JANUARY 2018
Vantage Innovate, scale, impact
A Newsletter of IL&FS Education & Technology Services Ltd.
REFLECTIONS
A very happy and creative New Year to one and all.
At the dawn of the year 2018 let me share a story of our
journey. 20 years ago, in 1997, IL&FS Education & Technology
Services Ltd (IETS) was born. It was known as ‘Schoolnet’,
then. We started with great gusto. We had the singular
aim to transform the educational ecosystem by making
quality education accessible and affordable by leveraging
technology. It was received with great enthusiasm as it filled
in a major felt gap. Initial euphoria, however, gave way to
hard realities. Internet itself was in its infancy. Reflecting in
hindsight, we were ahead of our time. Taking lessons from
‘Schoolnet’ experiences we reinvented ourselves as IETS.
Today, IETS is impacting 12 million students and close to half
a million teachers across the country on daily basis. We stand
today with substantial experience and wide footprint across
the country and beyond.
Educational technology (Ed-tech) is transforming the
learning opportunities and spaces with a dizzy pace. Multi-
media and simulated content makes learning ever engaging.
MOOCs and Open courses make best of teachers available to
all. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is emerging as a demi-god in the
Silicon Valley redefining the world in general and education
in particular. It is not easy to predict the future. However,
integrated, interactive, adaptive teaching -learning seems to
be the future of education.
At IETS we are bracing with the challenges of education by
way of innovating, scaling and creating larger impact. To
achieve our goals, we are designing appropriate solutions
to make impact at scale. Today, we have live ICT labs with
instructors in over 20 thousand school reaching out to 8
million students. K-Yan has been our flagship educational
solution device to achieve the learning efficiency and
outcomes. It is an amazingly simple device combining
innovative features to serve a variety of learning needs. More
than 40 thousand institutions are reaping the benefit of
K-Yan.
Reflections 1
Trending 2
Bottom line 3
Pro Talk 4
In the News 6
Events 7
Adding Value 8
To design quality education ecosystem and impact at scale,
we need to have a ‘community of knowledge’. More than
individual prowess it is the time to harness collaborative
wisdom. So, we have partnered with technology and industry
leaders including Google, Microsoft, IBM, Linkedin and other.
Startups like Nextstep, Avanti have also joined hands with us.
We are, thus, creating a collaborative ecosystem for everyone
to thrive together.
We have also introduced Future Classroom in partnership
with Google for Education as new age edu-solution for
digital India by creating an efficacious combination of
chromebooks and K-Yan. Our ‘connected classroom’ uses tabs
to create a vibrant learning space. Technology is effective
when presented as customized solution. IETS has gained core
expertise in designing suitable solutions.
Integrating technology is essential but teacher must play
pivotal role in realizing the transformational potential of
education. This is an approach based on insights from
learning sciences provided by cognitive neuroscience,
educational psychology etc. So, an effective educational
solution must integrate student, teacher and technology in
an organic way.
Leveraging our longitudinal experience and deep
understanding we are greeting the new year with our
versatile learning app as ecosystem called Geneo. It offers
a variety of collaborative resources – textbook, multimedia,
simulation along with assessment to check your learning.
Geneo as an AI backed solution offers adaptive learning
experience personalized to each student’s liking and levels.
And, to meet learners further query there are experienced
mentors available to respond and interact. It is a blend of
cutting edge digital learning with personal touch.
Our learners are our brand ambassadors. If they vouched for
it, we rock!
Happy Reading
RCM Reddy, MD & CEO
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 TRENDING

A solar system with as many planets

as our own has been discovered with AI – Whither Artificial Intelligence – AI Index 2017
the help of Kepler space telescope
powered with Artificial Intelligence
(AI). This is one of the latest startling
discoveries made possible last month.
Driverless cars are a reality, so is
intelligent personal assistant like Alexa
that obeys your multiple commands.
In educational field, adaptive learning
makes education more engaging and
personalized. The student-initiated
learning environment, Intelligent
tutoring systems (ITS) and AI assisted
educational diagnosis and assessment
are shaping the educational scenario in
a major way. (See the box for the ways
AI is impacting education)
AI has made some phenomenal growth
in the last couple of years heralding era
of data science, big data and emerging
possibilities of ‘superintelligence’, a
hypothetical agent having intelligence
far surpassing most gifted human mind.
AI seems to transform the world in Photo by Bryan Bedder
Courtsey: Getty Images for National Geographic
a major way. But how much? How
soon?And, where is it going?
The truth, however, is that the field of AI is still evolving. Even experts have little What has it achieved?
clue understanding and mapping the progress across the field. “Without the Consider the following facts about
relevant data for reasoning about the state of AI technology, we are essentially Artificial Intelligence (AI):
“flying blind” in our conversations and decision-making related to AI.” • The number of active AI startups
AI100, a group of leading AI thinkers from Stanford, decide to find a solution. They increased 14-fold since 2000.
aimed at tracking the progress of AI as an emerging field. As a result, came about
the AI Index 2017. The AI Index is an initiative to track, collate, distill and visualize • Venture capital investment
data relating to artificial intelligence. increased six times in the same
period.
AI and technological progress
• Publishing in AI has increased nine
The inaugural annual report of AI Index 2017 published in November times in the last 20 years
2017 showcases the aggregated data and presents discussions and expert
commentaries on key trends and ideas. AI Index looked at a number of measures of • Course enrollment in the
progress, including “volume of activity” and “technical performance”. introductory AI-related machine
“The goal of the AI Index is to provide a fact-based measuring stick against which learning at Stanford has grown
we can chart progress and fuel a deeper conversation about the future of the field.”, 45-fold in the last 30 years.
said Prof. Yoav Shoham, Emeritus Faculty, Computer Science, Stanford and one of Some of the charts representing the
the moving spirits behind the Index. technological progress are striking. For
Like UN development index or GDP (gross domestic product) the AI Index is example, image and speech recognition
supposed to provide a comprehensive baseline on the state of artificial intelligence programs seems to be matching, if not
and measure technological progress. The metrics in the index include evaluations surpassing already, human capabilities
of academic papers published, course enrollment, AI-related startups, job in just the past couple of years. The
openings, search-term frequency and media mentions, among others. The Index authors note that AI systems have
tracks and measures minimum 18 independent vectors including academia, excelled in such real-world applications
industry, open-source software and public interest among others. It also engages as object detection, the ability to
in technical assessments of progress toward “human-level performance” which understand and answer questions and
covers areas like speech recognition, Q&A, algorithms to identify objects and classification of photographic images of
activities in 2D images. skin cancer cells.

2
What is missing?
Having said that, the question remains
if it can’t gauge sarcasm, identify jokes,
or account for a million other pieces
of cultural context that are crucial
to understanding even the most
casual conversation? No. The report
acknowledges this and includes a
critical open section on ‘what is missing’.
Diversity and inclusion are two major
areas among the missing aspects.
The AI Index, in nut shell, is a reminder
that we must be “woke” about the major
switch that is taking place.
Will AI be a real game changer?
Wait and watch. Till then read the AI
Index Report at https://aiindex.org/
How AI Impacts Education
Is a robotic teacher round the corner? Could AI-enhanced entities solve our
most pervasive and systemic issues in education? We need to wait to get an
answer for these questions. But AI is already impacting education in major
ways. Some of them are enumerated below.
• Adapting Assessment and Educational Support
AI has already made adaptive learning processes possible through
assessment software, learning games and digital textbooks to individualize
learning. These tools detect patterns, highlight and emphasize key areas
where students need support. It also allows one-on-one focus on learning
process as per individual needs.
• Learning anywhere and at your own pace and way
AI powered MOOCs, online learning classes and blended class experiences
offer benefit from customized, individualized learning environment making
education available anywhere and as per learner’s choice.
• Out of the Classroom Support
Through AI, tutoring and study programs are growing more advanced.
Teaching fundamentals to students struggling with basic concepts is simple
and personalized through AI.
• Immersive Technology in the Classroom
AI has brought about exciting new opportunities in the form of immersive
technology like Augmented Reality (AR) and Vitrtual Reality. Now learners are
able to see and interact with the human body or a microscopic cell instead of
just reading about it in a book transforming how students engage with the
educational materials.
• Automating educational Administration Tasks
streamline and improve tedious admissions processes by automating the
process of paperwork and support for students with common admissions
questions via chatbot and interactive website.

‘Future Classroom’ transforming the present BOTTOM LINE

Bharti had just returned from the morning shift of her school. She quickly had
her lunch and got ready to go back to school again to attend after school ‘Future
Classroom’ (FC) classes till 5 PM. Rakesh Bhai, the spirited principal of the school got
special permission to allow motivated students to attend these classes. Around 100
Students of classes 6 to 8 regularly practice in the after school FC classes here.
IL&FS Education in partnership with Google for Education set up ‘Future Classroom’
at Chandlodiya Primary School, Ahmedabad, last year by giving 30 Chromebooks,
a K-Yan and designing special classroom for it. Today FC has been integrated in
regular teaching routine. “Students search relevant videos and resources and go
through them the previous day in FC. It helps them strengthen their interest and
knowledge in subject areas substantially. Thus, our students alone bagged 6 out
of 300 national merit cum means scholarship meant for over 800 schools of this
area. FC has certainly contributed to make our students a cut above the rest. We
also had 40 students from nearby private schools moving to our school this year,”
Rakesh Bhai, Principal
the principal shared proudly. Parents are mostly poor and daily wage people. They
Chandlodiya Primary School,
could not believe their kids could get such high class education in a government
Ahmedabad
school, said Dharam, the dedicated coordinator of FC.

The education department now cited this school as an example of achievement in improving educational standard. The
school community of this area was trained to use Google sheet and Docs applications for sharing data and information by this
school, said the Principal.
“I am grateful to our education department who gave free hand to me. My spirited staff members and school management
committee extended support. And, of course, IL&FS Education has made it happen for us to make our school a leading one
in the area.” Rakesh Bhai acknowledged all for the transformation brought about by Future Classroom in the educational
environment of the school.

3
 PRO TALK

Face to Face
Central Institute of Educational Technology (CIET),
is a premiere national institute of educational
technology under NCERT. Its major aim is to promote
utilization of educational technologies viz. radio, TV,
films, satellite communications and cyber media. The
institute undertakes activities to widen educational
opportunities, promote equity and improve quality
of educational processes at school level.In this Face
to Face Vagish K Jha interviews Prof. Amarendra
Behera, Jt Director, CIET who highlights the emerging
perspectives on ed-tech in the school education.
( This is the abridged version of the interview. )

Vagish K Jha address government systems. It has to be holistically

Congratulations for assuming the full-fledged
responsibility of Jt. Director, Central Institute of
Educational Technology (CIET), NCERT. Could you
please share the vision of educational technology that
we are going to see under your guidance?
Amarendra P Behera
Conceptually educational technology is development,
implementation and evaluation of materials, systems,
technique and method used for enhancing learning
among all stakeholders. When we talk about the
Information and Communication Technologies (ICT)
we mean all digital and digitizable resources and the
communication technologies for dissemination of
these resources to all stakeholders and enhancing
their capacity, capability and quality of education. A
lot of initiative related to that is taking place in the
form of creating digital infrastructure in and delivery
of all educational services whether it is educational
digital content, digital books, assessment of students,
performance, having a cumulative report card of
performanceof learners etc.
We cannot improve quality of education if we only
addressed. Government - private partnership in a
collaborative mode needs to be developed. There are
many areas where it is difficult for the government
to develop skills. Hence, there is a need to have lot
of collaboration with corporates, NGO sector and
government sector.
Vagish K Jha
Can you tell us more about the government - private
partnership in Edu-tech field?
Amarendra P Behera
Edu-tech initiatives needs to be seen within the vision
of digital India campaign which includes the digital
literacy of citizens including school students, teachers,
teacher educators and parents. Many a times NCERT
is also questioned that textbooks are not reaching
on time to many remote places like Leh, Ladakh and
Tawang in Arunachal Pradesh. In such a situation, for
example, NCERT has developed e-pathshala mobile
app and digitized all the NCERT textbooks to provide
digital books to students, teachers, parents and teacher
educators. Using this, we can send the text book to
them through mobile app and they can start studying

4
those material in the fraction of a second.
Now a days we have one tablet per child or one laptop
per child system also. So, we can think to put them all
their books in digital format. They can even do all their
exercises, assessments and questions in digital format
and also put these together in the form of a server like
a K-Yan or Geneo that IL&FS Education has developed.
In fact, democratization of digital resources is also
required.
Vagish K Jha
We give things like ICT and educational technology
to schools but then how these are being utilized
in teaching and training becomes very important.
“
There are some platforms
where a portable box can be
used as school server with
all the contents given in
the form of K-Yan or IL&FS’s
Geneo kind of learning
platforms. All the resources
and teaching tools are
embedded into it and there
will be local area network
with that
“
Amarendra P Behera
The government has recently launched the SWAYAM
platform- Study Webs of Active Learning for Young
Aspiring Minds (swayam.gov.in). It is a learning
management system. There are more than 400 online
courses.
The online courses for students and teachers and
teacher educators are also coming there. These are
the platforms which are going to help in continuous
professional development of teachers. Onsite training
can also happen through blended mode using a mix of
face to face and distance mode without disturbing their
work place.
Similarly NCERT has recently developed a course
portal which is popularly known as IPDT (In-
service Professional Development of Teachers and
Teacher Educators - itpd.ncert.gov.in). NCERT and
its constituents organise nearly 400 teacher training
programs every year.
NCERT has also started a 24/7 DTH TV channel under
Swayam Prabha umbrella. The e-contents developed by
NCERT is also simultaneously used through telecast of
these programs on 24/7 basis. Teacher training is also
being done through DTH TV channel.
Teachers can also use their telephones to access our
two toll free numbers 1800-111-265, 1800-112-199 to
listen to the resource persons and interact with them.
Using technology and scaling the number in a time
bound manner is our concern.
Vagish K Jha
What is the vision of PPP model that you have and how
the organizations corporates and others can come and
take it forward?
Amarendra P Behera
Actually there is no need to reinvent the wheel again
and again. If some NGO has done something which
is very good then we need not redo the same thing.
Rather government has the capability for scaling. So,
why can’t corporates and NGO sector and government
join together and
scale it?
There are some platforms where a portable box can
be used as school server with all the contents given
in the form of K-Yan or IL&FS’s Geneo kind of learning
platforms. All the resources and teaching tools are
embedded into it along with local area network.
Similarly, we have collaboration with Google and IL&FS
in Bhopal. Such experiments can be scaled also. We
should rather focus on customization. Translation into
regional languages will be the second option.
Recently government of India launched a portal called
‘shala sarathi’. If any corporate would like to fund 100
schools to provide infrastructure and e-content and
help the school to become a smart school and impart
quality education, they can provide their funds under
CSR to the government.
We not only talk about delivery of digital content but
we also talk about automation of the whole process.
In fact, Technology is not only providing e-contents
solutions for teacher training, solutions for assessment,
solutions for e-governance but also solutions for
transparency and accountability and truthfulness in the
management of the system.
(The full version of the interview is available at ILFS
website- www.ilfseducation.com)
5
 IN THE NEWS

The EdVantage
Newsroom
Launch of EnglishBolo
EnglishBolo, an online solution for improving
spoken English skills was launched by
Shri Nand Kumar, IAS, Principal Secretary,
Department of School Education & Sports,
Govt of Maharashtra on 25th October, 2017
at IL&FS Financial Centre, Mumbai. English
Helper & IL&FS Education & Technology
Services Ltd. (IETS) hosted this event
followed by a thought-leadership conference
on Tech Enabled English Language Learning
in India.
http://www.indiannewsandtimes.
com/2017/10/25/63808-thought-leadership-
conference-to-discuss-and-deliberate-on-
the-road-map-for-technology-enabled-en-
glish-language-learning-in-india/

Toyota Road safety multi stake holder consultative meet

Mr. Dependra Pathak, Spl. Commissioner
of Police (Traffic), inaugurated the multi-
stake holders consultative meeting on road
safety held at Indian Habitat Centre, New
Delhi on November 8, 2017. The round
table focusing on ‘Road Safety Education in
Schools’ was organized by IL&FS Education
in collaboration with Toyota Kirloskar Motor
Private Limited. Earlier, Mr. RCM Reddy,
MD & CEO, IL&FS Education, welcomed the
participants to this exclusive brain-storming
consultation attended by eminent experts
and major stakeholders from the corporate,
education, media, Police, UN agencies,
Hospital and Civil society organizations.
https://auto.economictimes.india-
times.com/news/industry/toyota-kirlo-
skar-motor-organises-road-safety-work-
shops-in-school/61581897

6
 EVENTS

Dream Change -
Arunachal Pradesh 2017
‘Dream Change – Arunachal 2027’ Conclave, an initiative by
government of Arunachal Pradesh was held on 8th & 9th
December, 2017 at Itanagar, Arunachal Pradesh. It aimed
at bringing various stakeholders together to brainstorm
the strategy and actions for ‘re-shaping the development
discourse’ of Arunachal Pradesh. Mr RCM Reddy, MD & CEO,
IL&FS Education, presented an array of edtech solutions that
can transform the teaching-learning environment.

Launch of Gyankunj Project

On the occasion of teacher’s day, Mr Vijay Rupani, the Chief
Minister, Gujarat, launched ‘Gyankunj E- Class Project’ at
Ahmedabad, Gujarat in the presence of Mr RCM Reddy, CEO
& MD, IL&FS Education. Aimed at promoting digital literacy
among primary students in all government aided schools in
the state this initiative enable 3.2 k classroom in government
schools of Gujarat to go digital.

India Afghanistan Trade

& Investment Show 2017
#Passage2Prosperity
IL&FS Education & Technology Services Ltd. (IETS), IL&FS
Institute of Skills and IL&FS Clusters participated in India
Afghanistan Trade & Investment Show 2017 held between
28th to 30th September at ITC Maurya, New Delhi. To
advance regional integration by strengthening economic ties
between Afghanistan and India through partnerships this
forum provided opportunity for showcasing and dialoguing
with potential partners.

Launch of Future Classrooms

A total transforming of education geared for the 21st
Century has been initiated with the launch of Google Future
Classroom in 12 Government Schools in Krishna and Guntur
districts, Andhra Pradesh impacting 10,000+ students and
200+ teachers. This significant step has been taken under the
Members of Parliament Local Area Development (MPLAD)
of Sri Y. S. Chowdary, Hon’ble Minister of State, Science and
Technology & Earth Sciences and Sujana Foundation in
partnership with IL&FS Education.

7
 ADDING VALUE
GeneoX
A Confluence Platform for Technology in Education
GeneoX, a unique initiative by IL&FS
Education, is a platform to bring together
talent and expertise in the use of
technology for teaching-learning while
ensuring active participation from all
stakeholders to learn, share & achieve
GeneoX is designed to evolve
over the years with two distinct
but interlinked elements:
1. GeneoX Championship has students, teachers,
principals and parents participate in challenges for
annual awards. The challenges has a strong focus on
use of technology across Innovation (Ideation and
Design), Academics (Math, Science, ..), IT (Basics, Robotics,
Programming, …) & Life Skills (Language, Good Citizenship).
2. GeneoX Edu Meet aims at engagement of all
stakeholders to discuss, debate, share, learn and showcase
work in the ‘technology in education’ space through varied
events.
• Conferences would involve discussions/debates on
innovations, sharing/showcasing new techniques
& methodologies, exhibition of products, research
submissions….
• Workshops would focus on developing digital skills and
awareness of global trends in education
Excitement of doing and knowing
The Championship invited students of Class IX to showcase
their IT proficiency and knowledge starting with School-level
competition and moving to block and district levels. The
State Finals would be followed by the Nationals. Participating
at various levels, students develop core cognitive ability of
faster and deeper thinking, creative problem-solving and
better analytical reasoning. In the process, they get exposed
to handling pressure, interpersonal skills and develop
confidence creating a high degree of enthusiasm.
Impact
27
Districts
participated
3000+
Schools completed the test
178,000
Students appeared
Editor - Vagish K Jha Sub-Editor - Ridhima Mehra Design - Poonam Panchal Design support Shahid Iqbal
Multiple stake holders Join hands
The championship has been designed as a comprehensive
engagement of multiple stake holders to bring together
talent and expertise in the educational space ensuring
active participation to learn, share and achieve though
collaboration between learners, teachers, technology.
Simultaneously, it envisions, bringing together the expertise
of the academic community, competence of the corporates,
reach of the government and ownership and commitment of
communities for greater awareness towards ‘Technology in
Education’.
Testimonials
Nayana Satapathy, Teacher
Konark School (SSD), Puri, Odisha
“When the Championship was rolled out at our school…. it was
wonderful to see the students prepare – wanting to do well in the
quiz. Of course, winning was important for the students but as a
teacher I saw my students confident, motivated, alert …..which is
an applaud for GeneoX & the IL&FS Education team!”
IL&FS Education & Technology Services Ltd
NTBCL Building, Toll Plaza, DND Flyway,
NOIDA - 201 301. U.P. INDIA
Tel : (0120) 2459200 / (0120) 2459201
www.ilfseducation.com