Chennai, Tamil Nadu:
The Olcott Memorial Higher Secondary school has provided free tablets to around 120 students in grade to 9th to 12th. These tablets are provided to students to boost the recovery of their studies amid the coronavirus pandemic. The school teaches underprivileged students with no fees and also issues uniforms and other ammonites.
The tablets are provided in a manner to overcome the huge gap of digital divide in the country. Where, almost everything has gone digital. The country still has thousands of people disconnected to the digital age.
Two of the students, Thaslin Parvin and Victoria are studying in 12th standard. They do not have any electronic appliance or smartphone to take their online classes from the last few months, but now they have tablets for their online studies and finally they can catch up with their studies. Thaslin Parvin her father works as clothes presser and the other girl Victoria and her mother works as maids.
Thaslin Parvin gave an interview to NDTV news channel and has shown her happiness after getting a tablet from her school. She said “I only have my dad’s phone. He doesn’t have a network. He has a lot of problems. It’s so helpful.” Along with her, Victoria also expressed that, “It’s very useful. I used to use my brother’s phone before but couldn’t use it after he returned to work.”
Both the girls also said that they want to be lawyers.
A boy of their school, K Manikandan also gets his new tablet for the studies. His uncle and his mother works as domestic workers and he showed his view after getting the tablet, he thinks that this tablet will help him to continue his studies and it will help him to fulfil his dreams.
“I was just sitting at home for five months because we don’t have a phone at home,” he said.
K Manikandan wants to be a part of the Indian Administrative Service (IAS Officer).
The private school is run by the Theosophical Society which raised 16 lakh rupees for the objective. Asha for Education, a US-registered non-profit organisation, distributed 100 tablets, along with that the Rotary Club of Chennai Mitra donated laptops for teachers.
Sashikala Sriram, Honorary University Director, said: “They are all underprivileged children. They should not be denied the right to education. I am happy to say that there are quite a few philanthropists and donors who are care about the nation.“
Two technology geeks Rahul Shankar and Sandeep Rajarajan, who are helping the students and are trying to teach the proper usage of the device to students, at present the school gives the information that all the devices are taking the cost 13,000 rupees for the whole year. Students will have to return the tablets after the end of this year for the upcoming batch.
Rahul Shankar, analyst at a software consultancy firm, said, “We don’t want students to miss out on or lose hope of completing their education just because they can’t afford to buy. a device. Exams.”
Sandeep Rajarajan added, “We want to see how successfully such a profitable model can be implemented where students cannot afford to go digital.”
They are trying to provide such facilities to the underprivileged students.
On the other side most of the people are thinking that the digital divide replacements have been more effective and they have totally changed the studying format.