Swayam

SWAYAM: MOOCs Online Courses

Last updated on Saturday, September 5th, 2020

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SWAYAM growing with fast face and becomes the number one Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) platform. This year 12,541,992 students enrolled in different courses through various mode to the SWAYAM.

SWAYAM INTRODUCTION

The “Study Webs of Active Learning for Young Aspiring Minds” in short form known as “SWAYAM“.  In India, earlier the NPTEL was taking care of technical courses. That was running by professors of IISc, and IITs, especially for the engineering students. Later, with the AICTE, New Delhi associations started FDP in affiliated institutions.

These SWAYAM Online Courses were not mandatory for the students earlier and very few students and teachers were aware about to it. In 2017-18, All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) joined the hand with NPTEL for advance courses and started it with Faculty Development Programmes.

At present large number of courses are running by the NPTEL itself and monitoring of these courses, like fees, student mentoring, registration, exam, etc., handled through their LOCAL CHAPTERS. It is the body of the concerned Institute that successfully organizing activities, an active academic network.

MOOCs STRUCTURE

Still, there is a misconception among the people by taking the name of “SWAYAM“. People think s this is similar to the “NPTEL online courses”. Here, why I am using NPTEL name, because still many people are around us, who don’t know more about the SWAYAM and its functions.

Swayam is a platform, that provides you online education through 9- different segments as per the demand of aspirants for the online studies. These nine segments are different bodies, each one take care of their domain only (targeted audience) and provide relevant education/information to the students and teachers. Collaboration and joint efforts are open as you have read earlier between the NPTEL and AICTE.

Swayam Efforts

Recently, the Department of Higher Education, Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India has taken the online education initiative on priority basis. No doubt, In India, there are various state education boards (state education boards,CBSE, and ICSE, etc) and further their strategy for education. So, how the government can provide equal and quality education uniformly to the students and simultaneously update the teachers with the latest technology and tools, is subject of our concern.

Indian govt. divided all education requirements (to educate the people) into the nine categories and for each section government nominated one coordinator. This is known as National coordinator, who take cares of only their sections.

Whether it is for school education, open school education, regular science, technology, engineering management, or all regular graduate and postgraduate courses, a separate department is available for that. These are listed here:

  1.   AICTE (All India Council for Technical Education) for self-paced and international courses
  2.   NPTEL (National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning) for Engineering
  3.   UGC (University Grants Commission) for non-technical post-graduation education
  4.   CEC (Consortium for Educational Communication) for under-graduate education
  5.   NCERT (National Council of Educational Research and Training) for school education
  6.   NIOS (National Institute of Open Schooling) for school education
  7.   IGNOU (Indira Gandhi National Open University) for out-of-school students
  8.   IIMB (Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore) for management studies
  9.  NITTTR (National Institute of Technical Teachers Training and Research) for Teacher Training programme

WORKING COORDINATION AND SUPPORT SYSTEM AMONG SWAYAM GROUPS

You have seen above nine different bodies that are taking care of concerned learner individually, under one umbrella that is “SWAYAM“. Now, it has been cleared to you that NPTEL and similar to this rest eights bodies are part of SWAYAM. Now, if suppose you are studying a regular B.E. course (just an example, you may be school student, BSc student, Management student, or an aspirant of distance education or interested for faculty development programme as a teacher) and you are looking for a certificate course through swayam. Then which co-ordinator will help you? or from where you can find the desired course? Let’s see it one by one.

AICTE

All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) take cares of all courses run by the affiliated universities and colleges for online credits. AICTE guide the institutions time to time and ask for opting at least one course in each semester by the students.

In general regular (and/or optional) courses provided by the affiliated universities and institutions  of AICTE, in a particular semester, students preferred to opt them (or their option) from SWAYAM list. Mapping of the course by the concern department and same for credits mapping also remain at the institution’s levels.

Recently, AICTE motivated faculty members to join the online faculty development programme courses. These courses are helpful in the promotions and career development as the regular courses.

 NPTEL

The National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning (NPTEL) is more popular and organized for Engineering education in INDIA. A reason of it maybe they started online courses first of all, and were equipped with technical tools along with technological awareness. NPTEL has started its LOCAL CHAPTERS in concerned institutions.

What do you mean by NPTEL local chapter? NPTEL organized their course delivery its output in very organized way. They assign a SPOC in the concerned college who want to create a local chapter. This SPOC works as a bridge between NPTEL [its instructions, course info, registration, fee, exam, certificate, etc ] and concerned institution’s students. 

The SPOC of local chapters manages all related progress with NPTEL representative through WhatsApp group for fast action. This is cooperative platform, here from all India SPOCs are connected with each other in zone wise.

For any technical or doubt SPOCs can ask a question and discuss with the NPTEL representative. As I told you that, all administrative work managed by this common platform, the rest of the work like mapping of the courses and credits acquired by the students are managed by the concern institutions. The NPTEL provides the detail hard and soft copy information through email and by post to the local chapter.

LOCAL CHAPTER APPROACH

I couldn’t see the local chapter approach in CEC or in any other individual body (for an organized working approach) to make their programme more successful. Today NPTEL looking for more than 1 crore registrations. No doubt, with the time it’s getting more popular as compared to the earlier time.

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NPTEL announce the selected courses list, before starting the new semester. They had already announced the next semester courses list, now. You can ask your institution SPOC for more information.

Your Institution SPOC receives a soft list and posters in this reference so all students and faculty become aware about the upcoming courses. You can ask your dean academics to know more about or to the concern SPOC so you can clear your doubt if any.

You can opt only one course from online courses in one semester for the credit transfer. It is up to you that an opted course is general replacement of the regular or optional course assigned to you by your department or college. There are many questions related to this point I hope I will try to cover in the FAQ section.

UGC

University Grants Commission (UGC), Department of Higher Education, Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India implement the policies for the best education and research in all UG, PG, and Research Institutions.

At present when I am writing this blog i.e. 12/04/2020 I couldn’t see any source of online courses directly through this portal. For the courses, you can click this link UGC COURSES.

The UGC now following decentralised approach, and have set up 6 major regional centres in India, while the main centre is in New Delhi. These centres are located at;

  1. Pune
  2. Hyderabad
  3. Kolkata
  4. Bhopal
  5. Guwahati
  6. Bangalore

UGC MOOCS

FOR PG STUDENTS:

 

UGC MOOCS FOR UG STUDENTS

Courses are:

 

For more details about the UG/PG courses you can visit INFLIBNET.

For more details about the functionality of UGC, you can visit the UGC website. The main role of UGC is to maintain and enhancement of the higher education quality in all listed colleges or universities and Institutions.

UGC along with INFLIBNET and other bodies evaluate the quality of education and research parameters to appreciate the institutions, that include several parameters. In general, an institution that is accredited by the NAAC receive the grades (based on CGPA A, B, B+, B++)and called a NAAC accredited institution.  In India, all the higher education institutes are bound to accreditation. They have to follow this process to be a part of the UGC. The accreditation committee is known as the National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC). For more detail, about it, one can visit the website.

CEC

The Consortium for Educational Communication is for under-graduate education like BA, BSc, BSc (Ag), BFA, BD, BCom, BMC, etc. are under the CEC. If you are non-engineering graduate student you can watch your courses here in the list of courses.

But the main point, this is not organized as the NPTEL, while for some courses CEC exempted the examination fees (that is around rupees 1000/- ) provided student pass the course. The last year they exempted the “Digital marketing” course fee and refunded it in the same account by the online process.

The CEC should also follow the LOCAL Chapter approach for spreading awareness among students and teachers. Yes, if you opted any Swayam course you can interact with your teacher/mentor online and they reply you.

PROS and CONS of CEC

The CEC can play an important role provided to follow some approaches as similar to NPTEL. I have some points here:

  1. SPOCs through Local Chapters approach should be implemented
  2. Organized the CEC YouTube Channel, no course playlist, no description of the topic in the video (on youtube) and not about the playlist from there all other related videos students can search.
  3. Most teachers use PPT (full of text) and are not interactive, more focus on reading not to physics.
  4. No responses to the comments
  5. Limited courses availability, old videos are in pieces on the channel.
  6. Mode of communication are not regionally specific, no doubt English is essential but for the explanation and better understanding of the students, it should be a mix. I feel traditional courses are adopted by the local students, so teaching should be keeping in mind the demographic status also. Second thing, you can not change physics or science when you know.
  7. Explanation with Hindi and English for Rajasthan, UP, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Haryana, and Himachal students
  8. Non-availability of science practicals demonstrations and simulations, so the student can run virtually, derive the results and the purpose of performance (Amrita Virtual lab and IITK efforts are appreciatable), but not popular as they should be.
  9. Opportunity to all teachers irrespective to the known Institutions, if they have sufficient knowledge and experiences.
  10. Not all teachers feel comfort when the video is recorded, so at least of 3 months of trial (online presence on live channels and feedback there) should be some sort of parameters before shortlisting of the concerned teacher for the video tutorials.

In favour of the second point mentioned above, I am referring a CEC playlist of Physics course 

e-PG PATHSHALA

Being a Physics teacher when I tried to search Optics video, I have observed some videos were scattered in the playlist. I don’t know how much difficult is to organize the list course wise in a specific category. We have to avoid parts in the video title and more focus on Physics instead of reading the text in video lectures.

These are some points which one can observe, but the point is can you take some help from these videos when enough quality content is available with demonstration and visualization on internet?

Yes, we have to review this channel with a positive angle, from the end-users point of views.

The latest courses you can create with some technology so it may comparatively more interactive. Also, you can visit the e PG Pathshala that is for the PG students especially. One can find all related subject information there. There are video lectures of senior professor of reputed universities but most of them I have noticed in the Physics case are from Delhi University.

The text and video are available for all the topics, so one can assume the time consumption on one course along with the money for this purpose.

If you are silent learner, and you don’t have a book or relevant information these video lectures definitely will help you.

I am in the mood to review now all these irrespective to the benefits of the online courses. Actually, in India, our teachers are not ready to accept the technology in teaching. Still, in the LOCKDOWN phase people who have taken initiative and recommended the online process, some are saying that online teaching can’t replace the classroom. I don’t know about this attitude, but I enjoy online teaching and learning.

Suggestions

When you start something new its pro and cons of technology remain in the education system, no doubt. But to see all the review points we can improve for the next series. Here, I have noticed some points for the Physics series;

  1. All the videos are static means instructor looking his/her PPTs and explaining the physical concept nicely. Because all are senior professors so trying to provide the best explanation with their hand’s movements.
  2. I have a question here to the concern who provide the design of the PPT and background of instructor, could you not find any eye-catching design and background? These videos are supposed for young students.
  3. All these courses are developed near to the year 2018 not so old. Then why teachers are technically handicapped in all videos?
  4. Please avoid this uniformity in presentation and allow the teachers to select the design of PPT.
  5. In the next series allow Pen-Tablet along with PPT
  6. Please try to add some animation, simulation in the presentations wherever are required.

Benefits Of the Students

The ePG Pathshala is useful for the students, who want to prepare their course through text and video content. These video tutorials are created by senior professors. All these videos are available at their channel named as “Vidya-Mitra“.

Or you can select your course directly from here;

If you see all courses and content, in each course this is a great effort by the MHRD for the students.

The CEC has twenty-one media centres across the country and trying to fulfil this goal. In addition to the CEC, there are 32 SWAYAM PRABHA DTH channels where 242164 titles are listed. This is the largest video repository in India where you can find all courses like Arts, Literature, Language, Social Sciences, Natural and Applied Sciences and Management and Professional courses.

NCERT Online Course at SWAYAM

The National Council of Educational Research and Training is for school education to provide the quality and latest content to the students. NCERT take care of research in school education, digital techniques and collaborative approach in learning.

The NCERT efforts towards online courses and teaching can help our young generation a lot. Because at present a big amount is spending on the Tuition of school children. This is more critical in-class +1 and for class +2 students.

If you are looking online courses for the class +1 and +2 you can visit NPTEL Online Courses website for the upcoming and current courses.

Here, this is starting and in coming days more online courses will be available for the primary and secondary, senior secondary students.

NIOS Online Course at SWAYAM

The National Institute of Open Schooling is the best option for those children who somehow left their education in between due to some reason. You are free to give the exam as per your choice and this was the first step towards academic freedom.

This is true no one can stop to learn in any stage, the NIOS is the best platform to complete the school education. Its certificate is applicable at all places and equivalent to the same as other boards. No harm and need to discourage at any time if somehow you get failed in your attempts, select your choice courses here and achieve your life goals.

For the teachers and students courses are available and its speed will increase soon in the coming days. You can visit the NIOS online course website for more information.

IGNOU

Indira Gandhi National Open University for out-of-school students is known for distance education at a higher level. IGNOU online courses will help to the students for new courses at the remote areas. These online courses you can find at the IGNOU online course website. Please login here and keep update your self for the new learning.

IIMB

The Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore for management studies online courses. This is one of the leading management education institutes in Asia. You will be surprised to see that IIMB is the first management school in India to offer MOOCs on the edX.

High-quality teaching and learning from the top Institute professors is an opportunity for the students. If you want to enrol in the IIMB online courses you have to visit this website for upcoming and current courses.

The examination pattern in the IIMB course is similar to the other platforms. There you will see online quiz and assignments and finally a paper.

  NITTTR

The National Institute of Technical Teachers Training and Research (NITTTR) for Teacher Training programme is situated at different locations in the country. These institutes are part of MHRD and mainly for engineering education development in the country.

NITTTR contribute to the engineering faculty development programmes. You can join their courses to get the benefit of FDP in your promotion or related areas.

If you are interested to join NITTTR Online Course you can visit their website at free of cost but if you are interested to get a certificate then you have to pay fee near about Rs. 1000/-.

CEC

SWAYAM STATISTICS

  Partnering
Institutes		 Completed
Courses		 Student
Enrollment		 Exam
Registrations		 Successful
Certification
NPTEL 26 1660 8163683 881514 631545
CEC 19 356 518172 13800 8524
UGC 133 263 284766 12310 9289
IIMB 3 58 144561 4861 3383
NIOS 1 130 2942319 0 0
NITTTR 3 22 65598 1561 961
IGNOU 3 52 91458 1485 962
AICTE 7 132 255565 7 0
NCERT 8 75 75870 0 0

 

CONCLUSION WITH SUGGESTIONS:

The online learning is based on the academic freedom concept. The learner, learn the things with their own pace, beyond the boundaries of the classroom or academic enviornment.

Here, no doubt NPTEL is fulfilling that purpose with all possibilities. Like the flexibility to submit the quizzes and assignments according to the individual pace, but with some limitations. They are following good model of the LOCAL CHAPTERS that CEC and UGC should follow (if there are, I haven’t seen that).

The mode of presentation and designs needs to improve in CEC and UGC video lectures. The IIMB, NPTEL and some others are using dynamics in the videos effectively.

ePG Pathshala has to look at their depository, for the old videos, some links are not working.

Local teachers should get equal opportunity to create the online video tutorials, irrespective to the language, affiliation and experiences. Online persence (popularity) of the Subject Master on YouTube, Websites should be a parameter for the selection of SWAYAM online courses.

School and Colleges, along with all universities and research Institute make sure to put the SWAYAM content on their websites. All institute spread the SWAYAM online courses information among the students and faculty staff.

Overall this is great time to look the opportunities in online teaching and learning, also initiative took by the Government of India. We are on the right track and will try to fill the technology gap in our education system.

The promotion of these online content should be in such a way that this information reaches with simple and effective way at the target audience.

The NIOS and NCERT has suppose to provide online courses in the regional languages with more interactive form. Using the latest technology and tools.

If particular course is not attracting students attention that should be review and modified with required changes.

CREDITS:

The information is extracted from the swayam and related websites, that are hyperlinked with the text. These are my personal views based on my emotional and professional experiences. For more information one has to visit the concerned website, those are acknowledged here.

FIND MORE:

If you are looking unique educational course content, definitely this website will help you, and you should follow it.

 

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Dr Sushil Kumar
Dr. Sushil Kumar, a physicist, an eminent researcher and a teacher for the benefit of students and fellow physicists alike. Apni Physics is an effort to create a better platform and also to help the students to be able to have content at their hands whenever they want, online. Dr. Sushil continues to upload his lectures and post articles about latest researches in physics, academic, physics education, and also lessons about daily life and how physics define every aspect of our everyday movement and life.
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Mrs sachdev M
Mrs sachdev M
1 year ago

I’m a soft skills trainer and would like to be associated with swayam

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