VISAKHAPATNAM: Launching digital classrooms connecting 1,200 schools across the State here on Thursday, Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu said that in course of time all the 42,000 government schools would be covered under the programme.
Terming it as a unique experiment in the country that would pave the way to make Andhra Pradesh a knowledge State, the Chief Minister said that digital content on subjects would be provided and schools linked for video-conferencing through the AP Fibre Grid.
Seeing the content being explained visually would help understand any subject better, he said.
Best teachers would be selected for teaching live all over the State, covering 30-40 schools, and the video-conferencing facility would enable students clear their doubts also. It would also help teachers prepare for the class even in the school on computers, the Chief Minister said.
He, however, assured that introduction of digital classrooms would not lead to a cut down in teacher posts.
“Teacher will have to be there and digital content will make explaining easy,” he said.
The digital content will be provided to private schools too.
It is a beginning and, in a month, all universities and colleges would get Wi-Fi connectivity so that students could learn on their own using a tab, he said.
High schools would also get Wi-Fi, and soon books could be accessed from e-library. Once the fibre grid connectivity was provided, students could access lessons via the Internet if they missed the class, Mr. Naidu said.
Innovation chapters at the school level, innovation societies at the district level, and incubation centres could be used to pick up best ideas, which finally result in start-ups, the Chief Minister said.
He lauded the gesture of NRIs for donating Rs.4.5 crore for the digital classroom programme. He announced that MP K. Haribabu would fund digital classrooms for 25 schools.
Mr. Naidu launched ‘Telugu Paluku,’ a magazine for NRI children to learn Telugu.
The Chief Minister later interacted with children and teachers at Gannavaram, Kuppam, and Anandapuram schools.
HRD Minister Ganta Srinivasa Rao said that the credit for bringing in reforms and forming HRD portfolio to improve human resources went to the Chief Minister. He recalled the efforts of Special Representative of Andhra Pradesh in North America Komati Jayaram in arranging a 12-day motivation tour for the project.
Mr. Jayaram said that NRI Telugus would help in setting up digital classrooms in 5,000 schools in less than a year by contributing their share of 30 per cent, with each NRI contributing $750. During the motivation tour, spontaneous response was received for 2,000 schools and the present contribution was for 1,000 schools.
The Telugu diaspora would also help construct 7,000 anganwadi buildings and improve burial grounds.
