With this announcement, now the Edtech startups will be permitted to collaborate with education institutes offering online undergraduate and postgraduate degrees to develop course content and carry out an evaluation of students considering a set of amendments made by the UGC. At present, 59 universities offer 120 Undergraduate, twenty-nine Post Graduate and two PG diploma degrees online. Out of these online courses, 50 per cent related to business administration, 15 per cent are science courses and 35 per cent humanities courses.
The initiative to make the involvement of the Edtech sector in digital education official has been taken at a time when the government has been urging the Edtech firms to run the business with absolute transparency.
UGC chairperson M Jagadesh Kumar said that through the amendments in the UGC (Open and Distance Learning Programmes and Online Programmes) Regulations, 2020, now the universities and colleges offering online UG and PG courses will be allowed to collaborate with Edtech firms towards developing course content and Financial Rules.”
