Dutch students from the Technical University of Eindhoven in the Netherlands have created a solar-powered motorhome, shaped like a huge teardrop. Expansive solar panels on the roof and on lateral wings allow the vehicle to travel up to 740 km (460 miles) on a sunny day. The team of inventors hope that their vehicle will [...]
October 25, 2021
Loknath Das
Education
China has emerged in the past two decades as one of the world’s largest markets for private education services and home to many of the richest entrepreneurs in the field. Shares in online education firms TAL and New Oriental Education, for instance, have soared during the coronavirus outbreak, fueling anew the fortunes of their billionaire [...]
March 4, 2020
Loknath Das
Education
Nirmala Sitharaman made important announcements about the education and skill development sectors in her budget speech on February 1, 2020. (Photos: India Today/Vikram Sharma and Lok Sabha TV) Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced an allocation of Rs 99,300 crore for the education sector and Rs 3000 crore for skill development in her 2020-2021 Union Budget [...]
February 1, 2020
Loknath Das
Education
Back in the day, e-learning used to be a plan B for students who couldn’t attend classes in the traditional way. Today, online learning has evolved into an effective and highly sought after method of studying and obtaining certifications. Innovations in cloud technologies have been brining great opportunities to online education. First of all, the [...]
November 5, 2019
Loknath Das
Education
The appointment of Gojek founder Nadiem Makarim as the new education and culture minister has been met with mixed public opinion, with a number of people using memes relating his new office to the app-based business. While others have expressed their support, some others have questioned his ability to address various problematic issues in the [...]
October 23, 2019
Loknath Das
Education
Indiranagar resident R Swathi’s 13-year-old son would spend hours playing PubG and FIFA games during summer vacations. It began affecting his concentration. Now, he is allowed only 20 minutes on the tablet or PlayStation. Swathi, however, found it a challenge to control the screen time of her 19-year old daughter. College assignments and projects required her to [...]
August 19, 2019
Loknath Das
Education
Protesters, in London in May, demanding action to address the crisis in education for young people with special educational needs and disabilities. Photograph: Dinendra Haria/LightRocket via Getty The funding crisis in special needs education is deepening, with council overspends on support for children with conditions including autism and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder rising by 30% [...]
August 18, 2019
Loknath Das
Education
The intention is to guide teachers as well as students through the entire syllabus without leaving any gaps in the teaching-learning process. (Photo: Representational image) India does not have a system of education,” proclaimed Prof. Krishna Kumar in his recent talk on “Teaching the Indian Constitution” at a conference in Kolkata. “We have a system [...]
August 13, 2019
Loknath Das
Education
The National Education Policy proposed by the Centre would have done well to emulate the earlier policies spelt out by the Mudaliar and Kothari Commissions even at the cost of being criticised for putting old wine into new bottles. Instead, it has attempted to offer new strategies for education at all levels and ended up [...]
August 2, 2019
Loknath Das
Education
Exposing the poor state of affairs in the J&K’s school education sector, the ministry of human resource development (MHRD) has painted a grim picture in terms of retention rate of students as well as availability of teachers. The ministry has prepared a 290-page document after holding project approval board (PAB) meeting to review and approve [...]
July 29, 2019
Loknath Das
Education
2020 Democratic presidential candidates are shown on a screen as members of the media work during the Democratic presidential candidate debate in Miami, Florida on Thursday, June 27, 2019. Photographer: Jayme Gershen/Bloomberg © 2019 BLOOMBERG FINANCE LP Charter schools are under attack. They are being blamed for draining money from traditional public school coffers. They [...]
June 29, 2019
Loknath Das
Education
The Kerala High Court on Monday stayed the state government’s order to merge high school and higher secondary directorates as per the Khader committee recommendations. The stay was issued based on a plea by the Nair Service Society and other teacher groups. The single judge bench which stayed the order referred to the Central Government’s [...]
June 18, 2019
Loknath Das
Education