Digital' classes to start with outdated systems

VIJAYAWADA: The prestigious Digital Classroom education programme that will be launched across the state on October 20 from Visakhapatnam is facing serious hiccups. The systems provided to around 300 identified schools are outdated and are not upgraded in ways as to meet the requirements. However, the Commissioner to School Education has sent officers from its IT department to each district to monitor the digital classrooms.

Interestingly, the systems given to the schools were almost outdated and hence the IT personnel have informed the same to the Commissio-ner of School Educati-on(CSE). In some cases, the headmasters of resp-ective schools are running from pillar to post to get the new systems. According to the format suggested by Rashtr-eeya Madhyamika Shik-sha Abhiyan (RMSA), the systems installed in the schools need to have certain specific facilities.

The schools should have technically equipp-ed themselves to accommodate the content both in Telugu and English, which can be integrated with the digital classrooms. The content will be integrated to the identified schools by the IT department personnel of the CSE. These personnel are designing the digital classrooms with support from assistant project officers (APO) and assistant statistical officers (ASO).

The RMSA has specifically stated that these guidelines need to be strictly followed. However, in a majority of schools, the system configuration does not match with the specifications of RMSA, which has mentioned that the hard discs in the CPU should contain 500GB and 2GB RAM. In Krishna district, the identified schools have systems with 1GB RAM and 150 GB hard disc, according to N. Nagesh, ASO of Krishna district education department. “The RMSA didn’t mention about the purchase of new systems. Rather, it has suggested drawal and spending of funds from RMSA account only for installation of computers and systems in the schools,” he observed. Under these circumstances, the execution of the Chief Minister’s dream programme is doubtful in several schools, according to a few senior teachers.