In an endeavor to empower teachers and enhance learning outcomes of students, Government of Kerala announced its partnership with Khan Academy India (KAI) recentely. An MoU has been signed at The Chief Minister’s Office, Secretariat, with Pinarayi Vijayan, Chief Minister of Kerala, Prof. C. Raveendranath, Education Minister, Usha Titus, Chairman KITE & Secretary Higher Education, Anvar Sadath, Executive Director, KITE, Sudheer Babu, Director Higher Secondary Education, Sandeep Bapna, India Country Director Khan Academy India and Mathu Shalini, India Strategist, Khan Academy India, in attendance.
Presiding over the signing event, Prof. C. Raveendranath, Minister of Education, Kerala said, “The Government of Kerala is elated on our partnership with Khan Academy. The vision of the state is to be able to provide personalised learning to all our students. Combined with the infrastructure and resources we are setting up in schools under our Hi-Tech schools program, we believe that Khan Academy’s educational resources and tools would help strengthen learning for our students. We believe that this partnership would empower our teachers and provide personalised learning for all our students, throughout the state.”
The partnership with Khan Academy will extend for a period of 5 years. Beginning this year, the partnership shall aim to cover 4775 Govt and Aided schools with close to 1 Lakh teachers and over 20 Lakh students, enrolled in classes 8 to 12, for Science and Mathematics.
Speaking at the event, Anvar Sadath, Executive Director and Vice Chairman, KITE said, “We have been working with Khan Academy for almost a year now. This partnership strengthens our Hi-Tech Schools program and we believe this would help our teachers to personalise learning for the students. Beginning with a close intervention this year in 22 schools, we are planning to scale it to all the 4775 schools in the state. We are supporting the schools by providing the necessary infrastructure and training. We look forward to iterating from this intervention and taking it forward.”
Kerala Infrastructure and Technology for Education (KITE) has already deployed Laptops, Projectors, other ICT equipment and broadband connectivity to schools as part of its Hi-Tech school project. Simultaneously, it is developing a resource portal called Samagra, with online educational content and resources for teachers. Khan Academy’s resources would be linked to Samagra. In 2018-19, KITE would be conducting subject-specific training to all 1 lakh-plus teachers across the state in utilising the resources available on Samagra and on Khan Academy. For the first year, KITE is actively enhancing the ICT infrastructure in 20 schools to support personalised learning.
On Khan Academy, each student progresses through unlimited quizzes and questions at just the right level for them. They get immediate feedback as they learn and, when appropriate, learning interventions are provided at the exact moment the student needs them. Teachers can track progress, identify gaps in learning, and use data to help individual students as well as shape classroom discussion. The partners intend to gather learnings from this intervention to inform the rollout across the rest of the schools.
On behalf of Khan Academy India, Sandeep Bapna, Managing Director said “We are humbled by the ambitious vision of the state of Kerala to cover all its schools over a period of 5 years. At Khan Academy, we have been focusing on making technology both easier and more powerful to improve learning outcomes. We are working with several states and school partners to enable readiness, training and adoption of Khan Academy resources in their classrooms. ”
