People and Management March 2019 | Page 30

PERSPECTIVE Is Education Being Disrupted by Digital Technology – An India Approach W hat started off as enlightenment under a tree, today means having Cerelac whilst watching cartoons on the IPad. Over the past couple of decades, the magnitude of changes experienced by us gives a sneak peek into the future disruptions that will only accelerate with time. What shape the future of education will take is still not fully clear, but most educators and observers agree that the future of learning will be beyond the boundaries of ‘classrooms’. Modern technologies like Artifi cial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning, Virtual Reality and Blockchain aren’t just changing the learning spaces for students: instead, they are also shaking up the very role of educators and remodeling modern classrooms. 30 | Vol. 10 Issue 3 • MARCH 2019, Delhi NCR Sahil Nayar HR Professional working in a leading consulting fi rm in the country. From ‘Smart Teachers’ we are now moving to ‘Smart Classrooms’. So, once confi ned to the pages of futuristic dystopian fi ctions, new-age technologies promise to be the most profoundly disruptive shift; since the industrial revolution and our educational institutions need to adopt modern systems of teaching and learning to keep pace. If we simply go by numbers, by 2030, the number of school going children in India, in the age bracket of 4-17 years is estimated to be 300 million, while 140 million of the youth population in the age group of 18-23 years will be enrolled in colleges and universities,