Why in news?
- Union Minister for Human Resource Development, Shri Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank’ held a detailed review of the National online education platform SWAYAM and the 32 DTH Television Education Channels SWAYAM PRABHA.
- In the lockdown condition there has been a tremendous increase in demand and the usage of SWAYAM Courses and SWAYAM PRABHA videos.
What is SWAYAM?
- SWAYAM (Study Webs of Active–Learning for Young Aspiring Minds) is a programme initiated by Government of India.
- SWAYAM platform is developed by Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) and NPTEL, IIT Madras with the help of Google Inc. and Persistent Systems Ltd.
- It is designed to achieve the three cardinal principles of Education Policy viz., access, equity and quality.
- The objective of this effort is to take the best teaching learning resources to all, including the most disadvantaged.
- SWAYAM seeks to bridge the digital divide for students who have hitherto remained untouched by the digital revolution and have not been able to join the mainstream of the knowledge economy.
- This is done through an indigenous developed IT platform that facilitates hosting of all the courses taught in classrooms to be accessed by anyone, anywhere at any time.
- All the courses are interactive, prepared by the best teachers in the country and are available, free of cost to the residents in India.
- UGC has already issued the UGC (Credit Framework for online learning courses through SWAYAM) Regulation 2016 advising the Universities to identify courses where credits can be transferred on to the academic record of the students for courses done on SWAYAM.
- The courses hosted on SWAYAM is in 4 quadrants
- video lecture
- specially prepared reading material that can be downloaded/printed
- self-assessment tests through tests and quizzes and
- an online discussion forum for clearing the doubts.
What is SWAYAM Prabha?
- The SWAYAM PRABHA is a group of 32 DTH channels devoted to telecasting of high-quality educational programmes on 24X7 basis using the GSAT-15 satellite.
- Every day, there will be new content for at least 4 hours which would be repeated 5 more times in a day, allowing the students to choose the time of their convenience.
