Venture capitalists, entrepreneurs and other players in the Indian start-up ecosystem either genuinely believe education (along with sectors such as healthcare and agriculture) are key to India’s progress or they earnestly want this to be the case. But the education sector, for example, is not easily negotiable for entrepreneurs.

Regulations and licence norms stand in the way of good private schools being set up. Deep pockets and the ‘right’ connections help – this is an unspoken, and as yet unaddressed, reality. Over the years, edupreneurs in India have been looking at opportunities in largely unregulated spaces.

inferential understanding

On a local train the other day, I noticed a young lady seated opposite me reading out loud from a chemistry text-book. Repeating equations and entire paragraphs. This is how many of us went through school. But how many of us remember more than a small percentage of anything we ‘learned’ in this manner?

iLeap was started in Mumbai five years ago, later branching out to Bangalore. With four learning centres in operation across both cities, each of them caters to nearly 250 students. iLeap’s after-school and summer programmes are tailored to help children refine their observation, association and application skills.

Noopur Kanchan, one of the founders, emphasises, “Education cannot be commercialised and yet it has to generate returns. Passion and the understanding that no one size fits all are vital. Edupreneurs must have strong technical backgrounds and ensure inferential ability is honed in learners in such a way that every student benefits”.

Reading & play

English, Math and Science are key to young children gaining knowledge of the world around them and operating efficiently in various environments. TheChipperSage, some six months old in the education space, creates innovative products that help children learn these vital subjects in ways that are strongly linked to curriculum.

However, tactile and play elements are strong in TheChipperSage’s approach. Its founders were both technologists in the past; Latha Srinivasan founded Tailorbird, a children’s library that has over 8,000 books before joining hands with Arvind Venkatadri (he was previously heading Akshara Foundation’s Library Programme) to kick-off TheChipperSage.

“English, for example, is taught as a language and not a subject. The focus is first on a child’s understanding of the role a word plays. Many children enter primary school without adequate fluency in reading. They do not read or write at their expected grade levels even when they leave primary school. We’re also working at building partnerships with NGOs and charitable trusts focusing on children, youth and education. Our target market is Tier 2 and Tier 3 schools where learning outcomes are traditionally poorer and the quality of teachers below par,” Latha explains.

Technology, in emerging India, has to cater to both rural and urban markets for everyone to benefit. Future products in the learning space must, therefore, enable collaboration between students and teachers as well as customisation of teaching methods.

The Mangoreader has attempted this. It eases the process of content creation for blended learning; its core method remains storytelling through simple tools and interactive technology that also allows sharing.

Founder Jagdish Repaswal believes Mangoreader is doing the right things in the market, in spite of ongoing public infrastructure challenges. “If the opportunities in education in India are estimated at $80 billion, the digital and blended learning space is a $2-3 billion market. With increased penetration of devices and platforms, the delightful richness of products like Mangoreader will reach the bottom of the pyramid,” says Jagdish.

Capitalise on open spaces

The Centre for Civil Society (CCS) is a libertarian think tank that has taken path-breaking advocacy steps in this direction. The ‘school voucher’ is one way that could make the education system more accountable to students. CCS’ School Choice Campaign would conceptually allow students to pick the school they want to go to and enable schools, whether government or private, to compete to provide quality education.

Shantanu Gupta, Associate Director for School Choice Campaign, elaborates, “There’s already a 7-10 per cent migration happening from Government to private schools even among lower income groups. State governments can make a difference here.

“In Haryana, for example, you can start a school as a private company. But the current opportunities for entrepreneurs are in the unregulated spaces – we’re talking pre-primary education, tuition centres, education products, including i006E areas like gaming, teachers’ training, school financing, among others.” When all debates are done, it is time to think of making those moves that shape education for this post-modern dynamic era.

(The author is a marketing communications consultant)

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