Indian education portal launches Gulf operations

Leading Indian education portal 24X7 Guru has launched its Gulf and Middle East operations targeting over 120,000 students in the region.

The portal is targeted at Indian students appearing for engineering, medicine and management examinations as well as the Graduate Record Examination (GRE). It is designed to help those from Class 3 to 10 strengthen their conceptual understanding of mathematics and science through self-assessment.

"This region has more than 120,000 students who can benefit from our website, which aims to reinforce the maths and science lessons taught in the classrooms," K.S. Muralidhar, chief executive of 24X7 Guru, said in a statement after the portal's launch.

"Using the multiple-choice concept, testing on the website is diagnostic in nature, application oriented and objective encouraging self-assessment and conceptual clarity amongst the students while at the same time honing their rational thinking ability and analytical skills," he added.

According to Khawar Abdulla, 24X7 Guru's marketing head for Gulf and the Middle East, the portal will help students cover their respective syllabi during periods of long holidays.

"With a long summer break and shorter days during the holy month of Ramadan, schools in the GCC (Gulf Cooperation Council) have struggled to ensure they cover the full year's syllabus," he said.

Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) comprise the GCC, which is home to over 4.8 million expatriate Indians.

There are a large number of Indian schools in the region and most of them are affiliated to the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE).

"Now, due to National Day (of UAE which falls Dec 2) and Eid (Al Addha), schools in the UAE are shut for most of December. By using 24x7guru.com, students can continue to learn, make up for missed lessons and review their portions without stress," Abdulla said.

Muralidhar said that the portal would encourage students in the region to move away from the conventional "mugging" and learning by rote trend.

"The interactive design and format of the site combined with a fool-proof testing system helps students understand the concepts and fundamentals by making learning fun, challenging and most importantly stress-free," he said.

Test packs are available for mathematics and science, for CBSE, Indian Certificate for Secondary Education (ICSE) as well as various state board curriculums from Class 3 to 10.

Curriculums for Class 11 and 12, and the International Baccalaureate programme will also be introduced shortly.

"Keeping in spirit with the site, additional features such as Guru IQ, Guru Factoids, and Guru GK among others, will be introduced, enriching the overall educational experience," Muralidhar said.

The website, which has over a million subscribers in India, already has over 5,000 subscribers in various schools across the GCC.

A product of LearnSmart India, 24X7 Guru has Bodhtree Consulting as its technology partner and Unified Council as its content partner.

Unified Council conducts the National Level Science Talent Search Examination (NSTSE)in India as also in Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Yemen, Oman, Kuwait, Nepal, Iran and Tanzania.

Last updated on Nov 19^th, 2008 at 16:01 pm IST--IANS