HYDERABAD: In a major step towards transforming public education, the Education department has signed Memorandums of Understanding (MoUs) with several prominent national and international NGOs to provide advanced EdTech-based learning solutions free of cost to students in government schools.
The MoUs were signed in the presence of Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy.
With the vision of enhancing the quality of education in the state, the government has entered into collaborations with six reputed organisations to introduce cutting-edge educational technologies in public schools.
These include EkStep Foundation, led by Nandan Nilekani, Prajwala Foundation, headed by Sunitha Krishnan, Physics Wallah, led by Alakh Pandey, Khan Academy, PiJam Foundation, founded by Shoaib Dar and Educate Girls, led by Safeena Husain.
Revolutionary change
The Chief Minister’s Office said: “Enchanted by the welfare and development programmes implemented by the People’s Government, these organisations came forward and joined hands with the government. The decision to seek the help of noted organisations was taken in line with the Chief Minister Revanth Reddy’s idea of improving educational standards in the state. The state government strongly believes that partnering with India’s renowned organisations will bring a revolutionary change in the education sector in the country.”
The EkStep Foundation is currently working in 540 schools with an artificial intelligence-based platform. Now, the organisation will offer services in more than 5,000 primary schools in 33 districts.
The organisation helps with Telugu and English languages as well as Maths basics from Class 3 to 5. Physics Wallah will provide coaching to Inter students in preparing for NEET, JEE and CLAT exams. It will also provides free training to students from the school level for competitive exams.
STEM training
Khan Academy will offer video-based STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Maths) training in accordance with the curriculum to students from Class 6 to 10.
Prajwala Foundation will launch child safety and protection programmes for students from Class 6 to 12 across the state. Pi Jam Foundation will provide training in coding and computational thinking to students from Class 1 to 10. Educate Girls will take up the enrolment of over 16,000 out-of-school children to improve literacy and educational opportunities for girls.
Government Advisor K Kesava Rao, Education Secretary Yogitharana, CM Special Secretary Ajith Reddy, School Education Director Narasimha Reddy, Director of School Education Naveen Nicholas, Education Department Special Secretary Haritha, EkStep Foundation CEO Jagadish Babu, Prajwala Foundation chief Sunitha Krishnan, Physics Wallah co-gounder Prateek Maheshwari, Khan Academy India MD Swati Vasudevan, Pi Jam Foundation founder Shoaib Dar, Educate Girls CEO Gayatri Nair Lobo and others were present at the MoU signing ceremony.