Eguru – Learning Management System – Grooming for Excellence

Eguru – Learning Management System (LMS) is an integral part of the education system of SSSIHL that transforms the entire learning process in to digital way and creates a virtual space for the students and teachers especially in the post-covid new normal world.

The main objectives of our project are:

• To enhance the existing delivery of free education for all at SSSIHL by using information and communication technology for learning, teaching and overall impact on the society
• To use technology platform to mould well-rounded holistic individuals who are professionally sound, socially responsible and spiritually aware

The Eguru LMS is developed and managed internally within SSSIHL. All users (Students, Teachers, and Administrators) have access to this 24 * 7 and 365 days. This is a cost efficient, open source system hosted on cloud.

For each year there are more than 1000+ subjects taken by around 1400+ students across all four campuses. All academic-related documents are being made available through Eguru LMS to all students and teachers. Apart from academic subjects, the integral education activities such as Yoga and Veda are also incorporated with Eguru LMS. The system currently holds around 1200+ lesson plans and 4000+ assessments.

Main Functionalities of the Digital Platform

The Eguru system mainly has THREE functionalities i.e Online Teaching & Learning, Online Assessments & Examinations and Online Admissions.

The Eguru system is secure, feature-rich platform that runs on multiple devices like computers, mobiles, tablets, etc. It is available in many environments so that the students without computers or having poor data connection can access the system using their available devices. This makes the teaching/learning process simple.

Examination Management System is a module that ensures end to end examination process is fully automated for all the Continuous Internal Assessments. A number of internal examinations each semester accounts for more than 2000 assessments in the system which includes quizzes, assignments, continuous internal assessments/Mid Semester exams for all the 550 subjects. Teachers have multiple options to conduct examinations using the system. If it is a computer-based test to evaluate the learning process of the student, there are 16 different ways of asking a question. For eg, Calculated multi-choice, Drag and drop, Descriptive, Essay, Matching etc., Eguru also provides a facility to create question bank and generate question papers randomly based on the learning capability of the student. The system also provides ability to conduct on-demand exams.

Cyber Security and Data Privacy Protection

The system is hosted in AWS in a highly secured manner. AWS offers a great cloud platform for delivering fast, responsive and highly available system environments. With powerful security tools such as AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) for granular access control and MFA support for user logins, among many other security features. With tools such as load balancers, auto scaling groups and CloudWatch, the system infrastructure is able to scale and grow with our institution, while having access to in-depth monitoring.

Digital Competence

The program involves training and coaching for teachers and facilitators. The technical support team trained all teaching faculties and non-teaching staff through video conferencing. The students are also being trained to use the Eguru system effectively and efficiently. All the beneficiaries are trained in,

• Creating contents for students
• Conducting assessments in the system
• Online evaluation of assignments and test papers
• Setting up the Question papers using different resources and activities available inside the Eguru system
• Doing E-Proctoring during End Semester Examinations
• Adding students and teachers to the Eguru LMS using different upload mechanisms
• Troubleshooting the Eguru system
• Setting up a feedback mechanism for the students to share/raise their concerns

Effective Teaching and Learning Practices

The LMS aids in efficient teaching pedagogy, wherein faculty can use online platforms to deliver their lectures, upload course content, use online applications for written as well as digital content delivery, effectively giving students a live classroom environment. The students get access to live classes, recordings to go through at their own pace, take quizzes on demand to check their learning status and chat with the course faculty for personalized feedback. The course content is monitored by the respective heads of the department for quality check, internal quality assessment committee of the University. There are a host of other features that enhance the learning experience, including Attendance, Chat, Feedback, File storage facility, Forums for subject discussion, value added courses including the latest skillset like data science to upskill the students. The students are engaged using regular assignments and assessed through online examinations.

Sustainability of its results and impact

• Bridging the gap between those with sufficient knowledge of and access to technology and those without, SSSIHL developed a system which runs on multiple devices like computers, mobiles, tablets, etc. Also, collecting regular teaching quality feedback from all students subject wise, using Eguru to assess the performance of all teachers and capacity development
• Integration of mobile application called Fully Exam Kiosk that controls access to other applications that are installed in mobile and prevents unauthorized resources being used during exam hours and Integration of Google assignments with Eguru.
• Developed mechanisms for students to use mobiles for examinations with Safe Exam Browser installed in it to reduce mobile data usage
• ensured end to end examination process is fully automated for all the Continuous Internal Assessments across all campuses and made it paperless
• trained all teachers to conduct computer- based test to evaluate the learning process of the student in multiple ways like multiple choice, true or false, fill-in the blanks, selecting missing words, numerical, calculated, calculated multi- choice, matching, numerical random calculations etc.,

Scaling Up

• The system is now capable to handle close to 1,00,000 students at a time
• Bringing new skill courses to the platform and open the system for students outside the university for upskilling
• Providing a space for school students to enroll themselves to some of the courses offered by SSSIHL and get certified on successful completion of the course
• Providing a platform for the students to learn new subjects with the help of SSSIHL faculties to crack entrance examinations
• Exploring more possiblities to improve the whole admission process
• Starting short term courses for internal students in areas other than their core subjects