Role of ICT in Rural Education

By Submitted to Prof. Madhumita Majumdar Group 20 B. Tech 2010

Group Members

Name Vaishali Behl Dhishna Chandnani Milan Parghi Akash Desai Shubhendu Saurabh Parth Shah Sahil Sikka Zeel Shah Ayush Kulshreshtha Vishv Brahmbhatt Krish Mahajan

ID 201001223 201001133 201001146 201001188 201001198 201001200 201001213 201001215 201001219 201001237 201001238

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Acknowledgement
We would like to thank Professor Madhumita Majumdar for assigning and supervising this project and providing us with an opportunity to witness the execution of educational schemes at the grassroots level. We sincerely thank Mr. Madhubhai Narjibhai Desai and Mrs. Narmadaben Desai for providing invaluable guidance and hospitality to us in Bhadresar. This project has been greatly enriched because of Mr. Hasmukh Joshis (Principal of Seth J.J Desai High School, Bhadresar) willingness to grant us his precious time for interviews with him, his faculty and students. Most importantly, we are indebted to all those patient students, parents and teachers who served as excellent interviewees and are the sole reason for the synthesis of this project.

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Index 1. Abstract.................................................................................. .6 2. Introduction.............................................................................7 2.1 General Goals..............................................................7 2.2 Project Coverage......................................................... 8 3. Method...................................................................................10 3.1 Project Design...............................................................10 3.2 Subject..........................................................................12 3.3 Material........................................................................14 3.4 Procedure..................................................................... 16 4. Result......................................................................................18 5. Problems Encountered in uplifting Rural Education.................29 5.1 Basic Drawbacks...........................................................29
5.2 Lack of school buildings and stationery...........................29 5.3 Lack of experienced and skilled teachers.........................29 5.4 Communication Drawbacks................................................29 5.5 English language seen as a barrier to familiarize with ICT ...........................30 5.6 Lack of computer hardware and software........................30 5.7 Lack of technical training...................................................30

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5.8 Other Drawbacks.................................................................30 5.9 Lack of library facilities........................................................30 5.10 Lack of transport facilities.................................................30 5.11 Large student to teacher ratio..........................................31 6. CONCLUSIONS AND SOLUTIONS...............................................32 6.1 LESSONS AT SCHOOL LEVEL............................................32 6.2 EDUCATION FOR ELDERLY UNEDUCATED PEOPLE....34 7. Bibliography...................................................................................35

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1. ABSTRACT
We being the students of ICT have witnessed and experienced its mammoth potentials in providing educational resources that provide various advantages over the other methods being placed in use. The interactive learning soft wares, video lecture series, educational websites are some examples of the most popular and effective ICT aides. As India faces a big shortage of teachers and also as the teaching quality seems to be going down with time due to various reasons. Also the screening of Bharat ki Chaap had proved to us that audio-visual tools can even make dull and boring facts lively. These factors motivated us to find out the ground realities that persist in the rural realm. The objective of our project has been to critically examine how effectively the Gujarat govt. has implemented its schemes aimed at beneficing education in villages. We focussed on trying to conclude the aptitude of rural students towards these technological aides. Also after organizing field trips and conducting actual ground work, we as a group tried to find out the solutions that could eradicate the presently persisting challenges that are hampering the process of ideal delivery and utilization of educational resources. We centred on technological solutions as proposed. Our work included focussed group discussions amongst our group, with students in six of the cited villages, interviews of teachers, principals, teachers and sarpanch. Surveys were conducted to analyse students attitude towards technological aides and to scrutinize problems being faced by them. The results unpredictably were quite positive and encouraging. Four out of the six villages had proper facilities in place except lack of technical expertise and also the problem redress-system was found out not to be up to the mark. But the objectives of the schemes were found out to be falling quite short of what they aimed at. Students had a very superficial knowledge of these ICT aides. Also they showed keen interest in video tutorials. The teachers were however not technically sound enough so as to use these resources effectively.

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2.INTRODUCTION
India, over the past decade, has become a test bed for innovations in information and communication technologies (ICT) serving the rural user. The most obvious may be that rural India has remained poor while the rest of the country has moved ahead.Around Ten years ago,none of the rural schools of Gujarat had access to information and communication technology(ICT).The few Schools that had computers did not have educational softwares,had no internet for most of the time,computers were kept turned off and out of hands of school children as a measure of damage prevention.Teachers were also untrained.Hardly there was any emphasis in ICT in education. But now,The Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) are being increasingly used by the Government of Gujarat to deliver its services to the rural population at their door steps. The Government of Gujarat has taken up major initiatives in the field of education which utilise ICT technologies in their implementation. One of the major objectives of the study is to show the relationship between technology use and changes in teaching and learning process, as well as educational curricular improvements. Modern information and communication technologies (ICTs) are found to have great potential to contribute in this respect. The dialogues concluded that ICTs would have a major role to play in promoting rural education and thus, rural development in the developing world. 2.1 General goals: The overall goal of the project was to improve learning process in rural areas of Gujarat through the use of ICT. Specific objectives: 1) To scrutinize the level of implementation of educational Government schemes in the state of Gujarat. 2) To facilitate the access to ICT for rural teachers and children. 3) To develop the skills among teachers and students in the use of ICT. 4) To promote the use of internet for information searching, communication with others, keeping the rural community informed(crop plantation, input price, international prices ,technical information and general news). 5) Local non-formal education for elderly non educated people. Despite large-scale political and bureaucratic attention and the more focused, small-scale efforts of thousands of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs)
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and other civil society entities, a replicable, catalytic approach to rural development remains to be found. The hope that ICT can surmount at least some of the educational challenges and become a viable technology for the provision of education, and other social services is thus ICTs strongest calling card. Government schemes: Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan Mission (SSAM), Education of Girls at Elementary Level (NPEGEL) Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidyalaya (KGBV)KGBV The Computer Aided Learning Program (CALP) Primary Education Computer Training at the Primary Educational level Secondary and Higher Secondary Department Diploma for the teachers to improve their teaching skills ( Teachers Training Program ) Teleconference for the students of Std. 10th and 12th. Technical Education Self employment programs for the women 2.2 Project coverage 6 schools from 5 villages directly over 10 teachers indirectly over 200 students Gram Panchayat and village State ministry of education Over one months, our team visited six villages and met their stakeholders. These ranged from the sarpanchs, principals, teachers, students and parents, farmers and state-level officials who want to use ICT as a tool for rural education, social services, telecommunications services, village residents who are consumers, intermediaries, and producers of ICT services.
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Major ICT initiatives implemented and their respective states of location are as follows: 1. Bellandur Gram Panchayat, Karnataka 2. Boodikote Jagruthi Resource Center, Karnataka 3. eSeva APOnline Centers, Andhra Pradesh 4. Gyandoot Government-to-Citizen Network, Madhya Pradesh 5. HP iCommunity in Kuppam, Andhra Pradesh 6. ITC eChoupals, Madhya Pradesh 7. M.S. Swaminathan Research Foundation InfoVillage Knowledge Centers, Pondicherry 8. n-Logue Chiraag Kiosks, Tamil Nadu 9. Warana Wired Village Project, Maharastra We describe the lessons learned below but as a generalization, we have concluded that all the projects are still experimenting with best ways to serve rural users through ICT applications.

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3.METHOD
3.1 Project Design:
As stated in motivation we know how much ICT can help in our education. So we want to provide these facilities to the students of rural areas. For that we have to know what are the schemes implemented by the government and what is response from rural public. So, First of all field visit is necessary. In field visit we planned to visit following villages. 1) Bhadresar, Dist. Sabarkantha We chose this village because government has implemented many schemes in this village. So we wanted to find the result of these implementations. And if we can suggest some improvement. 2) Odha, Dist. Banaskantha Reason behind choosing this village is, in Banaskantha is a remote district of Gujarat. It is in common knowledge that the government schemes are not implemented well in Banaskantha. So this village can be the best place to learn the problems of rural population. And we can also make more suggestions. This was the major reason for choosing this village. 3) Randesan, Dist. Gandhinagar This village is near the capital of Gujarat. So it is believed that when there is something new happening for rural population it starts from the capital. So, this village was our next choice. 4) Raysan and Bhajipura, Dist. Gandhinagar Both of these villages are in the capital of the states. Distance between both villages is 3.6kms. Still there are many differences between both villages. So these villages can give us information about differences of rural populations. First of all we have to make our objectives clear for field visits.
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1. We wanted the data from areas of rural students. Question is HOW? a. We designed a questionnaire for the students of primary schools. Which has most of the question related to their studies and about the technology schools are using for their development. b. We also planned to have a group discussion of students. So we can get ideas from students as a community. And we can know what kind of help they want. c. We also planned to have discussion with parents about their expectations from government. d. We also thought about discussion in detail with teachers and principal so we can have clear about what is happening. e. Education is not only about students, so we took interviews of farmers to know their knowledge about recent farming techniques. 2. Data collection is one thing, but when we are dealing with rural population we have to take care of their culture and their mentality towards technology. This is a tough task. a. For this we planned talk with students in absence of teachers. b. We also meet the Sarpanch of village to get their views for development in education. After collecting data and meeting people of different villages we planned to have group discussion among group members. Because usual that there are going to be differences in ideology of our group members. After discussion among group members we found several problems with education in rural areas. Some problems we encountered are due to negligence from government. Some problems are due to lack of information. After deciding central point of problems we have got some solutions for these

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3.2 SUBJECTS

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For our field survey we used a random sample of students, teachers and other villagers .For this randomly six different villages were selected form the areas within 200km of Gandhinagar. Upon the decision of the group following locations were selected:Bhadresar, Randesan ,Raisan, Bhajipura, and Odha. These villages were selected due to various factors such as proximity, strong influence, various developmental statuses of the villages. At these villages students of strong as well as weak economic backgrounds and different classes were interviewed so as to maintain randomness of the sample and to observe the impact of ones social status the education of a person. Apart from students many parents, teachers, principal s were also interviewed so as to get a broader insight into the matter. Farmers were interviewed as a part of our goal to examine the reach of education beyond the four walls of the classroom Further to guarantee the authenticity of the sample we ensured that the students were not impaired by any means (visual, hearing or any other to make sure that they are able to get full use of the services being provided to them)

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3.3 Materials
We made questionnaire. In that questionnaire we asked relevant questions asking information about his school, no of students in class and what was condition of computers in their school. We recorded all the interview-conversations that we did with them. We also took photocopy of that questionnaire and filled it from their response. Questions that we asked in the form and given response are given below with charts: Question 1): How many students are there in your class? Question 2): How many teachers taught you? Question 3): Do you know what the computer is? Question 4): What are the benefits of the Computer? Question 5): How many computers are there in your lab? Question 6): How many of them were working? Question 7): In what duration the faulty computers are repaired? Question 8): How many teachers are there for computer subject? Question 9): What is the Internet? Question 10): What are the benefits of Internet? Question 11): Have you ever studied by Video lectures? Question 12): Were Video lectures beneficial to you or not? Question 13):Graphical analysis Question 14) Do you use computer outside school? Question 15) How many hours per week is internet of your school accessible to you?
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Question 16) How often do you use internet in the school?

For Teachers: Question 1) How do you use internet in your profession? Question 2) Do you have an email address? Question 3) Did you receive any training in ICT before you join teaching profession? Question 4) Do you receive any training after you join profession? We showed a video lecture in Guajarati for standard 10 about polynomial in mathematics for student reviews. We checked all the systems in their lab and saw how effectively teachers taught them.

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3.4 PROCEDURE
Our work started off with background research about the various education related schemes implemented by govt. of Gujarat focusing on the rural areas. Group discussions were held and the following schemes1 were taken up as to focus upon: 1. Computer Aided Learning Program: The main objective of the CAL programme is to attract the children, and to improve the quality of the education through animated multimedia based educational content. 2. Teachers Training Program: Diploma for the teachers to improve their teaching skills. 3. Teleconference for the students of Std. 10th and 12th It was followed by chalking out the on-field work. Questionnaires were prepared for students. Principals, teachers, parents, and sarpanch were also interviewed. The aforesaid tried to scrutinize the following: 1. 2. 3. 4. Level of implementation of govt. schemes. Reasons behind non-implementation/non-functioning of various factors . Attitude of rural folks towards technology usage. Problems being faced by the rural students in optimally utilizing these facilities.

To check on the ground realities the field trips were organized over a span of 2 weeks to five villages of three different districts in different settings. The villages where the field studies were conducted are: 1.Bhadresar (Sabarkantha):- dated 15th Oct,2011 2.Odha(Banaskantha):- dated 26th Oct,2011 3.Randesan(Gandhinagar):-dated 19th Oct,2011 4.Raysan(Gandhinagar):-dated 19th Oct,2011
1

http://www.gujaratindia.com/initiatives/initiatives.htm?enc=TEnmkal8rLd9cWRBUEX85lswwfZZ+o8b+w+YfQPy7d U93tk/rntr0H+OnwOK0bubGxn8CTo/zrWp+HvkkBe+9jlVHX/lscs26LErVpv8pL9RZUhsIylDLEz1HE7iVyLfPbyl5bDZyad /OcTg9wXi7g==

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5.Bhajipura(Gandhinagar):-dated 19th Oct,2011 Students of class V, VIII and X were asked to fill the questionnaire and focussed group discussions were held and their views and problems were also discussed. Also personal interviews of few students, teachers, principals, parents and sarpanch were taken. The questionnaire consisted of questions that tried to scrutinize students aptitude towards technology and to find out the level of implementation of the govt. schemes and also to check how effectively these technological aides are meeting their objectives. Also we tried to check the level of technical know how of the rural students. The Sarpanch were questioned upon govts role , peoples view and their expectations from govt. The principals were in details questioned about the existing schemes implementing stages and effectiveness. Also their views were sought for in their interviews. The teachers were questioned upon their technical knowledge so as to find out if they are optimally using their acquired skills to impart the knowledge and also to analyse students aptitude towards technology. The parents were questioned upon their expectations and the changes they think these ICT aides have brought in their childs progress. The focussed GDs consisted of students and were held separately that consisted of 10-15 students at different locations.The questionnaires were given to the students and they were asked to Answer.. In the GDs the students were asked about their views on ICT aides. The students problems and expectations were discussed. Video lectures from You-Tube were screened on the projectors to instigate their views and students immediate responses were taken. After the data collection , discussions were held among group members to analyse the results and extract conclusions. The data from different places were compared and relative pie charts and graphs were made. A list of problems realted to implementation of technology, its delivery of foresighted objectives and students problem was made. Possible solutions were discussed upon. Specially technical solutions were discussed and debated upon. The possible solutions were discussed up with some of the in-contact Principals and teachers and the best ones were filtered off to be included in the report.
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4. RESULTS
Questions that we asked in the form and given responses are depicted below pictorially by the use of pie-charts and graphs: Question 1): How many students are there in your class? Answer:30-40(average)

Question 2): How many teachers taught you? Answer :

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Question 3): Do you know what the computer is? Answer :

Question 4): What are the benefits of the Computer? Answer : The general idea is as follow: 1)To watch Movie. 2)To make presentation 3)To explore in the file/folders. Question 5): How many computers are there in your lab?

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Answer:

Question 6): How many of them were working? Answer: The general response was that 82% were in working state. Question 7): In what duration the faulty computers are repaired? Answer: The general response was that 2-5 computers are not working correctly and they are repaired in two days after the issue is reported to the technician. Question 8): How many teachers are there for computer subject? Answer: There were 1-2 teachers for teaching computer subject. Question 9): What is the Internet?

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Answer:

Question 10): What are the benefits of Internet? Answer:-The general response was to search queries. Question 11): Have you ever studied by Video lectures? Answer: Students who had little idea about video lectures were not shown video lectures frequently and others had no idea about it. Question 12): Were Video lectures beneficial to you or not? Answer: Yes. Question 13): SIMPLE USE OF APPLICATIONS FOR PURPOSES OTHER THAN CLASSROOM LEARNING Word processing prepare papers Spreadsheets
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Fair

Good

Very good

55 65

30 25

10 5

5 5
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Basic Internet browsing 60 30 Use of Internet resources to 80 19 prepare homework, research, lessons, or for collaborative school projects Question 14) Do you use computer outside school? Answer:

9 1

1 0

Question 15) How often do you use internet in the school? ANSWER: During the Computer period. For Teachers: Question 1) How do you use internet in your profession? Answer:

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Question 2) Do you have an email address? Answer:

Question 3)

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Did you receive any training in ICT before you join teaching profession? Answer:

Question 4) Do you receive any training after you join profession? Answer:

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We showed a video lecture in Gujarati for standard 10 about polynomial in mathematics for student reviews. We checked all the systems in their lab and saw how effectively teachers taught them.

A survey of three government schemes in three villages where we have done field trip: Number of people who knows various schemes :2

X-axis denote village and Y-axis is no of people who knew about the schemes. We have gathered information on three different schemes: 1) COMPUTER AIDED LEARNING PROGRAM 2) TEACHER TRAINING PROGRAMME:

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3) VIDEO CONFERENCING FOR 10TH AND 12TH Observation from first field study: Shri J. J. Desai High School: The school was well developed and had sufficient amount of teachers. During our discussion with the Principal of the school, Mr. Hasmukh G. Joshi, we got to know that the school had been provided with all necessary infrastructures that would facilitate computer education for students, under the Computer Aided Learning Program. The school had been provided with 11 computers, 1 printer, 1 Scanner, regular internet connection & the SATCOM facilities. However, students were not benefitted by the SATCOM facilities as the dish was damaged. The students of 10th were shown a video lecture once, before the dish was damaged. But the dish had not been repaired despite repeated complaints by the school to the government. Also, the students were allowed to use the computers only once in a week, during the half hour allotted period, in which they were taught the basics of MS Office. They were not allowed to use the computers for their personal interests, the reason behind this also being the lack of awareness among them about the advantages of internet. They had not been acquainted even to the basic uses of internet, i. e. the Google Search, Yahoo Mail, YouTube etc. The students of 10th had not even heard of C programming, which is a part of 10th class syllabus and werent provided textbooks also for the same. The teachers of the school had taken the basic CCC+ training provided by the govt. but even then, they were not familiar with the general usage of internet in education and were not efficient with the syllabus supposed to be taught to the students. Because of these reasons, the students who opted for Computer in the Board exams were forced by the school to take P. E. for their exams despite their interest in computers. We showed a video lecture to the students of 10th, to see their response to it & their interests in e-learning. We registered a spark of enthusiasm among the students to this mode of learning, and succeeded in arousing curiosity among them about the various sides of e-learning.

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 Also, during our group discussion with the students, it was apparent that they did not receive any theoretical knowledge about computers. That is, every week, they were taken to the lab once and use the computer turn wise for 15-20 minutes, this obviously not being sufficient enough for them to acquire knowledge about even the basics of computers. Even those who were interested in computers could not pursue as they had no opportunity due to the lack of resources, i. e. trained faculty, in this case. Lastly, the discussion with the principal also put forward another perspective. The school had started open school in the evening for the illiterate. Many people initially registered for the school but dropped out later due to lack of interest in education. (One such another school in Idar also holds such evening sessions.)

Randesan Field Study: There was no high school in the village; students went to nearby village Koba, or district Gandhinagar for higher education. The level of education in the primary school was also not satisfactory. Two computers had been provided by the govt. but both were in damaged conditions. The students have not used computer even once in school labs. (As per govt. syllabus, students of 5th to 7th must also be taught computer)

Odha field study: We went to Odha in Diwali break. So we were not able to meet students in school. But we met some of them in their home. We met principal at his home. Odha is basically a typical underdeveloped village of Banaskantha district. There is only primary school in Odha. Due to Diwali break we were not able to meet students in school. So we met principal at his home.

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 We had a deep discussion about educational facilities at Odha Primary School. We found that there is no development made in odha for education, there is one computer allotted to school by the government. But there is no teacher for computer in school. So we can see that this school can be developed by the help of ICT. Then we met some students, but no one in this village- really wants to study. Because they were unaware of the importance of education. Raisan& Bhajipura field study: Here we focused more on elderly education, especially farmers, who wanted to learn ICT for farming but had no access to it, sadly they were not aware of existing Government schemes beneficial to them. We found a teacher, who held special night classes for elderly people but he charges tuition fee for this effort. Govt. provide loan to Farmers at 0% interest but they had no idea about it. Almost all farmers we met had no knowledge about internet at all & elderly uneducated people had no anxiety to learn about ICT tools for their works. In the village of Raisan, A secondary school (Sarvodaya Vidhyalaya) with all the basic facilities such as computers with internet were present, with good no. of educated people. on the contrary a nearby village of Raisan(Bhajipura) had only primary school up to 5th standard with trivial facility.(we found only one computer with no internet access) Thus, the students of Bhajipura were forced to study in the village of Raisan, and had to travel whole distance by themselves with no means of transport available.

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5. Problems Encountered in Uplifting Rural Education

There are three types of drawbacks facing rural schools - basic, communication and other drawbacks. 5.1 Basic Drawbacks These are problems that urban schools consider basic, while their rural counterparts consider them insurmountable hurdles. These are issues that rural schools need to overcome before any communication facilities and resources can be put in place to improve their access to quality education. 5.2 Lack of school buildings and stationery This is the most basic need when it comes to schooling, because without proper school buildings and stationery it becomes virtually impossible for learners to receive adequate teaching. There are many rural schools that do not have adequate school buildings and stationery for learners to use, because of the partial subsidy the state provides for building costs. The rest of the costs must be borne by the community.Most rural schools reside in areas with extreme poverty and therefore there is unlikely to be extra funds for buildings and resources 5.3 Lack of experienced and skilled teachers It is no surprise to find that the most experienced and skilled teachers reside in the urban areas. This is largely due to the availability and accessibility of relevant resources and facilities. The result is that the majority of scholars are receiving education of inferior quality by teachers without the appropriate facilities and resources needed to sufficiently teach 5.4 Communication Drawbacks These are problems that rural schools need to overcome if they want to compete both locally and globally. Schools that do not have communication facilities face being left behind in the dark ages (pre-computers). If rural schools want to make use of the Internet, chat rooms, bulletin boards and academic web sites then they have no option but to improve their communication facilities to be able to log on to the Internet.

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5.5 English language seen as a barrier to familiarize with ICT The rural population will be more willing to learn the usage of new technology(which is largely based in English)if they were more familiar with the English language.

5.6 Lack of computer hardware and software Computers and computer resources are indispensable in the educational and business environment today.It is very difficult for someone who is not computer literate to successfully complete his or her tertiary studies or find gainful employment. Most jobs in the business world require some knowledge of the use of computers and the Internet. Internet could be used to bridge the gap between rural and urban schools, through the use of educational web sites and lectures via satellite. The computer and its resources are central to modern education and its here to stay. 5.7 Lack of technical training Many schools in rural areas lack teachers with appropriate technical skills and experience in key subjects like computer literacy and Internet usage. This results in most rural schools not being able to offer computer courses, resulting in rural scholars not being adequately prepared for tertiary studies where computers and the Internet knowledge are indispensable. This makes the gap between rural scholars and their urban counterparts all the much greater when competing for tertiary positions 5.8 Other Drawbacks These are other issues that will hinder rural schools bridging the education divide between themselvesand urban schools. They are secondary problems that rural schools need to master before they can be judged equally with schools in urban areas. 5.9 Lack of library facilities The library is a common resource in most urban schools and areas most rural communities do not even know what a library is yet alone what its function is. 5.10 Lack of transport facilities Accordingly, it is not uncommon for scholars to walk long distances to school in
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rural areas. Giving rural scholars access to transport resources will motivate them to attend school as a large majority of them walk long distances to school everyday in all kinds of weather. This is largely due to poverty, limited schools available in rural areas and lack of appropriate transport facilities. 5.11 Large student to teacher ratio It is not uncommon for schools in rural areas to have class sizes of up to 70 scholars to a teacher.This results in the weaker scholars in the class not getting the necessary,attention that is needed, since the teacher has so many scholars to attend to.Also asserts that the drop out and repetition rates in rural schools are very high.

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6. CONCLUSIONS AND SOLUTIONS

The use of ICT to enable rural development must rank as one of the developing worlds greatest undertakings. India is the worlds test-bed for this endeavor due to its IT skills, political support, and poverty. International and local funding agencies and NGOs, the domestic and international private sector, and the state have participated in the effort, now about a decade old. We found that experimentation is still the order of the day for many reasons. Primarily, despite high user interest, the availability and affordability of relevant content and the information network remain major problems. As a result, most govt schemes are not viable and have not met user or provider expectations on content or usage. Worse, the hope that ICT in education will overcome differences of income, caste, faith, and gender among rural populations has not been realized, and may even worsen the digital divide by creating a new one in rural areas. While a single approach should not be chosen given the diversity in the field, Of education,we identified several common problems and linkages. Some were on expected lines, such as poor infrastructure, rapid obsolescence coupled with poor maintenance, the governments inability to provide content and challenges with local awareness of education, and quality of ground staff & teachers Our proposal for a new ICT model is based on separating the infrastructure from content provision and recommending that: a data center be provided at the state level in order to use content more efficiently. The Ministries of Rural Development and Panchayati Raj Institutions should create a framework of rules to enable state management of this process.

6.1 LESSONS AT SCHOOL LEVEL ICT projects in rural schools should not be hardware centered.the provision of computers with poor training and software provision has no impact at all.
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 Teacher training should be regular and effective. Frequent visit to schools are mandatory.Teachers and students are anxious to show their progress and have on-site advice. Each school has its learning pace.Not all schools should be pushed to be at the same stage of the project as some schools take longer to adopt what is being offered by the project. Students tend to learn easier and faster than their teachers.It s recommended that students should have access to many different sub-projects,where no teacher participation is needed. Computers ,internet and software are tools with which to get better learn the traditional subjects like mathematics,social and natural sciences and languages,and therefore all teachers should be involved and trained. A platform to report damages via internet, a technical station in each city, a kind of help centre, like moodle. Hire private computer repairing companies to check facilities in diff. areas. That is, privatisation of ICT infrastructure and development Increase daily usage of computers in schools, increase awareness about ICT with older agegroups, so that they provide sufficient infrastructure to students Provide more efficient teachers, and implement e-learning. Provide library resources in smaller villages. Semi-Privatisation of government schools for improved infrastructure. Government should hire private companies to train rural teachers. Interactive lessons i.e.video conferencing between students and teachers. Technicians should be sent by the govt. to help diagnose hardware problems and teach them basic technical procedures like virus disinfection, data backup & formatting. We can allocate retired teachers who still wants to teach to rural school for giving some guidance to those students. By showing them videos of English classes then it would be more easier for them to deal with this new technology. Teachers can be encouraged to communicate via email and build a communication network to share there experiences, problem and solutions.

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 We can hire a private company to teach computers to teachers and govt. can moderate whole system by evaluating teachers occasionally .

6.2 EDUCATION FOR ELDERLY UNEDUCATED PEOPLE Special classes for elders to enhance their skills in their respective professions. Provide information, via short messages services(SMS), or other forms of media about various schemes related to them. The Government schemes should be properly implemented as given in the brochure.

Our proposal for a new ICT model is based on matching the capabilities of different villagers with functions. It will also provide a long-term basis for expanding rural capacity in ICT. The proposed model has the advantage of being financially viable. While it is robust enough to handle many types of services, being compatible with transactional, informational, and governance services. We propose that a pilot project be conceptualized and implemented, based on the above proposal. It will require the participation of multiple stakeholders at many levels, not just at the village level We propose, therefore, that the pilot project be driven by stakeholders representing all the groups .The creation of such a partnership and a seed project are the logical next steps from this report.

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7. Bibliography
1. M.L. Dhawan, Challenges of Rural Education. Gyan Books, 2005 2. Katz, Yaacov, & Marshall Gail. Learning in School, Home & Community. Springer, 2003 3. Pilot Testing of Performance Indicator for Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in Education in India . UNESCO Bangkok & Ministry of Human Resource Development , Government of India 2005 4. Assessment of Impact of Information Technology of Rural Areas of India Implemented by M.S. Swaminathan Research Foundation, Chennai. 5. Educative Projects & Initiatives <http://portal.gujarat.gov.in/> 6. Bellandur Gram Panchayat, Karnataka http://www.financialexpress.com/news/bellandur-panchayat-takes-the-itroute-to-progress/89698/0 7. Gyandoot Government-to-Citizen Network, Madhya Pradesh http://www.dhar.nic.in/GYANDOOT.htm 8. HP iCommunity in Kuppam, Andhra Pradesh
<http://www.hp.com/e-inclusion/en/project/kuppam.pdf>

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