The need for Internet of Education (IoEd) in the Emerging Economies.
Education
providers in emerging economies have to overcome the legacy of a lack of quality. Education in
emerging economies seems to have been impaired by lower student motive, less of environmental concern
for skill building and more of a profit motive among the education providers. Emerging
economies seem to accumulate a large chunk of Less performing Student (LPS) category, which weighs down at a macro level by depressing overall skill
contributions to the society.
In emerging
economies, education has been the preserve of high end educational
institutions. Currently, the leading higher education institutions in the
emerging countries listed in the Times of
U.K.[1]
1. Peking University, China
2. Tsinghua University, China
3. University of Cape Town, S. Africa
4. National Taiwan University, Taiwan
5. Bogazici University, Turkey
6. University of Science & Technology, China
7. Istanbul Technical University, Turkey
8.Fudan University, China
9. Middle East
Technical University Turkey
10. Lomonsov
Moscow State University, Russia
11.
University of Sao Paolo, Brazil
12. Bilkent
University, Turkey
13. Punjab
University, India.
14. Renmin
University, China
15. University of Witwandersrand , South Africa
At the School
level, it is the American and British International Schools or similar standard Schools that are sought
after by the upper income groups in the emerging economies. Thus quality education remains the preserve of
a few. The vast majority in the remote villages remain far from the quality
effort even if policy prescriptions do provide for equity. A classic example is India where urban
agglomerations have the cream of schools while the interior schooling is rather
subjective as to its inputs and outputs. Another example is in Africa's big
shortage of teachers. It is not that the African youth cannot qualify to be teachers but that the
qualified desert remote areas after their compulsory stints. The success of
MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) in Rwanda is an example of how education
could be redistributed effectively through the medium of internet.
The Internet
of Education (IoEd) is a time to
rethink and restructure to bring forth equity and to reallocate quality
education at a mass level. Educational institutions (EIs) need to undergo deep structural changes in
approach and delivery. Reform proposals on the horizon must ensure that a host
interconnected technology mechanism is an equalizer.
As evolving
student learning intersects and interacts with the new technology and with the multiplier
growth of internet and mobile learning , barriers to entry into quality learning
would crumble. The Internet of Things (IoT) will weaken the market power of
elitism in education , and substitute that with mass based, blended learning.
This transition to the IoEd represents a uniquely challenging environment for
policy makers. Regulators have reposed a large burden on trust on extant EIs
and this has probably come at a social cost. IoEd is an opportunity to make amends.
IoEd should not be discarded as an unsustainable
business model but it should be the aim of the regulatory agenda to make education
more approachable, accessible and resilient. It should
reduce the burden of quality failure on society's conscience.
The costs of technology for IoEd are high with fixed investment high. The private sector
may not come to the support of IoEd, as they will naturally be targeting for return
on investment and profitability. In the context of low initial commercial returns
and depressed profit margins, Government
and supranational organizations have a joint role in emerging economies. A
Public -Private initiative would have for its theme that the marginal costs
will come down and therefore the average costs in the medium to long term. IoEd
would be infrastructure building and would have lower cost and higher
accessibility in the long run. One way for educational institutions and the community at large to raise profits
without shirking on investment is through genuine efficiency gains.
IoEd should
see the emergence of new education providers
including technology firms offering learning services. There will be
increasing competition in learning services with the winds taken out of
well-established Universities or Schools with IoEd taking it directly to a
retail micro- approach. Society has to look at the positive contributions a
technologically proficient society will render. Innovation in education has to
be encouraged in the public interest.
There is every reason for EIs to capitalize on the opportunity
provided by joining on to a Learning Union so that they could reap economies of
scale.
*****
These strands of thought are a part of
the research work being undertaken by the author on the Internet of Education
in Emerging Economies.
Copyright
of this article and its contents vests with the author of this blog: Jayaram Nayar. He can be contacted at email: jaynayar@gmail.com
[1] http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/world-university-rankings/2014/brics-and-emerging-economies
accessed on 27 March, 2015
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