Making Education Accessible

Context: There exist two possible solutions involving AIR and DD and Internet service providers that can help in making Education accessible.

Pandemic and issues in online Education

• Access: Dented by low internet penetration in India of about 50%, no access to online Education in most rural schools.
• Affordability: Dent on financial resources for both teachers and students.
• Efficacy: Exams lost credibility and no mechanism to ensure efficacy on online learning.
• Cost to health: With continuous exposure to screens.

Significance of Prasar Bharti in Education:

• Prasar Bharati is India’s broadcasting corporation handling both radio and television in India.
• All India Radio (AIR) has 470 broadcasting centres that cover 92% of the country’s geographical area and 99.19% population.
• Doordarshan (DD) with 34 satellite channels, 17 well-equipped studios in State capitals and 49 studio centres in other cities.
• Education is one of three functions of two agencies under the Prasar Bharati Act.

Solutions to tackle the above issues:

• Re-invent Prasar Bharati: Educational broadcasts for classes 10, 11 and 12 can be done over AIR and DD in ratio 4:1 (four hours of radio and one hour of TV).
  • Direct benefits: Less screen time for teachers and students and a check on the financial drain.
  • Scope for expansion: Lease out private FM stations.
  • Roping in teachers: Training can be provided by a set of master trainers over a month for teachers who will turn into scriptwriters and programmers.
    • These teachers can also be taught to create appropriate tools for evaluation over radio and TV.
    • The Central and State educational boards should be roped in to support, monitor and provide feedback to improve the system.
• Free hours of the Internet: Government shall call the shots to provide hours of free Internet usage to teachers and students.