Issues

Education

One of the major issues with computer literacy in Bijawar is basic English literacy because the quality of English education in these schools is poor. Since the options for computing in Hindi are so limited, the students and other people with whom we’re working have to be able to read and understand at least some English. Context menus and dialogue boxes are intimidating because learning the ways in which Windows prompts users to take certain actions are difficult enough without the additional language barrier. Students and even teachers are additionally unable to generate significant content – letters, CVs, lesson plans, essays – in English, which makes it difficult to establish a connection between the skills they’re learning and their lives. Using the Internet is also a challenge without good English skills. While there are efforts being made to generate content in Hindi, the amount of information in Hindi is a fraction of that available in English.

Learning to type in Hindi, using a Hindi font like Kruti Dev, might help with this issue. The problem is that learning to type in English is currently a necessity for operating a computer and using the Internet. While this can be accomplished through the use of free typing software, there is no software to teach Hindi typing. There are books available for this purpose, but it is an imperfect solution that is largely untested at the high school level. Speculatively, I would venture that it requires significant time and effort to learn to type in Hindi, but it certainly bears further research.

Maintenance

The maintenance of these computers is also a huge problem. When we first arrived, the computers were in terrible shape – slowed down by viruses and bloatware, suffering from incomplete Windows installations, and physically gathering dust. Portable USB drives are becoming more common, especially among those who already have a computer, and these thumb drives are vectors of infection. Although we cleaned the computers up, I have no doubt that once the students and teachers begin to use them, especially while connected to the internet, the hardware and software will inevitable develop problems. Our time spent in Bijawar elucidated the clear need for a knowledgeable part-time IT person to maintain the workstations; without someone to keep them running, the computers will be used until something goes wrong (even if that something is truly minor from our perspective) and then they will be basically abandoned. The issue of who these IT personnel are and how they are funded remains to be seen.

Electricity

The electricity situation in India, and especially in Bijawar, is also major problem because there simply isn’t enough electricity to supply everyone at all times. While we were in Bijawar, the electricity was following a three hours on, three hours off scheme. We had power for about 12 hours a day – from 3 am to 6 am, 9 am to 12 pm, 3 pm to 6pm, and 9 pm to 12 am. Besides making life generally difficult, this scheme means that desktop computers can only be run at certain times, limiting their usefulness. Although desktops are cheaper, more powerful, and more reliable, they don’t make a lot of sense in Bijawar because of this issue. The hours for the boys’ high school, for example, are from 12-4:30 pm, so there’s no electricity to run their ten computers when they’re in session. They do have a separate power supply, but desktop computers drain that pretty quickly, and it cannot handle too much of a load at once.

Physical Resources

In the boys’ HS school, specifically, the computers are being kept in a temporary room, crowded together, with no regard to proper wiring or connectivity. The fuse which they’re using cannot handle the load of ten computers running at the same time and periodically smoldered while we were there. The new computer lab that is half-built is stuck at the moment because the funds haven’t been released at the district level, the details of which are fuzzy to me. The people in charge of building this lab additionally don’t have the knowledge about what kinds of things are important when constructing a computer lab. The concrete slabs on which the computers will rest, for example, are only deep enough for a monitor – there is no space for a keyboard. The government sent them official blueprints, but they were unable to understand the plans and so have ignored them.

The final issue is that there are too many students and too few computers. We’ve found that students learn best, at least initially when they’re learning to handle the mouse and type, with one computer per student. There simply are not enough computers to teach everyone, especially when you take into account school hours and the hours during which electricity is available.

Possible Future Plans and Ideas

We are looking into multiple avenues to continue this project in the future. Our first and most important goal is to follow through on the pilot project with one or two sets of ten students, taught before or after school by some of the teachers who are either already somewhat computer-savvy or with whom we worked over the last three weeks. The logistics and details of this plan have yet to be worked out. I also want to check in with the teachers when they’re preparing their students’ marks sheets in March and April, after board exams, to see whether the templates are being used.

The possibility of opening up the computer lab, under supervision, for students or teachers to use by signing up is also something I’m interested in. This extra, free-form time would give students the opportunity to either practice what they’ve learned in their extracurricular classes or to explore the medium by themselves and would give teachers a chance to enter their marks in Excel or to hone their computer skills. In a similar vein, the option of providing computers elsewhere in Bijawar for the teachers to use in their off time is something to explore.

I’d like to find a way to connect this computer literacy to the students’ other subjects or to their lives. Computer-aided education is an entirely different subject, but it would be interesting if students could use Excel to do some math and science exercises related to their coursework. Producing essays and papers is more difficult, because students would have to be fairly proficient at typing in Hindi first.

There is a teacher training camp held every summer for two weeks, in which master trainers go through the coming year’s curriculum and instruct the teachers on how to teach their students. Some of the teachers with whom we worked suggested that one teacher from each school be trained at this camp so that they can train others when they go back to their school. This avenue is worth investigating further.

We want to find a way of contacting the M.P. Board of Education to understand more thoroughly what their plans are regarding computer literacy in rural areas where they’ve sent computers but have not made any visible effort towards developing a sustainable infrastructure within which to actually teach students. If we have more information about the official plan, we’ll be better able to tailor our work to fit with theirs.

In the distant future, I would be interested in exploring computer literacy at the elementary and middle school levels as well, to expose students to technology as early as possible. I’m unaware of any current government scheme to send computers to these schools, however. Students also only begin learning English in the sixth grade, which is a possible stumbling block. They might be able to use drawing software or play games, which would at least teach them basic mouse and keyboard skills and allow them to become familiar with Windows at an intuitive level.

To combat the electricity problem, I’m going to look into public and private schemes to implement alternative energy sources, especially solar power, to run computers.

The last two days have been crazy busy with long hours at the boys’ high school, trying to get their computers up and running. We’ve been trying to get there by 10, so that we can work for two hours on all of the computers before the electricity goes out at noon. Although the school has a UPS (uninterruptable power supply) that can supply some power, it cannot handle more than one or two computers at a time and runs out of charge fairly quickly. After noon, we work on the computers separately, and when the power comes back on at three, we again turn them all on again. Yesterday we actually managed to blow and burn through the fuse by turning on all the computers at the same time, so they’re going to have to look into installing proper wiring when they reach that stage in building their permanent computer lab.

We reformatted the one computer that was having issues with an incomplete Windows installation. We also installed AVG, Adobe Reader, and some free typing software on all the computers. Since the computers aren’t networked, we labeled five computers as “Class 9 Work,” “Class 10 Work,” “Class 11 Work,” “Class 12 Work,” and “Administrative Work” to ensure that any marks sheets and roll sheets that are filled out in Excel can always be found on the same computer (i.e., so that teachers don’t forget which computer they were working on and get confused about where their work is saved). We’ve also made instructions for beginners on how to turn on the computer, open and save files, and turn off the computer that we’re going to paste on each CPU.

Although today was Sunday, the principal gave us the keys to the computer lab so that we could go in and work if we needed to. We tried to go around 3pm, but we found the gate (to which we don’t have the key) locked.

We spent the rest of the day finalizing three templates for them to use in their grading and administrative work: one for the class 9 marks sheets, one for their nominal roll (used to tell the government which students will be taking which board exams and how much they have to pay), and one for their admission roll (basically a list of everyone being admitted into every grade). For the marks sheets, we even used this macro to automatically name the worksheet tabs with the roll number of the student, which will be filled by hand by the teacher using the template. I’m a little worried that all this hand-holding is going to be simultaneously too dumbed-down (what with it’s ‘foolproof’ locked Excel cells so that inexperienced computer users can’t accidentally overwrite formula cells but that also prevent anyone from changing anything, even if the school’s requirements change) and too complicated (for example, figuring out a way to save and print the files in an intuitive, efficient, reproducible way is even more difficult when the people involved don’t have any conception of the Windows file structure). This combination might basically result in no one using the templates we’ve slaved over. The ideal would have been for the teachers to spend a week actually using the templates while we helped them iron out any bugs or user issues.

I’ve been really frustrated for the last few days, now that our time here is winding down, with how little we’ve actually accomplished, despite the fact that I explicitly didn’t come into this process with any concrete goals. Three weeks really isn’t enough time to help enact meaningful change, but it just seems like all of our focus lately has been on getting the boys’ high school computers in a state where they can be used by the students and teachers. This time spent has elucidated the clear need for a knowledgeable part-time IT person to maintain the workstations; without someone to keep them running, the computers will be used until something goes wrong (even if that something is truly minor from our perspective) and then they will be basically abandoned. I’m also worried that the school won’t even get this far and that no one (besides the administrative assistants who produce things like the payroll, which is required by the government to be submitted electronically) will use the computers at all.

We’re trying to work on convincing the principal to allow students and teachers to use the computer lab in the mornings from 11-12, but he seems mainly concerned with, again, things which are absolutely mandated by the government, like the payroll. The cynic in me wants to say that the only reason he’s been so enthusiastic about our efforts to get his computers working is because he’ll no longer have to pay a sizable amount every month for one of his administrative assistants to go to Chhatarpur and have someone with an internet connection to fill out the form online, but I know this is an uncharitable analysis of the situation. Hopefully we’ll be able to find an angle that will inspire him to allow the students (for whose benefit this whole school exists!) and teachers access to the wealth of resources the school now possesses.

I wish we could have worked with the teachers to formulate a concrete plan to teach students computer skills, which they could have presented to their principal. I’m uncomfortable lobbying him ourselves, since I wasn’t really looking to plan anything or start a program myself, but we’re sort of out of time and options if we want the computers to be used after we leave. The information we’ve gathered indicates that a pilot project with 30 students and a dedicated teacher (who might be able to be funded by an external grant if there’s no money in the school budget for this position) from 11-12 am every day would be the most feasible.

Another source of frustration for me has been how little we’ve accomplished at the girls’ high school. In retrospect, I suppose this was inevitable, since there’s only one computer in the principal’s office, and the little work we were doing there wouldn’t have produced a sustainable plan until April.

Yesterday and today, we haven’t worked with the women teachers in the evenings because two of them are taking are taking the PSC (Public Service Commission) examination in Chhatarpur and one of them hasn’t been showing up lately because it’s gotten so cold in the evenings. (Seriously. I was wearing five layers yesterday. It’s not that much colder in absolute temperature than California, but the lack of indoor heating provides no respite from the cold anywhere.) Tomorrow we’ll be meeting with them again to wrap up our time here and encourage them to continue their education, as well as start programs at their respective schools to begin educating their students. Actually, Menka came by today (with her sister, who I’d asked to do henna on my hands) and mentioned that she wanted to talk with the principal of the boys’ high school to see if he would allow her and other elementary- and middle-school teachers to use the computer lab at 10 am, before they’re required to be at school. This is the kind of plan I’m thrilled to see being undertaken, because it indicates the sustainability of the meager work we’ve managed to do here.

The main point that came out of this two-hour discussion was that training teachers in computers must become compulsory, which will be necessarily accompanied by computer education becoming a part of the government school curriculum. The women believe that this effort will become fully actualized within the next few years.

There is a teacher training camp held every summer for two weeks, in which master trainers go through the coming year’s curriculum and instruct the teachers on how to teach their students. It was suggested that one teacher from each school be trained through a similar government effort so that they can train others when they go back to their school.

The ‘too many students, too few computers’ problem was also discussed. The suggestions were mainly along the lines of instituting an hour or two before the official start of school in which teachers can work with interested students. Again, this problem will be better solved if and when the government mandates computer education, because the needed time can then be taken out of the school day.

The current generation of students, according to these women, is heavily into the computer ‘craze,’ both because it’s trendy and because they see that computer skills are an integral part of participating in an increasingly globalized world. This new generation is also more interested in solving India’s problems and concerned about its problems than the previous one. They’re more united in asking for their rights and forming mass movements to exact change. In the nearby city of Chhatarpur, entire blocks of people refused to vote to register their distaste for some political process. I’m not sure whether this is a phenomenon specific to a generation or whether it is a function of the idealism that accompanies youth of any generation. It might be some of both.

The women also want to see the establishment of a computer center in order to provide computer access to people (especially teachers) who don’t have (and can’t afford to buy) one for themselves. At Menka’s school, some of the teachers are thinking about pooling their money to purchase a laptop for the group with which they can begin teaching students.

The biggest obstacles they see themselves facing in continuing to develop their computer skills are time and money, as well as the social pressures exacted on young, unmarried women. For example, it’s dark by 7:00 pm, which is when they come by every night to work with us. It’s frowned upon here for women to be walking around after dark, but they’ve made that commitment to come anyway because they want to learn. Many of the women are escorted by their husbands, fathers, or older male children on the way here and back, or they travel in groups.

One woman talked about how she doesn’t feel right asking her parents for thousands of rupees to get her PGDCA (some sort of degree in computer education) because they are expected to spend hundreds of thousands of rupees on the weddings of she and her four sisters.

I’m really glad we had this meeting, because it helped bring everyone up to speed on the research we’ve done and figure out how the motivated teachers are thinking, what their needs are, and how we can help them. That was, after all, the original plan.

In the afternoon, we visited the boys’ high school and met with the principal (above in blue).

The school has ten computers, but for some unknown reason, Microsoft Office has only been installed on two of them. The computers sit in the above room, mostly gathering dust; everyone seems to be waiting for the new computer lab to be finished, but no one really knows when that’s going to happen. At one time, they had landline Internet access, but their service was cut off when they stopped paying the bill.

The two teachers on the left above are Salar (social science) and Ashish (physics), both of whom seem to have good computer skills. Although we didn’t spend a lot of time with them, they were able to speak knowledgably about Windows, Office, and the Internet. They also know how to code in HTML and wanted to learn C++. It was disheartening to see the neglected state of these brand-new computers and to hear that no efforts were being made at teaching the students, despite the fact that two of the teachers know a lot. There just doesn’t seem to be any plan, or guidance with which to make a plan, geared towards using these (or any) computers for the students’ benefit. There is also a disconnect at the governmental level between providing computers and providing the teachers, lesson plans, and other resources necessary to effectively teach computer skills to the students. As far as I can tell, computer literacy isn’t a priority for the school.

One of the major challenges that we’re running into is one that, except for English, all of the classes in these Hindi-medium schools are obviously taught in Hindi. The teachers’ lesson plans and class materials, therefore, are all planned and written in Hindi – and Hindi computing is no easy task. Even typing in Devanagari within Word, though possible, is time-intensive; it is often easier to simply write out things longhand than to deal with the unwieldy keyboard mapping.

It may turn out that the teachers will find little use for computers in preparing materials for their classes. This is a problem to be solved another day. Although unfortunate, this fact doesn’t stop teachers from learning computer skills in order to teach their students. My goal is still to bring computer literacy into the mainstream village education institution.

I’d like to work with these two boys’ high school teachers, plus Divya – who also works there – to develop a plan to teach computers to the high school students and integrate computer use into their existing curriculum. Many of the administrators and teachers we’ve spoken to get stuck on the idea that, in order to teach computer skills, there needs to be a dedicated period and teacher set aside every day, both of which cost money and resources that government schools often don’t have.

We want to counter that assumption with the introduction of an integrated scheme, in which teachers might be able to require that students, for example, submit one typed essay a month in their English classes. At such a small scale, the requirement wouldn’t be a burden for students who don’t have access to computers outside at home, because they could use the ones at school before, after, or during scheduled class time (these details would have to be worked out with the teachers and administration). At the same time, they would be using the computers in a constructive and productive way, finishing schoolwork while learning a new skill.

The other issue that we’re running up against is that there are simply too many students for the number of computers and teachers available. Finding a solution to this problem will require more thought and brainstorming.

We also visited with the principal of the girls’ high school. There are four male teachers interested in learning computer skills, two of whom have computers at their homes in Chaatarpur. Starting January 2nd, we’ll be meeting with them on a daily basis to first assess the quality of their existing knowledge and then bring the other two teachers up to speed.

From talking to some locals, we learned that the primary school in Bijawar received computers about seven or eight years ago, and she had even begun teaching the students how to use them. The computers were slowly pilfered by various people who took them home to their families, and nothing was left at the school.

These little kids showed up again in the evening to learn how to use computers. The girl on the left is Ashi. I’ve talked about the boys (Gagan and Sagar) before. They played some Solitaire, typed in Word, and drew in Paint. We’re mostly teaching these kids because they’re so persistent – they drop by before school, after school, before going to tutoring, and after they’re done with tutoring. It’s hard to say no to them.

Later, we worked with Neha, Divya, and Menka again. We asked them to make a formatted grocery list, with all the things they need to buy for their household, in different categories. We also asked them to put prices and quantities next to their items, which caused them to run into a limitation of Word – it has issues putting things into neat columns. The effect is achievable with a table, set to have invisible borders, but such work is much better suited to Excel. The teachers saw for themselves what kind of task is better performed by alternative software, so it provides a great place to segue into teaching Excel skills tomorrow or the day after. We also want to start on the Internet soon.

We also started working with another woman, Neeta, who teaches at the government school in an even smaller village, Jasgowl. She’s been a teacher for eleven years. Her family just bought a new laptop, and she wanted to learn to use it. We’re trying to catch her up to the other women, and she seems to be doing well.

Ten women, plus Prabha and Sonali, showed up, with varying levels of computer experience. Some had never touched a computer before, while others had taken a few hours of classes but never used the skills they learned. Three are teachers in Bijawar and two teach in even smaller villages. One woman works at an NGO, helping to build latrines.

We learned that there a reasonable amount of computers in Bijawar households – estimates put the percentage at anywhere between 30-60%, although that number seems very high to me and probably reflects the higher social class in which these women socialize. Some households have internet connectivity, which they mostly use to run small businesses, charging people for downloading and filling out government job application forms and getting test results posted online. Computers are being used quite a lot for official business, including banking (through the State Bank of India), the village panchayat (government), and the court. The Indian government has provided computers for the boys’ high school, and the girls’ high school is expected to receive some in April. In fact, the girls’ high school already has computers that are several years old and seem to be unusable. I’m planning on visiting both schools in the next few days to see for myself what the condition of the computers is.

The teachers don’t use computers, even if they are available at their schools, due to a lack of training and free time, and there have been very few attempts to teach computer literacy to the teachers at these school. The schemes have all failed due to four factors: they cost too much money, they were offered during inconvenient times (such as during the school day, while teachers are busy at their jobs!), the strange electricity schedule in Bijawar (more on this later), and finally, the dearth of opportunities to use the knowledge learned.

It’s important for a sustainable system that these teachers see the value in passing on the computer literacy they might learn. Teachers could be incentivized to learn and then teach computer skills with if someone subsidized the purchase of a laptop for their personal and work use, on the promise that they would teach in a government school. The model that might work is the same model that most other teachers use, in which they teach everyone at government schools and then tutor their most promising students (who must also have the money to afford private tutoring) in order to supplement their income. It might be possible to subsidize low-income students for such private tutoring as well.

To ensure that students and teachers are getting the opportunity to exercise their computer skills on a daily basis, the curriculum must incorporate them, the same way as is expected in the US. Papers and problem sets and essays must be written on the computer, so that students get a chance to practice their typing and computer skills. I understand that most government school students don’t have access to computers at home, so time must be made in the school day for them to finish typed assignments. Perhaps teachers could require one assignment a month to involve computer use. The utility of computers for students is the power of easy revision – when papers and assignments are written in longhand, it is difficult to write more than one draft or to fix mistakes; on a computer, such actions are trivial.

According to the 2001 census, Bijawar has a population of 18,412 people, of which 53% are male and 47% are female. The literacy rate is 59%, which is a very little bit lower than the national average literacy rate of 59.5%. Males are 66% literate and females are 50% literate. (1). To my knowledge, the economy is mostly agricultural.

The advent of digital literacy in this small village would open up a new economic avenue for a great number of people.

This winter, my plan is to spend three weeks in Bijawar (my first visit in three years!) to determine the infiltration of computer education among both teenagers and adults, begin introducing high school teachers to computing, and develop a plan for a sustainable computer literacy program. By design, these goals are vague and subject to change. I refuse to start this process with preconceptions about what is needed on the ground and prefer to help people in this community actualize their own goals, instead of swooping in to solve all the problems the global North thinks they have. I’m trying to get away from the "modern missionary" mentality.

I’d like to introduce computer literacy to middle- and high-school aged students, mostly because kids who grow up with technological fluency are most able to use their knowledge as adults. The most obvious way would be to simply step into schools and teach the students how to use computers.

The sustainability of this program, however, is perhaps the most important aspect. Three weeks is not enough time to teach an entirely new skill set to 12-17 year old students. I am also not a trained teacher. I believe they would be better served if I focused on training teachers how to use computers to supplement their lessons, with the possible additional goal of helping to train people to be teachers themselves. My family and I have identified some teachers from the high schools who are very interested in learning a new skill, so this idea has some potential.

I’m also thinking about teaching other individuals, probably women, how to use computers with the idea that they might be able to supplement their families’ incomes with a job in data entry or something similar. I’m not yet sure whether this is something I want to do, or whether it’s even viable.

From the information I’ve gathered so far, the Indian government recently granted the boys’ high school with some computers, although I think they might be intended for the teachers’ use, rather than for the students. I’m not sure if anyone knows how to use them or what state they’re in. The girls’ high school has had computers for a few years now, but again, I don’t know if anyone uses them or if they’ve been kept in good condition. There are some households with computers, but the number is probably quite low. There is also no Internet connectivity, barring the expensive option of purchasing a wireless data card. I think there might be some government plans to roll out broadband or wireless to villages such as Bijawar, but I’m not sure what the timeline is on that.

There are private tutoring ("tuition") computer literacy programs for those with the proper motivation and potential, as well as a significant amount of money. As far as I can tell, there is basically no way for the average student in Bijawar to use a computer on a regular basis, so my plan is to bring this type of education to a broader audience. Fair warning: my supposition may not be correct, so we’ll see what the situation is really like when I get there.

I’m leaving the US on December 23, with plans to be in Bijawar from December 26 to January 13. Once I get to Bijawar, my internet connection is going to be limited and erratic, so I don’t know how many posts I’ll manage to actually publish while away. Rest assured I will be writing, though!