A "school without teachers" using a combination of cheap makerspaces and the Internet, for rural Indian youth.
India is a country of a majority of youth, most of whom reside in villages. However, India's development has concentrated itself mostly on cities, making them hubs of opportunity, while the villages slid back over the years. Although an agrarian economy, with industrialization the focus shifted on big companies in the cities that made much more money, as opposed to the villages where agriculture became increasingly difficult, owing to lack of Government oversight and innovation. As the capital difference grew, correspondingly the gap in opportunity grew along. One of these gaps came about in the field of education.
The cities had and could afford quality private education, but such access is not available to the villages. The Government schools were quickly proven to be inefficient, with high rates of drop-out, teacher absence, under-capacity of teachers, etc.
The question however is that is it really possible to have great teachers for such a huge population as India which send millions of kids to school every year. So how could we bring the best teachers from around the world to everyone?
The other question is, who can be a teacher? Is the traditional concept of a teacher still applicable, where a teacher is supposed to be an expert and a deliverer of information? Why can't we all be teachers, and students ?
The third question is, what is the kind of education that we need? Is it enough to be book experts, as it is now the case in India. Shouldn't education be practical?
Project DEFY is bringing these concepts through hands-on experience and leveraging the internet. The project aims at creating a system where anyone can learn skills in areas of their interest, from high quality sources, in a completely customized fashion, at a makerspace, with fellow individuals, learning out of curiosity, without teachers. A space which has tools and equipment that are used to build things and to learn while building.
India is a country of a majority of youth, most of whom reside in villages. However, India's development has concentrated itself mostly on cities, making them hubs of opportunity, while the villages slid back over the years. Although an agrarian economy, with industrialization the focus shifted on big companies in the cities that made much more money, as opposed to the villages where agriculture became increasingly difficult, owing to lack of Government oversight and innovation. As the capital difference grew, correspondingly the gap in opportunity grew along. One of these gaps came about in the field of education.
The cities had and could afford quality private education, but such access is not available to the villages. The Government schools were quickly proven to be inefficient, with high rates of drop-out, teacher absence, under-capacity of teachers, etc.
The question however is that is it really possible to have great teachers for such a huge population as India which send millions of kids to school every year. So how could we bring the best teachers from around the world to everyone?
The other question is, who can be a teacher? Is the traditional concept of a teacher still applicable, where a teacher is supposed to be an expert and a deliverer of information? Why can't we all be teachers, and students ?
The third question is, what is the kind of education that we need? Is it enough to be book experts, as it is now the case in India. Shouldn't education be practical?
On a monthly basis, we are interacting with at least 50 users of the space. Most of them from the village. Sometimes we also have some visitors who come and work with the village participants or on their own projects or volunteer. The user base is varied and involves variety of ages from 7 to 24 (currently) and has had participants even above the age of 40 in the past.