India’s newest kid in the fast-crowding ICT (information/instructional communications technology)-for-schools market is the Hyderabad-based Helix Technology Solutions Pvt. Ltd. Although the company commenced sales operations just one year (January 19, 2008) ago, the young quintet of IIT-IIM alumni behind the enterprise believe they have learned from the mistakes of pioneers such as Educomp Solutions, Everonn Education, IL&FS-ETS etc and are “in the right business at the right time with the right products”. Within 12 months, the company’s 200-strong Hyderabad-based content development team has developed three “user-friendly student and teacher-empowerment ICT products, which have the potential to significantly improve learning outcomes in India’s classrooms”. Their salient features are detailed below.
LearnNext is a CD-ROM based product which offers NCERT-curriculum mapped audio-visual content in science and maths for classes VI-X students. Launched in March last year after 15 months of intensive research and loaded with audio visuals, graphics, examples, and experiments, it is designed for after-school supplementary learning and to stimulate critical thinking. The package (price range: Rs.199-2,000) also offers revision tests at the end of each lesson and solved question papers of previous years.
TeachNext is the company’s star product developed to help India’s notoriously digitisation-averse teachers community overcome its inhibitions. Modelled after a television remote control device, the sturdy TeachNext box is pre-loaded with K-10 content prescribed by NCERT covering most subjects — maths, science, history and civics, geography, economics, English etc. The audio-visual content can be displayed on any television or computer screen. Launched on October 1, this multi-subjects package is priced at Rs.4,500 per class per month.
Helix Technology’s third offering, SchoolNext combines the NCERT-mapped curriculum content of the TeachNext Box with additional features allowing teachers to modify content, sequence lessons, draw up question papers and conduct student assessment tests. Packaged as a one-stop e-learning solution for schools, it also offers a question papers bank, interactive whiteboard features, and administrative software which can be customised.