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Tag: Student Management Software

Strategies for Implementing an Enterprise Resource Planning System in Ghana’s Public Universities

Posted on by Hemant Mahajan

Educational institutions on a global scale are taking a major turn towards digital transformation and institutions are getting more systematic, aligned, and effective using technologies like ERP – Enterprise Resource Planning, SIS – Students Information System, and more. 

Ghana’s education system is also changing rapidly, and public institutions here are choosing ERP/SIS for overall management and growth. When it comes to the education ERP system, it’s often known as SIS (Student Information System).

If your institution is considering an ERP/SIS system as supportive software for managing all the academic & administrative tools, you are on the right track. 

An SIS system can efficiently help educational institutions by making all the academic and administrative solutions easier for all the stakeholders, like student management, and faculty management, and even helping parents with the best prospects. But with all these, Ghana’s universities must learn about strategies for implementing an ERP that will help the institution’s overall management. 

Strategies for Implementing an Enterprise Resource Planning System

Choose the right ERP/SIS platform 

Multiple vendors provide ERP services to educational institutions globally. Institutions in Ghana must choose the right platform & vendor that can effectively provide all the needs and requirements. The right ERP system can help save time in institutional tasks, eliminate tonnes of paperwork, and collates everything in a central place accessible to all stakeholders, like principals, teaching, administrative staff, parents, students, and more. 

Smooth & clear communication between ERP vendors and administration 

Communication is considered one of the most vital parts of educational institutions. It needs to be effective in any form.

Various things need to be discussed while implementing an ERP system in your institution, so it is a must that the ERP vendor you choose must assign you a team that can communicate and connect with your administrators and faculty members. The ERP team should also understand your needs & requirements and explain all the functionalities and features like student management software, admission management, fee management, and any other that can help you in the long run. 

Analyze & research 

Institutions in Ghana are on an ultimate digital transformation journey, they need to analyze & perform proper research before implementing an education ERP/SIS system. You have to analyze & research each & everything that can become more efficient after ERP implementation. You can study details from your institutions like

  • Inquiry & admission 
  • Fee management and accounting operations 
  • Program & course management 
  • Examination management 
  • And a lot more… 

Understand the product from demonstration & templates 

An Education ERP can help educational institutions in the best prospects until and unless all the stakeholders here know the complete functionalities of the software being used. The ERP vendor you choose must provide you with a comprehensive demonstration & tour of the product along with customizable templates according to your needs. 

2-3 rounds of detailed product demonstration can help in the effective implementation of ERP concerning the needs & requirements of the institution.

Carefully manage the data migration 

While implementing a new and modern ERP, you must be exceptionally careful in transferring or migrating important data from a legacy or a manual system. Firstly you will need to differentiate and select your necessary data that needs to be migrated in any case, keeping aside the unnecessary information or data. 

While migrating the data, your staff and administrators need to be attentive along with the ERP migration team. To understand it better, let’s say, your institution owns data for 12K stakeholders. So this huge data will need to be migrated using some integrations like MS tools or any other tool. For this, it becomes too crucial that the ERP you choose must have all the capabilities to migrate the data along with having interoperability features with other systems. 

How does Academia ERP help Ghana Universities/Institutions?

Among n-numbers of ERP vendors across the world, Academia ERP stands out to be different and exceptionally helpful for educational institutions across the world. Looking into Ghana’s digital transformation journey, we are a part of various universities/institutions in Ghana. 

Being one of the core ERP presenters in the world, we follow an institution-centric approach that focuses on accomplishing the customizable needs of all stakeholders. We have a tremendous implementation process with a highly qualified team that supports all the pre-implementation & post-implementation processes. It also provides integration with all the pre-built connectors/plug-ins, Web services API, and integration platforms along with having a multi-center capability feature supporting multiple academy locations of an institution.  

Watch the video to check the reviews of one of our prestigious clients in Ghana:

How Education Management Systems Are Revolutionizing Student Learning Experience

Posted on by Hemant Mahajan

The new generation of students is different, having a modern approach for everything, they demand a quick, easier, and better way of performing any operations. So for this, it is high time for educational institutions to adopt modern techniques and ways that can help in optimizing a better student learning experience. What do you think about an education management system? Do you know why student experience is important for institutions? How can it help institutions in managing all the operations in a more systematic way that can lead to revolutionizing the whole student learning experience? Let’s discuss all these points in this blog. 

First of all, let’s discuss why student experience is important! 

Why is student experience important?

Students in any educational institution needed to be considered as a priority, for this, institutions can adopt modern tools and techniques like an education management system to provide seamless learning experience automating and streamlining all the academic and administrative operations in the institution like enrollment, records, teaching, homework and assignment, library management and a lot more. Isn’t it interesting?

How is the Education Management System helping to Improve the Student Learning Experience?

  • 24/7 Access

The education management system provides easy 24/7 access to everyone, students can check and submit their assignments anytime, can access their fee details along with receipt generation at the time, important mails, library, and whatnot! They can operate any feature anytime according to their flexibility and requirements. 

It results in saving time and efforts of students that can be consumed in other productive activities. 

  • Offer Centralized Access 

In an educational institution, multiple things need to be managed at different ends. Various tasks need to be managed at each end by administrators, staff, and students. Right from admission to alumni, there remains a bundle of works. Having an education management system, institutions can provide required access to every individual on the same platform eliminating extra time, effort, and chances of errors.

Easy and Convenient!

  • Analytics and Reporting 

Students often in institutions complain about a lack of timely feedback, exact analytics, and reporting of tasks that hinder their learning experience. With manual interventions, students often have to wait for things like feedback, approval, and even their performance reports.  

An education ERP helps institutions to generate all the reports along with real analytics on the time. It helps students in staying motivated and encouraged towards their end goal i.e., their studies. It also helps faculty to get a clear picture and in-depth understanding of a student’s learning curve.

How easy! 

  • Customization of Learning Experience 

It is the best feature that institutions can initiate using an ERP system, it provides real-time access to customize the learning experiences for students. Faculty can create customized homework and assignments, can provide assessment details, can discuss passages to discuss queries with students, can use podcasts to improve their learning skills and a lot more. 

So isn’t this customization that can generate more ideas and techniques to learn and attain institutional objectives? 

  • Reduced Paperwork 

Any educational institution involves a lot of data and paperwork. Hopefully, you will also agree that more paperwork and managing those papers and documents is the hardest and messiest thing, not only for students but also for faculty and other staff, right? An education ERP can help institutions to improve the student experience and faculty experience by exchanging papers and documents with computerized processes and management. 

An effective ERP manages all the documents, right admission forms, examinations papers, result paper, and all other documents can be created and sent using the mobile app and portal which reduces the time, efforts, wastage of paper, and of course easiest access. 

What do you say? Easy enough! 

  • Encourages Continuous Learning 

As discussed, an educational institution involves lots of necessary tasks like fees, examination documentation, and many others. All these occupy a lot of time for students in manual processes. So having an education management system, institutions can provide students with a mobile app that can simplify and automate all important operations like fee submission, examination timetable, entrance card, results declaration, and all other things, they will also get notifications like when is the next slot for fee submission. A mobile app associated with an ERP helps in encouraging continuous learning reducing the excessive time from other administrative tasks. 

Relief from other tasks means the right to focus on studies, right? 

  • Effortless Communication 

Effortless communication between students and faculty is the most important element in any educational institution, it needs to be efficient for the smooth functioning of the institution and to provide a revolutionizing student experience. An ERP software helps educational institutions to achieve this objective effectively providing platforms like mobile apps and portals for operating all the operations and communicating thoroughly as and when required. 

Easy communication breaks all hurdles! right? 

Academia – A revolutionizing ERP software for educational institutions

Various ERP vendors provide good ERP software for educational institutions, but institutions must focus on having a platform that focuses on the 360-degree development of the institute. Academia Education Management System helps institutions to indulge in the digital world making everything smooth and easier for students and faculty along with providing a 360-degree development of the institution. 

Also check:

Top 13 Reasons Institutions Should Use Student Database Management Software

Conclusion

Hope you liked the blog and it helped you in understanding how to improve the student experience at university, and how it can help transform the overall atmosphere of your institution along with providing a revolutionizing student learning experience. What do you think, is it relevant for your institution? Get your queries clear with us, request your demo now! 

 

When to replace or renovate your student information system (SIS)?

Posted on by Hemant Mahajan

The educational ecosystem is on the path of change for various years, and year by year institutions focus to adopt changes in technology that can lead to growth and success of the organization, Student Information System (SIS) is one of the most common technological changes that institutions are focusing to adopt from last few decades, but it is important to check that the SIS you are using is supporting your institution to drive changes along with providing you to deliver modern, innovative technology services being the best student information system for higher education.

Let’s discuss how you can evaluate your current SIS and is it the correct time for you to update or renovate your current SIS software attributing the latest research report by Gartner for “Deciding to Replace or Renovate Your Student Information System With the Fitness Attribute Framework”.

Important things to consider while checking the fitness of your current SIS:

1. Evaluating the capabilities

There are various SIS vendors out there who are providing the same outdated technology for SIS that is restricting the ability to deliver new and modernized services. It is also not wrong to say that most the institutions are using the same SIS without any upgrade for many years leading to restricted growth and advancements in the institutions. 

According to Gartner’s latest research report, it is important to assess the fitness of the institution’s SIS by evaluating its capabilities to function, enable, differentiate, and transform the institution. 

It is important to evaluate the fitness of your SIS based on its:

  • Function

The SIS software in your institute must provide the best and most modern functionalities in maintaining the routine operational expectations, performance, uptime, architectural sustainability, routine maintenance, and skillset availability. It should lead your institutional work in a more fast and actionable way along with a touch of modernization and technological trends leading to the overall growth of your organization.

  • Enablement

A modern SIS includes a lot of advanced features and not just administrative operations. It should meet business unit requirements being responsible for workflow changes and education-specific functionalities for financial aid regulation, satisfactory academic progress, common core application, international visa regulations, tax reporting, and legislative mandates.

  • Differentiation

In today’s modern world, it is most important for educational institutions to opt for change that supports the deployment of unique processes along with the capacity to provide a competitive advantage. Let’s say, in the current situation it is important for institutions to use BI and analytics leading to competitive growth in every way. 

  • Transformation

Modern ERP or SIS software works to automate complete processes of all the tasks in an institution that leads to digital transformation focused on aspects like automation, artificial intelligence, digital relationships, personalized interactions, and ecosystem partnering. So the SIS you choose must lead to complete digital transformation along with all the above aspects.


2. Cost quantifying 

Cost is one of the primary elements of the SIS fitness framework if you are thinking of replacing or upgrading your current SIS software, it is necessary to compare and evaluate the costing involved. 

You can especially compare costs and expenses that you will need to spend on upgrading your SIS versus the expenses you were doing with your current SIS. 

It is important to note that if you are using outdated SIS software, it will include various expenses to meet the current criteria of the technological world, and on the other hand an advanced SIS solution will save most of your institution’s cost providing complete automation of all the processes along with easy access from just one click providing everything efficiently and effectively. 

So take your decision wisely choosing an SIS software that helps you in saving cost-effectively.

3. Develop an SIS modernization plan

This pandemic has taught us to opt for technologies that can ease our work effectively, so the impact of this has created a perception for institutions to evaluate the workings of their current SIS and if it is not meeting their expectation criteria it is better to replace and renovate it as the institutions who are not opting modernization are at risk of being left being in the digital business environment, isn’t it true?

So hope you have got the things that you need to consider while evaluating and checking your SIS fitness. Now let’s discuss the advantages of using the best student information system in higher education institutions.

Advantages of using the best and updated student information system in higher education institutions:

  • Complete automation having multiple data backups

Different and modernized from the traditional student information system, an upgraded SIS automatically updates all the data from time to time. With regular and automatic security updates there are very few chances of the student information system getting hacked by anyone leading to complete data security. With all this, it also initiates multiple automatic backups of all the information stored providing the satisfaction of complete data security in any manner. 

  • Increased productivity

A technology updated student information system increases the productivity of institutions, it eases out every task providing access to everything with just a few clicks, it manages all the tasks like admission, library management, course selection, hostel management, transportation, all other hundreds of tasks. So having easy access to everything the staff and faculties get the opportunity to use the time and energy in greater productivity and growth of the students and ultimately of the institution. 

  • Fosters efficiency 

With the best student information system for higher education, the complete operations of an educational institution get automated. Various things like manpower, time, resources, and paper works, get reduced from every perspective. Meanwhile, these things can be used for better processes driving students’ progress and outcomes. Simply, we can say that a technology-upgraded student information system fosters efficiency making everything simple, efficient, and worthwhile. 

  • Comprehensive management 

In an institution, there are various things to manage for every student, so it becomes messy for administrators to manage all the operations of hundreds of students like student registration, attendance, examination, results, and so on. So to ease out all these operations they choose SIS but imagine a scenario where you have opted for an SIS and it is becoming more tricky to manage tasks, the management of all the things will go adverse. So you must choose the best student information system for higher education that is technology updated and can help to automate all the processes with ease, and if you can find one such; then in simple words you can attain comprehensive management of your institution in the best and most effective ways. Just think- isn’t it satisfactory?

Is it the correct time to update or upgrade your current SIS?

So what do you think of the above? Do you think it is the correct time to update your student information system (SIS)? You can also check Gartner’s latest research report that can help you in deciding to replace or renovate your student information system with the fitness attribute framework. Its ideology will help you understand things that you need to keep in mind while analyzing and evaluating the results of SIS software available in your institution. 

Download Gartner’s latest report now!

Wrapping up 

Hope you find this blog relevant and if you think that you need an advanced, modernized, efficient, and the best student information system for higher education, you must check with Academia. It is one of the best SIS solutions having all the latest functionalities that must be there in your institution. We will feel obliged to provide you with a free demo of the system, just reach out to us and our team of experts will be there to manage it for you. 

Download Exclusive Gartner Reports Brought to You by Serosoft (Academia):

Top 13 Reasons Institutions Should Use Student Database Management Software

Posted on by Hemant Mahajan

Educational institutions involve a huge amount of data of students for managing school affairs systematically. To streamline the process of managing student data, a lot of institutions are thinking about school management databases. It helps you to store and organize student-related data in a proper and centralized manner so that you can easily access, edit, or update data if needed. 

  • Manages complete student information

A school management database deals with all the information related to students’ attendance, assignments, academic reports, curriculum details, project details, exam management, grades, achievements, medical history, addresses, accounts, and many more things. It also helps faculties to reach all the student data easily and effectively. 

  • Streamlined coordination and communication

The school database management system helps for better coordinating and remembering all the events and activities that are going to be held in the school in the upcoming days or weeks. It provides a proper look at the data on a single screen and helps to highlight and remember the important information. This helps institutions in better productivity and growth. 

It also allows institutions to circulate easier communication between students, faculties, faculties-parents, and student-faculties and even allows for the school alumni to stay connected with each other. 

Instead of relying on the diary system, a school database management system can send instant updates to the faculties on school events, attendance, and even disciplinary issues over email or SMS. students can also communicate with each other and with their teachers on the discussion boards to clear their doubts and collaborate over assignments. 

The school database management system takes care of the admission process as well. The complete management system accesses the registration process, admission approval, document uploading, test and interview schedules, and much more. The way of managing academic processes is changing, people are attracted to an effective admission system that can provide ease to faculties, students, and parents. 

It also helps students and faculty to fill out the application conveniently reducing long queues to get an application form or to get their admission-related queries and get an application form or to get their admission-related queries answered easily. 

“Admissions are no longer difficult now, they are easier than ever before. 

  • Reduces paperwork 

A school database system helps students manage students’ data automatically, reducing the paperwork and providing effective digital tracking of student data. All the documentation like admission forms, student records, financial aid, paperwork, and all other data can be managed effectively. It also provides proper security of all the records managing and securing the data for future reference to access whenever they are required which is quite complex with paperwork. 

A school database system stores each data properly providing real-time tracking of all the documents with just a few clicks. 

  • Trustworthy and secure 

The school database management system is the most secured and reliable source, it provides a hundred times more security than manually stored information. Student database software helps in storing all the information using a cloud-based server. It also provides multiple automatic backups of essential data to make sure you do not lose your valuable data. Most importantly, it prevents software from getting hacked by any competitor or other cyber suspect. 

  • Proper and efficient attendance management 

The school database management system includes tools that help faculties maintain quick records of student’s attendance. The software provides student attendance management features that require students to check and scan their fingerprints and enter or leave the classroom and school premises. The software also takes care of the attendance of students, which includes half-days, late coming, etc., without any kind of manual intervention. 

It also reduces the faculty’s workload from the monotonous task of taking attendance of each student by calling his\her name. It also allows faculties to directly check the summary of the presence and absence of the students digitally. The most interesting part is this software allows administrators to keep track of faculty’s attendance along with providing them with a quick calculation of their leaves and adjustments. 

  • Transport management 

A student database management system provides easy access to the transportation system of the institute. It manages the complete transportation requirements right from tracking the vehicle to managing and monitoring the salary, working hours, and other tasks of drivers and other helpers in the vehicles. The software provides easy access to parents and faculties to track their kids using the mobile application keeping them updated about the kid. 

  • Timetable management

The school database management system also provides a better school and class management. Timetable creation is considered the most critical thing that involves a lot of time, it also becomes difficult to circulate the timetable among the students as a minor error by a student or faculty can create a lot of confusion, and even in some cases, it can spoil student’s future if the student not downs wrong time table. 

So the school database management system helps with a timetable management feature that helps in scheduling the classes properly. It helps institutions to meet the requirements of different education boards. The tool also enables users to make changes to a timetable as per their convenience along with providing the timetable to students on their mobile app that can be accessed anywhere and everywhere. 

For more information, check out this video about how Student Information Systems Benefiting Educationalists Worldwide:

Bottom Line:

Hope the article helped you to understand more!

So if you are thinking of optimizing these benefits of a school management system in your institute, Academia SMS can be the best option for you. It provides the best system that helps institutions to manage all the academic and administrative operations of an institute. 

So don’t just be an average competitor of other institutes but be a growth seeker focusing on student’s growth and secured future. Contact us today. 

A Template To Shortlist The Best School Management Software Company

Posted on by Hemant Mahajan

Are you the key decision-maker for school ERP implementation in your organization? If yes, here are some factors that can help you find the one in the haystack of thousands of education ERP software providers in the world. Let’s begin.

Factors to consider when choosing the right school management software company for your school 

  • Start by analyzing your needs

You cannot choose the best when you do not know what you want. Identify the needs of your school, talk to your staff, evaluate the problems and analyze the solution that you are looking for. 

Draft an outline of the solution you need to meet your objectives. Depending on the nature of the project, the requirements, and the reputation choose an offshore or onshore school management ERP software provider. 

  • Check the company’s expertise

You would find many companies with good products, but they may not be the right fit for you. You need to prioritize your needs over their vivid technical exuberance. If you need a product that is simple yet effective, that is what you get. Rather than a product with tens of features, nothing meets your needs. 

Talk to the vendors about how their product aims at solving your pain areas. The one that provides you with the right answer demonstrates the product’s functionality to meet your needs, and is genuine about the results that the product would drive is the one that you shortlist. 

  • Reputation

It is very important to understand you are not just buying a school administration and management system but are partnering with the company. Reputation is a very important factor. 

Look for people that are highly professional, and polite and provide you with flexibility. Check their customer testimonials and reviews on reliable sites such as Gartner Digital Markets & G2. Learn what opinion their customers have about their products as well as their services. Some bad reviews are okay, but a company with exceedingly bad reputation in the market is not the right fit for you. 

  • Budget

Cost is always an important factor when deciding between vendors. Determine if the cost of the product falls within your budget. Unless you are confident and the vendor guarantees you ROIs, you don’t want to buy a product that is eating up a large chunk of your school’s budget and resources. Having said that, do not compromise on quality at all. 

Many companies may provide you with an upfront cost of the product but have underlying additional fees and charges. Talk to the vendors about document management, data management, cloud cost, configurations, customer support, data migration costs, setup/training/maintenance costs, etc. 

  • After-sales support 

Unfortunately, there is no product in the world that is going to guarantee you 100% uptime. There would be instances when the product would show some problem running, and that is okay. What you need is a team that is available 24*7 to provide you instant support during these times. A good support, maintenance, and cloud-based solution that can be remotely updated, and upgraded are what you are looking for. 

Wrapping Up 

These were some factors that can help you decide between hundreds of school management ERP software. If you are looking for a vendor, you can consider Academia ERP which is a leading solution provider for eminent schools in 22 countries. Request the Academia school management system demo here. 

A Guide To Choice Based Credit System

Posted on by Hemant Mahajan

The education ecosystem is changing rapidly, there are various changes and one of them includes a Choice Based Credit System (CBCS). This grading system changes the traditional teaching-learning system in India. 

To maximize skill-based education & enhance student learning outcomes in terms of their grades as well as skills, the National Education Policy has made some crucial changes in the traditional teaching-learning system in India. The right to choose subjects & the multidisciplinary education approach are the best takeaways. 

Do you know what a choice-based credit system is and how it can help higher education institutions? Let’s discuss it in this blog:

What is a Choice-Based Credit System?

The CBCS is a University Grants Commission (UGC) initiative and promotes the liberalization of the current conventional higher education models. With a student-based approach to learning or acquiring higher education, the CNCS allows students or learners the flexibility to choose their course from a list of elective, core, and soft skill courses.

A credit system for higher education measures different parameters like –

  • Student performance
  • Learning outcomes
  • Entrepreneurship skills
  • Contact hours
  • Innovation
  • Creativity & talent

UGC has categorized the groups as

  • Core Course – Core courses are there every semester and students have to compulsorily study the core or the main subject to meet the requirement of the program of that particular discipline.
  • Elective Course – Here, the student can choose any paper
  1.   Discipline-Specific Elective Course
  2. Generic Elective
  3. Project
  4. Ability Enhancement Courses
  5. Skill Enhancement Courses
  • Foundation Course
  1. Compulsory Foundation
  2. Elective Foundation
  3. CBCS moves away from numerical marking to grading semester-wise with two semesters in a year where students’ performances are evaluated and grading is done subject-wise.
  4. The CBCS works in compliance with other grading systems of institutes, all over the world.
  5. Different evaluation methods are followed, based on the suitability of the course approved by various legislative bodies.
  6. UGC recommends Letter Grades and Point Grade Systems to be applied
  7. Letter Grades are based on a student’s marks or percentage from his/her course
  8. Grade Point Systems are where marks are converted into grades based upon a fixed period.

What are the Features of CBCS?

Having multiple features of the Choice Based Credit System (CBCS), let’s discuss a few of them:

  • It is one of the best features as credits can be transferred if the student changes his/her branch of study
  • It has changed numerical marking to grading
  • It positively stigmatized the criteria of failing students
  • It facilitates student mobility
  • It provides potential assess to faculty members for student’s performance
  • It promotes easy course evaluation and is accessed to provide an effective and balanced result.

How Does CBCS Work?

The CBCS in higher education works on the simple principle of the choice being in students’ hands. Higher education institutions provide subject options to students, with a CBCS, students can choose subjects according to their choices and the credits needed for a particular semester. 

The students can attend any of the needed classes obtaining credits to pass any semester. 

A CBCS owns the following elements:

  • Semesters

In any educational institution, assessments are done semester-wise. A student progresses based on the courses taken rather than time like three years for science, arts, commerce, or four years for engineering, etc. The CBCS format provides flexibility in creating the curriculum and assigning credits based on the course section and patterns of learning and teaching. 

  • Credit system

Each course is assigned with a fixed credit. When a student passes a course, he gets the recognition of credit which is based on a course. If a student enrolls in a single course in a semester, he does not have to repeat that course later. 

  • Credit transfer

There are various ways for a student to cope with the study load and with a CBCS pattern he owns the freedom to study fewer courses, earn fewer credits and compensate for the next semester. 

  • Comprehensive continuous assessment

It provides a continuous evaluation of the student to the faculty members and also to the student himself. 

  • Grading

CBCS includes grading in a 10-point grading system. 

It includes

O (Outstanding): 10 

A+ (Excellent):9 

A (Very Good): 8

B+ (Good): 7

B (Above Average): 6

C (Average): 5

P (Pass): 4

F (Fail): 0

Ab (Absent): 0

Core Advantages of CBCS that Academia Modules Includes:

  • The student has a choice of inter/multidisciplinary courses:

With Academia, the students can select their inter/multidisciplinary courses in just a few clicks using the program and courses modules. Academia provides easier access to all stakeholders in the institutions starting from the faculty members, students, and parents for selecting, scheduling and finalizing the courses and subjects likewise. 

  • It promotes group work, research, examination, and assignments 

Using Academia modules like examination, assignments, and others, institutions get the authority to work effectively, research, and manage examination-related tasks and assignments, and more easily and efficiently at all levels like faculty members, students, and parents. 

  • Students progress at their pace

Students are the most important stakeholders of any institution, it is important to provide them with the best and Academia provides them with all the student databases provisioning, storing, and organizing all the student-related data and information. It can easily access, edit, or update data if needed.

Conclusion 

The implementation of the student-centric CBCS system is beneficial for institutes. Academia ERP, which provides the most reliable and trusted solutions to educational institutes, has inbuilt functionality to support the rollout of the CBCS for educational campuses.

How Higher Educational Institutions (HEIs) are set to transform due to NEP 2020?

Posted on by Hemant Mahajan

The National Education Policy of 2020 is a revolutionary step taken by the Indian government. The policy is envisaged to change the current working of Higher Education Institutes in India and allows students to choose multiple disciplines as per their preference at every stage. 

Higher education in India is widespread. It is partially digitalized and has responsibly transformed the country into a knowledge hub and made it a knowledge economy. 

The National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 is based on five fundamental pillars – access, equity, quality, affordability, and accountability. It is designed to change the current education system

with high-quality knowledge resources and skill-based education.  It also primarily focuses on integrity and promotes equality in participation in varied disciplines, irrespective of what social and economic background they hail from.

What is the New National Education Policy?

Through this new education policy, the government of India aims at bringing more than 2 crore students into proper learning. It is projected that this crucial step would allow the government to achieve 100% GER (Gross Enrollment Ratio) in preschool, secondary, and higher education institutions by the end of 2030. 

These attempts are to prepare India to become a “global Knowledge Superpower”, by making the education ecosystem of India more flexible, holistic, and multi-disciplinary in line with the global skill demand. 

Let’s look at the major reforms the NEP 2020 is set to bring in for HEIs in India –

  1. Opens entry for large education institutions

As mentioned earlier, one goal of NEP 2020 is to increase the Gross Enrolment Ratio in higher education in India, including vocational education from 26.3 percent in 2018 to 50 percent by 2035. As per the NEP, 3.5 crore new seats will be added to higher education institutions. The NEP proposed multi-disciplinary, holistic undergraduate education. The Policy is focused on supporting skill education and streamlining educational planning, administration, and management at all levels.

The primary focus of NEP 2020 in Indian higher education is to transform HEIs into 

(a) Research-Intensive Universities (RUs)

(b) Teaching Universities (TUs)

(c) Autonomous Degree-granting Colleges (ACs)

This goal has to be achieved by 2040. 

According to reports, India needs an additional 1500 HEIs to encourage and accommodate more students. The policy proposes the setting up of large and foreign universities. It seeks to promote India as a global destination for quality and affordable education. It will allow high-performing Indian universities to set up campuses abroad while allowing ‘select’ universities in the top 100 in the world to operate in India. This would promote healthy competition among Indian HEIs. 

  1. Promotes Liberal & Flexible Education

NEP 2020 is designed to generate interest among students in the specialized area of research. This will lead to discoveries and acknowledge the importance of invention and scientific outcomes.

Arts and Science streams will not be separated strictly, as well as curricular  & extracurricular activities and vocational & academic qualifications. This is meant to promote a holistic and very versatile learning environment that will nurture open-mindedness and build well-rounded individuals. 

A revolutionary introduction in the Indian context is the freedom for learners to learn at their convenience. The new policy gives flexibility to students to choose from a variety of subjects and move out with a certificate, diploma, or full degree, depending on the number of years spent on the course. It gives students multiple entry and exit points in degree programs, which further encourages lifelong learning philosophy. 

An Academic Bank of Credit will be introduced which will store the academic credits of students earned from different HEIs digitally and these credits will be counted towards the final degree earned.

The policy has also asked HEIs to do away with high-stake examinations and bring in a continuous and comprehensive evaluation system. 

This reform is meant to help the students to nurture their creativity and critical thinking by motivating them to follow their passion in their chosen field. This will completely change the business models of HEIs in the future, along with their curriculum and delivery methods. Technology will be the integral support that will help in this seamless shift. 

  1. Eases Regulatory Structure

According to NEP 2020, there would be one common regulator for all HEIs in India -National Higher Education Regulatory Authority (NHERA). By eliminating the multiple, overlapping regulators, NHERA will create various verticals and cater to different disciplines and simplify degrees or diplomas. This change will ease the regulatory burden of HEIs and will allow them to focus more on their core role of imparting knowledge. The single regulatory system would provide autonomy to HEIs, which is crucial to innovations in education.  

Initiating a New Education Policy in 2022: Key Highlights

  • The policy emphasizes providing quality and affordable education to all students between 3-18 years of age group all over the country.
  • It also focuses on using technology in education to make it more accessible and effective.
  • The focus should be on online learning to ensure the highest quality education for students. As part of the new system, e-learning will be expanded to include online courses, which will allow students to study from anywhere and at any time.
  • It also promotes holistic and multidisciplinary education replacing rote learning.
  • The curriculum in India has been updated to incorporate more concepts and vocational education.
  • The policy seeks to provide vocational and technical education to students so that they are equipped to enter the workforce.
  • This policy introduces a new 5+3+3+4 education structure replacing the current 10+2 system.
  • The policy aims to increase the Gross Enrolment Ratio in higher education to 50% by 2035.
  • According to NEP, learning should be holistic, joyful, stress-free, and a lifelong process.

Conclusion

A change in the Indian higher education system was long overdue, and NEP 2020 marks a bold move away from the long-standing and established rote and herd learning practices in India. 

While the NEP 2020 aims at improving the operative environment for HEIs across India, it reveals the government’s intent to restrict the commercialization of higher education in India.

The NEP reforms introduced in the Higher Education System are set to result in – 

  • Institutional restructuring and consolidation
  • A holistic education eliminating rote learning
  • Internationalization
  • Teachers training
  • Professional education
  • High-quality research
  • Quality universities and colleges

Changes in the overall ecosystem will bring new challenges for educational institutions, staying updated with the latest developments can help educational institutions to address these challenges. For this, a higher education ERP or SIS can help institutions bring digital transformation and automation, you can also schedule a demo now!

A Checklist To Safeguard Your Institution’s Data

Posted on by Hemant Mahajan

Today, data protection is one of the biggest challenges in the education sector with institutions being prone to vulnerabilities and frequently falling victim to massive data breaches. However, a checklist to safeguard data can help improve the overall security and prevent incidents of major data breaches from compromising their reputation.

Higher educational institutions and Schools are data treasure-troves as they often collect and process personal and confidential information about their prospective and enrolled students, alumni and staff. From personally sensitive information like addresses, health records and payment information, these institutions often run extensive networks across different campuses, with thousands of students and staff accessing their online portals through different devices at any time of the day or night. Hence, educational institutions are at high risk of having their data breached. In 2019 itself, Stanford University, education software developer Pearson and Georgia Tech have all suffered data breaches, with Georgia Tech alone having 1.3 million of their records exposed.

While educational institutions are required to take active measures to safeguard their data from unauthorized access, here is a checklist of how Academia can help institutions to protect their data and records.

– High scalability

Scalability in an ERP software is very crucial as it manages an institution’s growth by streamlining operational performance and maximizing productivity. Academia ERP (SIS/SMS/TMS) is highly scalable and can handle the increasing volume of data and the requirement of securely adding new users. The software is a robust solution meeting every expectation of a growing institute or chain of institutes.

This scalability offered by Academia solutions is beneficial for an institution as it allows the institute to focus on its growth and not the challenges associated including compromising on the security while handling huge volumes of sensitive and confidential data.

– Superior flexibility

Academia ERP(SIS/SMS/TMS) can be customised and configured as per the taxonomy of the institute. This allows for a personal touch to the terminology making it easier to interpret and allows even a non-technical person to operate the software easily without relying on technical help. The configuration features could also help to add extra functionalities as needed.

This superior flexibility from Academia makes an institute technologically advanced, future-ready and self-reliant. Academia SIS offers complete and detailed campus management solutions that improve an institution’s productivity, workflow efficiency and boost high ROI by streamlining administrative processes with automation. Academia’s MIS is highly configurable and scalable, aiding institutional growth. It provides data analytics with detailed reports for every department as required. 

The ease of use and familiarity of taxonomy results in lower incidents of human error, one of the major causes of security lapses.

– Diverse Reporting 

The diverse reporting in Academia ERP(SIS/SMS/TMS) offers dashboards for the administrators and for a range of user roles, which is extremely helpful to disseminate information faster from the existing data. It also offers visual aids with graphical representation like pie charts and bar graphs with consolidated data. With diverse reporting, it is easier to find student details year wise, their academic performances, extra-curricular activities, and all other activities. This helps in optimising time and resources while ensuring that reports are seamless and easily accessible in the most secure way. 

Academia’s diverse reporting helps to make more informed and data-driven decisions in the quickest and most hassle-free way. There is no time wasted in going through uncountable files for little details. It is a crucial tool to gain powerful insights into student data smartly and safely. 

– Cloud Enabled 

Cloud computing has become an essential aid for universities, colleges and schools for content delivery, communication and collaboration. The need for servers, storage and software have become essential to share resources, software and information, to computers and other devices.

Cloud computing also dramatically reduces the time, money and infrastructure that educational institutions need to reach out to new markets. The institutions achieve efficiency in operations with centralised control with students becoming more engaged with the available options and teachers focussing more on learner requirements instead of mundane admin tasks.

Academia’s products are cloud based, which helps to reduce risk and enhances data security. The cloud security not only helps the IT teams to recognise and remove risks in the system, but also enables them to create consistent security policies in all the branches of the institution.

Conclusion:

Finally, with the number of cyber attacks on the rise, data security has become a prime concern for educational institutes. Academia ERP software are built to work around huge volumes of data which are easily accessible by those who require to use them, yet with the tightest security possible. There are multi layers and types of information security control to combat abuses and breaches of security, at every level. To know more and learn about how Academia’s customised ERP solutions keep your data safe, among other benefits, please book a demo by clicking on ERP software for educational institutions.

Online only universities in UK – Technology to the rescue

Posted on by Hemant Mahajan

As universities in the UK shut down due to COVID 19 in March, students had to move online to attend live-streamed lectures and swap practical group work for remote assignments. In an attempt to deal with dwindling scholarships, travel restrictions and redefined visa rules, many prestigious universities have moved their courses online. Here is a look at how universities are adapting to a new norm, while using technology for remote learning.

With the pandemic calling for social distancing, it is likely to disrupt normal life for a long time to come. Hence, universities in the UK have shifted to offering online only classes. Leading the pack in the shift to online courses is the prestigious University of Cambridge, which will begin their online only academic year 2020-2021 from October 6. The university announced that it will move its entire course online for the 2020-21 academic year, scheduled to begin on October 6.

The University of Manchester has moved online for the upcoming autumn term with Cardiff University also moving most of its classes online after the summer break. Despite moving online and not being able to offer the intercultural experience that international students seek, it is also believed that top universities like Oxbridge etc will likely be able to attract and retain international students with the UK University degree tag.

In the last few months, there has been totally unexpected changes in the world which should be looked upon as an opportunity for universities to adopt people-centred technology and bring in digital transformation. Today, it can be safely said that the universities meeting this challenge will be the ones to thrive in the future. These universities need to adapt and expand their digital platforms to offer what students really want. The next step would include collaborating with tech companies to create affordable modular online course options, accessible to all.

Universities moving online will have to compete with new formats, including coding bootcamps like Le Wagon, Codeworks and Northcoders which offer quicker, cheaper courses in subjects like web development and data science with in-built industry connections. However, moving online also comes at a cost, Hence, universities in the UK will make sure their investment in digital transformation will be for the long term, especially when they had been lagging behind universities from other countries for years.

Modular Courses

The success of online learning has been experienced with institutes such as The Open University. In recent years, universities like Oxford, Imperial and UCL have also started experimenting with free MOOCS (Massive Open Online Courses) through FutureLearn with a paid upgrade option. These courses have proved to be highly popular with their affordability and accessibility and a degree from an internationally recognised University.

For online courses, the focus today has been moving towards modular courses or even short courses that can be availed from home, to match career choices. Here, technology makes these courses available with excellent existing programmes. For example, Zoom or Microsoft Teams platforms are being used to record sessions and provide apt online support for students. Workshopping technology like the whiteboard tool Miro is a great visual way of showing work. Augmented Reality which already existed in the gaming industry is being adapted to play a part in more practical courses.

Modular learning programmes allowing to pick and mix from different courses is likely to be the model going ahead with students having their virtual shopping baskets filled with the best modules according to their needs instead of signing up for a degree or a higher education programme irrelevant to them. 

Going ahead

The growth and adoption of education technology started even before COVID 19 with global edtech investments reaching US$18.66 billion in 2019 and the overall market for online education projected to reach $350 Billion by 2025. But with COVID 19, there will be a rapid rise in usage of online technology whether it was in language apps, virtual tutoring, video conferencing tools, or online learning software.

Practically, it may look like the future of UK universities is in mixing online curriculum and offline experiences, which is known as blended learning. This will enable social distancing on campus and enhance the experience of studying. Interestingly, some innovative UK universities such as the University of East Anglia (UEA) already offered blended learning even before COVID 19. 

With a consortium of 10 universities led by Coventry recently awarded £3.7m to develop partly online postgraduate conversion courses in artificial intelligence and data science, a lot of universities are taking the online route. The pandemic kickstarted a lifelong online learning agenda which will also skill up employees whose jobs will become automated in the future.

Finally, elite universities will have the advantage of their name and reputation to continue trading on, but for many other universities that bring in students because of location or for a specific course, the future depends on identifying other differentiators to bring in students. Future learning will hence be more about the quality of the learning experience and how geared up universities are to teach remotely in an innovative way using various technologies. 

To get the full benefit of online classes, there is a specific need to go beyond just replicating the physical class through video capabilities and instead, using different collaboration tools and engagement methods which promote inclusion, personalisation and intelligence. With an abundance of ready to use content available across different digital media to enable capability building and meet targeted challenges, Universities will need to use well-designed digital tools for sharing knowledge and support information. The role of technology in online learning will have to be explored to its full potential.

7 Emerging Technologies that are Reshaping Education

Posted on by Hemant Mahajan

In the field of education, emerging technologies are revolutionizing the learning process for students by enhancing the way students, teachers and institutions work. Technology has changed the world and cutting-edge technologies  are reshaping education in innovative and unimaginable ways. Students are getting the opportunities and unique experiences they need and deserve as emerging technologies promise to deliver exciting new resources for learners.

Let us take a closer look at the seven emerging technologies that are earmarked to make major waves and reshape education.

1. Augmented Reality & Virtual Reality

Mixed Reality and Simulations are pathbreaking experiences for learners and teachers too. AR, considered as one of the best emerging technologies in the world, can be used by educators in innovative ways to make lessons interesting and interactive. AR is useful in overlaying interactive digital elements to give real time experience and for promoting skills like creativity, critical thinking analysis and problem solving. AR promises to help learners capture their dreams and imaginations and take learning to the next level.

Virtual Reality, the next big thing in education, enhances student learning and engagement by cutting across all barriers and immersing students in what they are learning and helping them to process information better.

learning and helping them to process information better.

2. Artificial Intelligence

Artificial Intelligence (AI) in education is already transforming the way curricula are implemented in schools, with innovations that would have been impossible a few years back. AI applications have made the academic world more convenient and personalized. One of the key impacts of AI from kindergarten to graduate school is the different levels of individualized learning with adaptive learning programs, games and software, where students can work at their own pace.

AI aims to reshape education by supporting the sharing of first-person perspectives which will be useful for students research. From artificially generated content to image recognition and smart tagging systems, AI is also automating basic activities like grading homework and tests as it takes up a lot of time for teachers. While human grading may not be fully replaced, AI can help in providing detailed analysis of student performance in exams, and help in grading to a certain extent.

AI has resulted in automation of administrative jobs, saving time for educators.

3. 5G Technology

5G is the fifth generation of wireless technology which promises high speed and low latency wireless technology. 5G is meant to change the way educational institutions interact with much quicker downloads and increased efficiency and expanding the scope of connected devices and technology within the classroom.

Some universities have started implementing IoT integration for higher education where lectures and discussions on specialized topics can be conducted through virtual reality experiences. Seamless connectivity will bring in better engagement which will be a big boon for international students, along with faster downloads of files and resources and more powerful networks. 

Interestingly, 5G was supposed to be launched in India in 2020 and would have been extremely beneficial for students learning from home during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, things didn’t go as planned and the launch has been pushed to mid 2021.

4. Internet of Things

The Internet of Things (IoT) has tremendous potential to create smarter and connected schools and is already impacting the education sector by making learning simpler, faster and safer. IoT can save energy and lighting, and sensors across the campus can track traffic and the strategic positioning of security features like lighting would help students and visitors too.. IoT can help break the usual barriers to education like language, location or certain disabilities, besides helping everyone with bottom-line solutions.

5. Adaptive Learning

The Adaptive learning technology provides learning activities to students, based on their needs and learning style and behavior. It helps students with unique learning paths that are based entirely on their interests and learning ability. 

It can play a huge role in the educational system as it uses computer algorithms to orchestrate the interaction with the learner. Although this technology originated from AI, it actively caters with individualized resources and top learning activities to take care of the special needs of a learner.

6. Learning Analytics

When it comes to the process of learning for students, it needs efficient tracking and analyzing to understand results better. This is essential to bring about improvement which is a very important factor in education to improve the learning experience of every student. The learning analytics technology helps teachers to better record the learning rate and behavior of students so that teachers can provide targeted improvements to courses.

7. Blockchain

The Blockchain technology which has changed every industry dynamically, can prove to be very useful in the education sector as well. It is especially useful to collaborate around distributed information in a database. Blockchain can help in examination management, verifying student credentials, verifying certificates, managing life-long learning records etc. Besides effective analyzing and tracking, it can help teachers provide targeted improvement for courses and help students deliver enhanced results.