Edu-leaders

When we talk of education and technology in the same breath, we cannot just refer to emails and whiteboards. As educators it’s important for us to understand that we need to look at the larger picture: how technology helps in the larger effort to constantly examine the improvement in teaching pedagogy.

Technology’s biggest boon is that it can bring educators and students from all over the world on a single platform to promote a direct and demonstrable interaction. At OP Jindal Global University we use technical tools to facilitate learning every day in classrooms — the campus is WiFi and multimedia enabled which allows us to engage with practically anybody across the world.

So, we have used this tool to conduct classes between us and all those universities that we collaborate with. Take University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, for instance. With the help of technology we have conducted classes with both Indian and Ann Arbor professors. We are not talking of stand alone, sporadic seminars. We have completed a full semester, 15-week course with Ann Arbor and Jindal professors teaching both our students and theirs. These classes involve 25 Indian and 25 US students and begin from 6.30 am (Indian time). Our teachers regularly engage with Ann Arbor professors to collectively plan out schedules and curriculum. Technology has also helped us to conduct common examinations at the end of the course. The examiner may be in the US. Or here.

From January, we plan to expand further and conduct similar classes with Cornell University. Previously, we collaborated on a much smaller scale with several other universities taking the help of the multimedia enabling technology.

We intend to significantly expand the use of technology as a tool for education. At the university we do concentrate on ‘live interaction’. Otherwise there would be no difference between distance learning and real-time classes.

Technology makes it possible for students and faculty to work across research projects, together, using technical settings. It’s becoming an increasingly common platform for researchers across countries to collaborate.

There are other concerns which make me resort to technology and security is one of those issues. We have installed security cameras and swipe cards on campus. In this case, technological tools should be balanced with physical security.

But more than that, what technology has helped us as a university to do, is to keep a check on ‘identity theft’. In an increasingly cloud-driven world, where most research is on the virtual world making sure that you keep your research safe, is cardinal. A space where we use a lot of technology is at the library. Some of the technologies that we use are Atlas, Stella Systems, SAS Educational Analytical Suite Package, IBM SPSS Statistics Base and Turnitin. The last one prevents instances of plagiarism and engages students through originality check, grade marks. So, when a student swipes his or her security card we not only log his or her demand for a book, but we also log in the books they are referring to.

As far as promotion of the institution and strategising is concerned we do have a clear website and accept online forms. However, we wouldn’t say that we are doing anything different from other universities here. Where we are consciously trying to put systems in place is how we will eventually manage alumni. For now, each university graduate is being given an online ID which will be with them for ever. We also have domain addresses for every school. This way we hope that as Jindal grows, we will be able to keep track of our students and stay in touch with them–and help them grow with us.

The unfortunate part of technology is that it can be used as a tool for exclusion. High-end educational institutions such as Indian School of Business and OP Jindal Global University are some of the names that are increasingly using technology in their classrooms. The institutions on the other side of the spectrum cannot resort to tech tools that often due to resource crunch. But we can relate the same lectures across the country’s classrooms, across universities, schools and campuses, so that they also have an opportunity to participate. If used wisely technology can be used as a tool for the democratisation of knowledge. Unless and until we use technology to engage with the other side of the spectrum I would believe that we are not using it to its fullest capability.