latest investment brings the total funding received by the edtech platform to $68.5 million.

• Poland-based Brainly, a peer-to-peer learning community for students, parents, and teachers across 35 countries including India,
• has raised $30 million in its new funding round led by Naspers with participation from Runa Capital and Manta Ray. 

By: Sujata Sangwan

Poland-based Brainly, a peer-to-peer learning community for students, parents, and teachers across 35 countries including India, has raised $30 million in its new funding round led by Naspers with participation from Runa Capital and Manta Ray. 

The latest investment brings the total funding received by the edtech platform to date up to $68.5 million.

The company said in a statement that the current round of funding will be used to enhance Brainly’s user experience and invest further in the quality of the help provided to students and parents across the globe. In addition, these funds will enable the company to further expand its user base in India, one of its key markets, which is witnessing continual growth with more than 15 million unique monthly users.

Brainly CEO and Co-Founder, Michał Borkowski said

“Our goal is to extend that access to academic help to every student in the world, including India, giving them the resources and the tools to succeed while inspiring collaborative learning. This funding allows us to do just that. We also plan to utilise these funds to expand our offerings for the Indian community of students, parents, and teachers, by providing a platform to discuss and study in other local languages like Marathi, Gujarati, Bengali, Telugu, and Punjabi, to name a few.”

Brainly CEO and Co-Founder Michał Borkowski with students

Founded in 2009 by Michal Borkowski, Lukasz Haluch, and Tomasz Kraus , Brainly last raised $38.5 million in Series B round from seven investors, including Naspers, which also funded India’s first edtech unicorn BYJU’s.

“We have been impressed by Brainly’s growth over the past 10 years, particularly in the US, and high-growth markets like India, Indonesia, Turkey, and Brazil,” said Larry Illg, CEO of Naspers Ventures.

“At Naspers, we extend our support to companies that can address grave societal needs like education, helping them fulfill their vision with the ultimate aim of bringing about a change at a global scale,” he said.

With more than 150 million monthly unique users, Brainly now reaches out to students, teachers, and parents across 35 countries in solving their academic problems and exchanging knowledge. In addition to India, the platform’s largest communities are in the US, Russia, Indonesia, India, Brazil, and Poland, among others. 

Middle and high-school students, as well as their parents across India, have been leveraging Brainly’s platform to strengthen their skills in core academic subjects such as Math, Science, local languages like Hindi, and Social Studies, the company added. 

In 2016 and 2017, Brainly closed $15 million Series B funding and $14 million Series B-1 funding, led by Naspers and Kulczyk Investments, respectively. The platform’s previous investors also include General Catalyst Partners, Point Nine Capital, Runa Capital, and Learn Capital. 

Brainly’s ‘crowdlearning’ model combines online education, social media, and machine learning, and is disrupting the $2.6 billion education market on a global level.

Source: https://yourstory.com/2019/07/edtech-platform-brainly-funding-naspers-runa-capital-manta-ray

How Edtech Solutions are Building a Productive Digital Space for Millennials

Beas Dev Ralhan Co-Founder & CEO – Next Education India Pvt. Ltd.

• Education technology has, therefore,  undoubtedly helped the millennials gain a productive, adaptable learning environment in the digital space that caters for multiple kinds of learners in multiple ways.
• Need for governmental policies to work towards the integration of such tools in an organised and all-encompassing manner so that such a space can become much more productive than it is today.

The 21st-century learners are characterised by their inherent thirst for knowledge that goes beyond the linear search of information, their preference of choice and individualism over one-size-fits-all trends, and their expertise in tech tools and social networking via various forms of digital media. On the other hand, the 21st-century teacher may be one who is concerned about quality but lacks the resources and skills necessary to ensure that the learners’ potential is not wasted. Edtech solutions are bridging the gaps in the teaching-learning ecosystem by transforming the essential elements of the education space. Let us see how.

Breaking the Traditional Frames of Learning

Traditional models of education dictate the frames of learning such as time and place; for instance, the majority of academic activities happen in the brick-and-mortar confines of a school within 8-10 hours of a day. E-learning has done away with such frames and given students the ability to learn anywhere, anytime. Similarly, while books were once the chief source of learning, aiding only the visual learners, the edtech sector has helped in bringing multimedia content, including immersive experiences such as augmented and virtual realities to cater for all kinds of learners.

Most of all, such tools challenge the passive one-way lecture-mode learning, helping learners be more active in their learning with hands-on learning, flipped learning and peer interaction. Now teachers are facilitators of their students’ learning, monitoring their individual performances and helping them with personalised feedback/recommendations.

Doing and Understanding: The Real-world Connection 

Edtech tools help students learn better by providing the platform to solve real-life problems with ease, which hones their understanding of the world around them and helps them develop skills necessary to navigate through their lives. For instance, robotics help youngsters develop their STEM skills, and in the process, aid their understanding of the existing problems in the world around them. Similarly, collaborative digital spaces are being utilised in a constructive manner to drive discussion and action with respect to real-world situations. Game-based learning also helps in a deeper understanding of situations in a simulated environment with the help of creative games such as Minecraft.

Innovative Methods of Assessments

For education to meet the requirements of the students, it is necessary for the instructor to know precisely where the individual learner stands at the beginning of the academic course and to measure the gaps through the course of learning. Assessment is the best method to carry this out. Unfortunately, traditional tests do not give an accurate picture of what the learners know or don’t know, and what kind of instructions the students need to learn new concepts. 

Artificial intelligence, one of technology’s greatest boons, has helped shape adaptive tests to quantify the proficiency or knowledge level of the examinee accurately. These tests adapt to the abilities of the learners and act as a morale booster, since the chances of discouragement or boredom are reduced.

Gamified assessments are also an innovative way to assessments, so that fear of tests are eliminated. Gamified assessments will capture learners’ attention, provide simulated situations to train them in handling real-life scenarios and help them retain information better. Questionnaires can be prepared in a Kaun Banega Crorepati (How To Be A Millionaire) style, or in crossword-puzzle mode, or based on motifs of common games, such as Tic-Tac-Toe, Hangman and Find-Your-Way so that students enjoy the process of assessments. 

Promoting Personalised and Self-learning Styles

The viewpoint of learning has changed from teacher-centred to learner-centred, and therefore ‘personalisation’ and ‘self help’ are the buzzwords in today’s education scenario. The factory method of learning does not help most students and hinders their potential by trying to fit all students in a single mould. Personalised learning is powered by adaptive learning technology, which helps the individual student understand his or her skill level, and suggests the most suitable course of study. A lot of self-learning solutions are also available which can help students and teachers upskill themselves as per individual requirement. This has bolstered distance learning through popular platforms.

Education technology has, therefore,  undoubtedly helped the millennials gain a productive, adaptable learning environment in the digital space that caters for multiple kinds of learners in multiple ways. We need governmental policies to work towards the integration of such tools in an organised and all-encompassing manner so that such a space can become much more productive than it is today.

Source: https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/337212

Ed-tech Startups: A Highway Towards Rich Quality Education For India

• As per the reports released by Google and KPMG in 2017, the online education market in India currently stands at USD 247 million and is estimated to rise to $1.96 billion by 2021
• At present, there are about 1.57 million users of online education. This user base is said to increase to 9.5 million by 2021.

By Aakanksha Ahire

Since ages, the Indian education system has been following rigid methods of educating the students. Right from the tender age of 5, children are made to fall into the vicious cycle of sitting for classes in school, surviving through the long hours at tuition classes, filling out hundreds of pages as homework, rote learning from textbooks, vomiting it out on the answer sheets during examinations and then anxiously waiting for the results, only to repeat the same cycle but at a higher level.

Its way past high time we change the ways we acquire education and make it more student-friendly to foster effective learning. This seems possible only if the education system holds the hands of technology and decides to move forward. The development of technology is boosting by leaps and bounds. In such a scenario, the education sector must make the most of it.  

Education Technology startups, more commonly called as ed-tech startups are a pragmatic solution to better the education system of India. Edtech startups is a platform that combines education and innovative technology and provides to students effective learning methods and solutions which are very different from the education imparted at the brick and mortar schools.

Image Credits: Inside Higher Ed

As per the reports released by Google and KPMG in 2017, the online education market in India currently stands at USD 247 million and is estimated to rise to $1.96 billion by 2021. At present, there are about 1.57 million users of online education. This user base is said to increase to 9.5 million by 2021.

These figures clearly indicate that the students have started demanding for quality options in the field of education. They have started looking out for gaining a deep understanding of the concept at lower costs. To cater to this demand for education by the students, the ed-tech startups have dived into the education sector.

The ed-tech startups are undoubtedly going to be a harbinger of change in the education system of our nation. They have already brought in AR(Augmented Reality), VR(Virtual Reality), MR(Mixed Reality) in order to present effective education solutions. These provide students with practical and experiential learning through AR and fosters interactions via VR. Some of the best examples of edtech startups which are into AR and VR would be NewGenApps, Smartivity, and Veative. These startups are not just providing top class and effective educational experience but are also cost-efficient since the hardware and software used in making these technologies available too are cheaper.

With the advent of ed-tech startups:

• Websites and apps are being developed by the ed tech startups that provide on-the-go study material and content which makes it easily accessible on laptops and mobile phones. The app and website are also updated from time to time with new concepts and topics.
• Since every student signs up individually, the website has each student’s individual profile which enables the website to track the student’s progress, analyse the weakness and accordingly provide study material and tests for further improvement.
• Schools too have welcomed the efforts made by the edtech startups by developing STEM and Innovation labs to teach subjects like Mathematics, Science, Technology, and Engineering, etc. in a practical way.
• Further, the use of AI (Artificial Technology) has enabled the tracking of a student’s progress and helps in customising the learning approach based on the performance. Schools, colleges and other educational institutions fail to realise that every student learns at his/her own pace. By providing personalised education, edtech startups like Byju and Vedantu who are equipped with customised learning algorithm help each student to grasp subjects at his/her own pace. 
• Edtech startups bridge the knowledge gap that exists between the urban and rural education by providing the same education to all which doesn’t happen in traditional education as the skills and knowledge of teachers teaching in urban India and rural India differ vastly. 
• Moreover, in a highly competitive world where a zillion of careers has been created, an intense need is felt, for education that trains the pupils for such careers. Ed tech startups like upGrad are the perfect platforms that provide innumerable courses which range from Blogging to Data Science and Blockchain.
• As edtech startups are the birth children of technology and are accessible on digital mediums, the content put up is highly visually appealing, even the most complicated concepts are made easy to understand for the students thus strengthening the students’ knowledge.  

In India, there are many small as well as big edtech startups that performing greatly in the market. Some of the small edtech startups include Open Door, ClassPlus, NeoStencil, etc. Big startups that have risen to massive success over the past few years include Byju, the largest funded edtech startup in the country founded by Byju Raveendran, upGrad, a higher education platform co-founded by Ronnie Screvala, Embibe, the largest Artificial Intelligence platform for education in India, and Unacademy, which provides around 50,000 courses.

At present, India is home to over 3,500 ed-tech startups. The loopholes present in the Indian education system is such that they cannot be filled overnight. If we all join hands and together and shift our likes from the traditional methods of schooling to online education, and for a change instead of participating in the mad race of scoring more marks, focus on deeply understand concepts, the country will blossom producing not just highly qualified individuals but also intellectual and experienced professionals. 

Source: https://youthincmag.com/ed-tech-startups-a-highway-towards-rich-quality-education-for-india

Budget 2019: The high point of higher education in India

Budget 2019-20: The NEP will help India increase its global presence by stressing on areas like research and innovation, as also setting up world-class institutions.

• Sentiments across the education sector have been primarily positive post Budget announcements.
• Increased fund allocation to schools (12.8%) and higher education (14.3%) is commendable.
• In fact, at Rs 400 crore, the allocation is over three times revised estimates for last year.

Anil Nagar

Budget 2019 India: Sentiments across the education sector have been primarily positive post Budget announcements. Increased fund allocation to schools (12.8%) and higher education (14.3%) is commendable. In fact, at Rs 400 crore, the allocation is over three times revised estimates for last year.

As the finance minister noted, five years ago, India was nowhere in the top-200 world university rankings. However, thanks to initiatives like GYAN, three of its institutions, including two IITs and IISc Bangalore, have made it to the list.

Focus on research: The NEP will help India increase its global presence by stressing on areas like research and innovation, as also setting up world-class institutions. This will supplement its plans to promote ‘Study in India’ programme and attract foreign students. The government plans to present a draft legislation for setting up the Higher Education Commission of India. Then there is the proposal to establish the National Research Foundation.

Skill development: Considering the evolution of technology and the nature of jobs, demographic trends point towards skill shortages in the future. The government will focus on imparting practical working knowledge to professionals in innovative technologies such as AI, big data, 3D printing, robotics, etc.

Edtech industry: As more and more start-ups are entering edtech space, there is a proposal of a new channel under the Doordarshan bouquet to provide a platform to them to disseminate information.

But the government has overlooked a few issues that have been restricting educators and students from realising their full potential. Edtech industry expected the government to scrap GST on online video tutorials (18%) and on e-books (5%). However, the Budget did not mention any change in this area. A revision in rates coupled with measures to empower the edtech industry will provide a fillip to the economy. It remains to be seen when will the government take these steps.

The author is founder & CEO, Adda247, a preparation platform for government exams

For latest coverage on Budget 2019-20 log on to financialexpress.com. We bring you full coverage of Union Budget 2019 Live. Stay Connected.

Source: https://www.financialexpress.com/budget/budget-2019-the-high-point-of-higher-education/1644014/

Edtech: Investing in education technology

• The promise of edtech has been there for a long time.
• Last two years, the sector has been getting attention and it is turning into real opportunities,” says GV Ravishankar, managing director of Sequoia Capital in India, who has several investments in edtech firms in Asia.

Tan Zhai Yun    

Technology has changed the way people learn. From massive open online courses (MOOCs) to virtual classrooms such as Blackboard and on-demand video tutors, education technology (edtech) has emerged as a rapidly growing sector, especially in Asia. It has also attracted a lot of investor interest.

“The promise of edtech has been there for a long time. But I think in the last two years, the sector has been getting attention and it is turning into real opportunities,” says GV Ravishankar, managing director of Sequoia Capital in India, who has several investments in edtech firms in Asia.

Edtech refers to technology that is used to develop tools for the education sector. For example, it could be in the form of classroom management software that enables virtual classrooms, interactive apps that educate users on various topics or platforms that connect tutors and students virtually.

The recent boom in Asia is driven by factors such as the growing mobile penetration rate, affordable internet access, willingness by parents to pay for education and a strong demand for supplementary education materials.

One of Sequoia’s investee companies is BYJU’S, an Indian edtech that is attempting to fill the gap left by a lack of good teachers. It offers students a personalised learning journey into subjects such as maths and science via online videos, animations and illustrations in a mobile app.

Sequoia also has an investment in Edusys, which provides professional certification and test preparation courses in online, classroom and hybrid formats. “We are quite bullish on the trend because we are seeing consumers adapt to online learning models quickly. The younger generation is very comfortable learning online. So, from our perspective, we think the market is ripe [for investments],” says Ravishankar.

Jeffrey Paine, managing partner of Golden Gate Ventures (GGV), sees the edtech sector as a relatively new segment. Investors must choose carefully, depending on the country and target market, whose needs may differ widely. GGV is invested in KooBits, a Singapore-based edtech firm that teaches math online.

“China is leading the way with edtech. The US tends to have alternative high schools or universities, whereas India tends to have a bit more video-based learning and a lot of focus on K-12 [kindergarten to 12th grade] maths and science,” says Paine.

“In Southeast Asia, Vietnam is growing fast, from K-12 content and corporate training on how to use Microsoft Excel to online video-based English tutoring. In Malaysia, one example is a company called EduAdvisor, which helps inform people who are going overseas to apply for schools.”

EduAdvisor has received venture capital funding from 500 Startups and the KK Fund, according to Pitchbook, a US-based data provider in the areas of venture capital, private equity and mergers and acquisitions.

According to a 2016 report by UK-based consultancy IBIS Capital, the edtech market is projected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 17% to US$252 billion in 2020 globally. While the US previously led the pack, Asia is currently experiencing the fastest growth in investments in the sector, going from 46% of the global market to 54%.

This is particularly true for China. According to a 2017 report by Pitchbook, the biggest edtech venture capital deals had been found in Greater China in the past five years. Three of the top five edtech investments since 2012 have also been in the country.

This has led to the birth of several edtech unicorns, including VIPKid and Yuanfudao. The former is an online English learning platform while the latter is a homework assistance app. Users can take a picture of their arithmetic homework, for instance, and the app will use artificial intelligence to check the answers.

India has an edtech unicorn in BYJU’S, which received Chan Zuckerberg Initiative’s first investment outside of the US. Some of the big players in Indonesia and Vietnam are Ruangguru, a marketplace for private tutoring, and Topica Edtech Group, whose offerings include live English tutoring and bachelor’s degree programmes online.

Ravishankar believes that the edtech trend is being driven by the prevalence of computing and smartphones in the hands of end-consumers. “For example, a huge population in India began to have access to really affordable broadband in recent years and this is the first time they are experiencing the internet. That has allowed many companies to reach out to hundreds of millions of people and it enables consumers to experience the power of education through technology,” he says.

The other major factor driving edtech investments in Asia is the high value that parents attach to education. This results in a greater willingness to pay for education in markets such as China, India and Southeast Asia.

“Perhaps this goes back to the market structure some of these countries have. In the US, most people go to public schools, which have delivered reasonably good quality education. That is why people there are not as used to paying for education. But in China and India, people are willing to pay so their children can find jobs. In India, education is seen as a way of getting out of poverty and getting a well-paying job,” says Ravishankar.

This means the kinds of edtech companies serving Asian and Western countries are different. In the US, many edtech firms focus on selling to school districts whereas in Asia, they may target parents.

“We have seen an example in China in the form of VIPKid. It has a very interesting model of teaching English to Chinese students through teachers who are in the US. It leverages the language advantage that English-speaking countries have to teach students in China, where there is a huge demand to learn English. That is possible because high-quality internet access is widely available,” says Ravishankar.

Opportunities in edtech

Edtech companies with the most potential for growth tend to be those that serve consumers directly or provide content that supplements the school curriculum. “That is because there are so many students in that age group and younger people are more comfortable with technology,” says Ravishankar.

This is especially true for subjects such as English and maths, the mastery of which can boost the chances of a child getting a good job in the future. There are many popular edtech companies in the region targeting those who want to learn English such as the Topica Edtech Group in Vietnam and Globish Academia in Thailand.

“In Singapore and Malaysia, students learn from courses provided by edtech companies just like they would by going for offline tuition classes. You have to take your SPM, so you need to go for tuition classes where they teach you how to pass your exam,” says Paine.

“The services provided by these companies may be homework-driven. It could be that I am stuck doing my homework and I need a social network to teach me how to solve problems. It could be a live video tutoring session or online curriculum.”

GGV invested in KooBits because of its track record over the years. The latter is now used by students in countries such as the Philippines and Indonesia. The reputation of the Singaporean maths curriculum — which has been ranked the best in the world by some international agencies — has increased the attractiveness of the company in the eyes of its potential customers.

There are also opportunities in the working adults segment, a group that could comprise more serious learners with a greater willingness to pay for these services. Sequoia invested in India-based Eruditus, which partners Ivy League Schools in the US and top universities in the UK to offer online courses for professionals.

“It [Eruditus] puts some of its undergraduate education programmes online. This is for professionals who want to learn things such as data science or the new generation of technology tools that are impacting management today,” says Ravishankar.

While this idea is not new — it was popularised through MOOCs run by those like Coursera and Khan Academy — a new set of players, such as Eruditus, have changed the game for this sub-segment of providers, says Ravishankar. Users learn online together in a virtual class, listening to the same teacher in the same time period. They have projects, group work and online discussion sessions.

“It is an online application of the offline student environment. I think they have created models that allow for substantially higher completion rates compared with MOOCs because this creates familiarity among the cohort. These companies came up in the last few years and we are pretty optimistic about what that means for edtech and higher education,” says Ravishankar.

Edtech companies in Asia face a few common challenges. One of them is gaining the trust of users. Second, the cost of acquiring customers can be quite high because of the online competition for users.

The business-to-consumer market is where the future of edtech is, in Ravishankar’s view. That is because business-to-business edtech companies face challenges in selling their solutions. “That model has been traditionally hard to scale because you have school networks that are highly disorganised. Selling to them and collecting money from them have been tough,” he says.

Source: https://www.theedgemarkets.com/article/edtech-investing-education-technology