SWAYAM

SWAYAM is an Indian government portal for a free open online course (MOOC) platform providing educational courses for university and college learners.

History

The SWAYAM initiative was launched by the then Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) (now Ministry of Education), Government of India under Digital India to give a coordinated stage and free entry to web courses, covering all advanced education, high school, and skill sector courses. It was launched on 9 July 2017 by Pranab Mukherjee, Honorable President of India. SWAYAM has been developed cooperatively by the Ministry of Education and All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), with the help of Microsoft. The current SWAYAM platform can facilitate 2,000 courses. The platform offers free access to everyone and hosts courses from class 9 to post-graduation. It enables professors and faculty of centrally funded institutes like IITs, IIMs, IISERs, etc. to teach students.

SWAYAM has accumulated 203 partnering institutes, 2,748 completed courses, 12,541,992 student enrollments, 915,538 exam registrations, and 654,664 successful certificates.

SWAYAM (meaning 'Self' in Sanskrit) is an acronym that stands for "Study Webs of Active-Learning for Young Aspiring Minds"

Functionality

SWAYAM operates MOOCs learning resources in different ways and structures. Learning is delivered in four ways; e-Tutorial, e-Content, discussion forums and, self-assessment.

The first quadrant is e- Tutorial, which means that there is not much extra work by students. It could include teaching video, animation, PowerPoint presentations, Podcast, and so on. These will depend on the individual subject and the strategy adopted by the teacher.

The second quadrant is an e-content which could include e-books, illustrations, Case studies, Open source content, reference links, further reading sources, etc.

The third quadrant is about clearing students' queries where students can interact with each other and faculty; any student or faculty can answer a student’s question.

The fourth quadrant is self-assessment to check what a student has studied and whether they are eligible to get a certificate. This includes tests in the form of Multiple Choice Questions (MCQs), quiz or short answer questions, long answer questions, etc. The fourth quadrant also has Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) and their answers to clarify common misconceptions among students.

The University Grants Commission (UGC) considers that universities should play a key role in publicizing and popularizing SWAYAM courses among their learners and the university, enabling them to gain from MOOCs on a more extensive footing.

National coordinators

Nine national coordinators are appointed to manage the course content. Each coordinator is assigned a particular area for maintenance.

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

Courses offered

Credit transfer

All the courses offered by SWAYAM are recognized by the government of India. All the courses are valid in the country. UGC announced a “Credit Framework for Online Learning Courses through SWAYAM” Regulations where credit transfer was defined. The UGC regulation requires Universities to make changes in their rules to incorporate provisions for credit mobility and MOOC courses under the SWAYAM platform. Certificates will be given upon completing the criteria of the course taken, and that certificate can be used for credit mobility for academic credits. The current guideline of UGC constrains just 20% of the courses for a degree-level program.

Local chapter

NPTEL is a joint initiative of the IITs and IISC. NPTEL offers online courses and certifications in various fields and has set up a system to provide certificate courses in different colleges across India termed as NPTEL- local chapters. A local chapter will be under one faculty member of the college as one Single Point of Contact (SPOC).

Further under the SWAYAM-NPTEL webpage, two more departments are operated, i.e., timeline, list of active local chapters, local chapter ratings, etc. Other departments show news from local chapters, i.e., local chapter colleges/universities. Each Local Chapter has a separate Coordinator/SPOC.

SWAYAM PRABHA

SWAYAM PRABHA is an education learning platform initiated by the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) available through 34 (initially 32) DTH channels. This initiative provides an educational program on television. As with the SWAYAM online portal, the content providers are NPTEL, IITs, UGC, NCERT etc.

In 2023, the SWAYAM PRABHA started broadcasting educational counselling in Meitei language (officially called Manipuri language) on behalf of the Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) in Imphal. The live sessions for the lectures were archived on YouTube, thereby enriching and the resources for its learners in the language.

See also

• National Digital University

Present time total channel in swayam prabha 40 .(Verify at website)

References

Kumar, K., Mahendraprabu, M. Open educational practices of SWAYAM programme among research scholars. Educ Inf Technol (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10639-021-10495-2