The document discusses the development of open schooling and virtual schooling in India. It notes that open schooling was established to provide alternative education opportunities through distance learning mechanisms. Virtual schooling allows students to learn online through asynchronous and synchronous technologies. The document outlines a proposed model for a national consortium for open schooling that would develop online courses, a learning management system, and virtual classrooms. It discusses considerations for staffing, instruction, technology, training, quality assurance and other expenses needed to implement virtual open schooling in India.

1. Virtual Open Schooling:
the Road Ahead for India
Ramesh C. Sharma
15 March 2013
International Conference Education for All: Role of Open Schooling
National Institute of Open Schooling

2. After our Independence in 1947…
• Concerns of The Government of India
• To look for an alternative system of education
(to the formal education)
• Provisions in First Five Year Plan (1951-56)
• Need to address the increasing demand for
education.

3. What is being done…
• Primary
• Upper Primary
• Secondary and
• Higher Secondary
• Different initiatives: UEE, USE, RMSA
• Still measures inadequate

4. Mid Term Appraisal of the 11th Five
Year Plan (2007-2012)
• Strengthening 44,000 existing secondary
schools
• Opening 11,188 additional secondary schools
(through up-gradation of upper primary
schools)
• Appointing 1,79,000 additional teachers and
• Constructing 80,500 additional classrooms.

5. Open schooling
• an alternative to the main stream educational
channels
• educational opportunities (courses and
programmes) are provided at primary or
secondary level
• through distance education mechanisms

6. OPEN SCHOOLING IN INDIA
• National Open School (NOS) established in 1989
and renamed as the National Institute of Open
Schooling (NIOS) in July 2002
• Open Schools (SOS) in 17 states of India, viz.,
Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh,
Punjab, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Haryana,
Karnataka, Kerala, Jammu &Kashmir, Uttar
Pradesh, Assam, Chhattisgarh, Delhi, Himachal
Pradesh, Gujarat and Bihar

7. ICTs and Open Schooling
providing educational opportunities to large
masses up to pre-degree level courses

8. Alternatives to…
Exclusive face to face
learning models
• Internet - enabling
learning anytime,
anyplace
• Online / Hybrid /
Blended Learning
Models

9. Virtual (or online) Schools
Where students can learn
and carry out tasks online
as they would have done
them in a regular
classroom
Empower students
to learn at their
own pace, time and
place convenient to
them

10. http://www.connectionsacademy.com/blog/posts/2010-11-29/Is-Using-an-Online-School-at-Home-Right-for-Me.aspx

11. ConnectionsAcademy
https://www.facebook.com/ConnectionsAcademy

12. virtual schools model
http://villagevirtual.blogspot.in/

13. Benefits of Virtual Schools
• Personalized, tailored content: suited to
individual learning
• Flexibility: Anywhere Anytime access, students
can enrich their skills in learning a new subject or
take up a course or class normally not available at
their schools
• Lower costs: Saves on permanent infrastructure
costs
• Access to high quality education: Access to
quality teachers and peers, increases
collaboration

14. Skills they learned through a virtual school experience
My fellow classmates, we’ve all made it through online
high school.
Along the way, we became independent and self-
motivated students. Our teachers taught us how to
write a research paper, apply the scientific method,
and use the Pythagorean theorem. What I believe they
taught us the most was to think creatively, have
confidence in ourselves, be responsible individuals,
have goals, and have the fortitude to achieve those
goals. When our social studies teachers were teaching
us about the past, they were opening our eyes to what
our future could hold.
- Aaron Ridenour, Graduation Speech, 2010
http://www.connectionsacademy.com/blog/posts.aspx?BlogTagID=c2e61174-ffa3-46eb-8144-6927317fceeb

15. Cases of virtual schools
around the world

16. The African Virtual School
To help students pass exams in West Africa . It does this by
helping them revise using quizzes and videos online

17. The Korean Air & Correspondence
High School
Serves the nation’s youth and adults who couldn’t get a diploma because they were
forced to work in the factories to support their families or because they could not
afford to pay for high school (students pay to go to most high schools in Korea)

18. Open High School Turkey
Three dimensional approach to learning materials:
• Printed educational materials
• Education through the media
• Face-to-face teaching

19. Grampians Virtual School, Victoria,
Australia
Consortium of schools which provides virtual education in specific strands such as
Physics, Psychology, Mathematical Methods, Chemistry and Physical Education, to
remote students who can follow a face-to-face class in a school through video
conferencing

20. Florida Virtual School, USA
USA's first state-wide Internet-based public high school, offers more than 120
courses. Enrollment is free and open to public, private, and home school
students in the state of Florida. Students outside Florida enroll on a tuition
basis.

21. Open High School of Utah, USA
Best examples of providing "one-to-one tutoring for every
student in every subject". It is a tuition-free public charter
school. The School does not charge any fee for attendance,
other than some nominal fee at the beginning of the year.

22. Virtual School British Columbia,
Canada
The students have a variety of goals. Some want to complete high school. Others are
graduates who want to satisfy the prerequisites for a college or university programme.
Still others want to better their English skills before they move on.

23. Features of Virtual Schools
• Facilitate individualised learning
• Use innovative technology
• Offer tailor made flexible curriculum
• May be free or charging fee
• Provide a variety of content material to the
learners like textbooks, study guides, science kits,
and electronic gadgets depending upon needs of
curriculum
• Flexible in allowing students to decide the study
schedule as per their convenience and pace

24. Management of Virtual Schools
Operations wise virtual schools may be:
• State owned
• College or university based,
• Consortium based,
• Public charter schools,
• Local education agency based,
• Private virtual schools, and
• For-profit virtual schools etc.

25. Virtual Education

26. Emerging Trends In Technology Use In
Education

27. New Education Systems

28. edX
Free courses designed
specifically for interactive
study via the web,
provided by MIT, Harvard
and Berkeley.
Udacity was born out of a Stanford
University experiment in which
Sebastian Thrun and Peter Norvig
offered their "Introduction to
Artificial Intelligence" course online
to anyone, for free. Over 160,000
students in more than 190 countries
enrolled and not much later, Udacity
Udacity was born.

29. 21st Century Indian Learners
• Net Generation • Digital Natives
• Millennials • Multi-taskers

30. Internet Usage in India

31. A snapshot of digital India
http://www.digitalstrategyconsulting.com/india/2012/05/a_snapshot_of_digital_india_12.php#more

34. Road ahead…

35. Game Changers: Education and
Information Technologies
Today’s knowledge revolution isn’t about how much information
is available.
It’s about how fast knowledge can travel through vast, connected
networks of people—and how it can grow exponentially.
Game Changers: Education and Information Technologies © 2012 EDUCAUSE

36. Aakash hopes to end the “digital divide”
in education between the rich and poor
http://www.springwise.com/education/india-internet-access-poorer-students-low-cost-tablet/

37. Transforming
Lives
Shaping the
future…

38. Virtual Open Schooling: Indian Model
Institutional
Transformation
Cognitive
Transformation
Technological
Transformation
Physical
Transformation

39. Virtual Open Schooling
An educational practice that
provides opportunity to
learners to study a formal
school-based course online
and gain credit for
certification purpose.
Learners can study using
asynchronously or
synchronously technologies.

40. National Consortium for Open
Schooling (NCOS)

41. Virtual Open Schooling:
Structural Model

42. Online
Registration
Online Wiki based
Examination Open Courses
VOS
Platform
Web
Open Source
Conferencing
LMS (Moodle)
(BigBlueButton)

43. Virtual Open Schooling:
Support Services
Image source:
http://www.mindlogicx.com/mindspace.html

44. Virtual Open Schooling:
Teaching Learning System

45. Virtual Open Schooling:
Funding Mechanisms
• Subsidised by NIOS
• Fee Sharing
• Each Member Open School contributes

46. Technologies:
Instructional Delivery

47. Virtual Open Schooling:
Course Development

48. Virtual Open Schooling:
Assessment and Evaluation

49. Considerations…
•Personnel
•Instruction
•Technology
•Training for professional development
•Quality assurance
•Reporting / data analytics
•Marketing
•Other expenses (travel, health, insurance…)