KUALA LUMPUR: Come April, nearly one in four Terengganu primary school students will able to download entire textbooks, take simulated exams, watch educational videos and be involved in interactive lessons, courtesy of an initiative taken by the state government.
As part of the plan, parents of those students will also be able to monitor how long their children spend on their studies and receive regular trial-examination results via SMS starting in June.
The Terengganu state government gave 75,000 primary students out of a total of 400,000 in the state locally-manufactured netbooks with Windows XP operating systems last June.
With these netbooks, the students can soon access rich media lessons, courtesy of content developer, Kadena (M) Sdn Bhd, which is an MSC Malaysia-status company.
The 75,000 students were chosen from lower-income families but Kadena targets to have all primary students in the state accessing rich media lessons in two years or so.
In fact, Kadena group chief executive officer Nazrul Zaman said that his vision is to get every single primary and secondary school student nationwide on this system within a decade or less. Help from BT
Nazrul explained that the solution, called Integrated Rich Media Community, is the basis of a true smart school environment, which involves multimedia education.
“There won’t be any copying of notes anymore and students won’t have to lug around heavy-textbooks to school on a daily basis,” he said.
This solution is part of a collaborative R&D initiative by the Multimedia Development Corporation (MDeC) and British Telecom (BT) Multimedia, which allows MSC Malaysia- affiliated companies to commercialise intellectual property (IP) developed by BT.
In this the particular case, the IP from BT Multimedia was the source code and concept for out-of-classroom education.
“What BT offered was more than just IP. We visited its research centre in Ipswich, England where BT was already working on technologies that were 10 years ahead. The R&D is already there and this saves us from reinventing the wheel,” said Nazrul.
Nazrul said that Kadena also plans to expand this solution to mobile devices, where students can access rich media via their smartphones, by June. Digital lifestyle programme
Kadena is one of the 21 graduate companies of the MSC Malaysia-BT Digital Lifestyle Programme.
Launched in July 2007, the two-year smart partnership aims to foster collaboration between multinational companies and local small- and medium-scale enterprises (SMEs), to remove or lower the R&D costs of SMEs.
On its part, BT Multimedia conducts research of future trends and user requirements. The research is then used to create proof-of-concept prototypes of next-generation broadband-based products and services.
Ivan Boyd, head of business engagement and operations of BT Multimedia said that it is no longer enough for companies to develop innovative products and services on their own.
“BT Multimedia uses an open innovation model, in which new products and services are created together with other companies and industry players,” he said.
MDeC said that BT Multimedia will enjoy some revenue-sharing when the products go to market but would not reveal details. MDeC is the custodian of the MSC Malaysia initiative.
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