Principles of National Digital Educational Architecture
- Unifying not Uniform: For the efforts of all players to be amplified, India’s diversity has to be preserved and united in a cogent manner.
- Ecosystem Driven: No one app, platform, or piece of technology can fix India’s schooling problems.
For innovation, variety, contextualization, and choice, the ecosystem spanning governments, society, and market participants has to be revitalized. Harnessing the energy of the ecosystem players requires ongoing engagement with the ecosystem through clear rules and a set of useful tools. - Unbundled and Combinable: Build unbundled fundamental building pieces to enable the ecosystem to find a variety of solutions rather than concentrating just on “solutions” Fully pre-built systems cannot change and accommodate a range of solution requirements. All elements of NDEAR must be created as separate microservices that are accessible through interoperable APIs and may be joined to create newer solutions.
- Federated but Interoperable: Although a central system might hasten adoption, it should be an option, and it is vital to provide interoperability across numerous federated systems by using common specifications.
- Open Access: Everybody has the ability to learn, assist others in learning, and support and manage. Open-source guidelines and open licenses are essential.
- Address Diversity, Inclusion, and Special needs: Design the system with users with special requirements in mind, providing them with tools and materials that are appropriate for their needs in terms of language, context, device, connectivity, capacity, etc. The system must support end Point devices at the root level and grant consistent access to everyone, including those in remote locations with poor or no connectivity.
- Evolvable: The infrastructure must be designed such that it can continuously adapt and change without requiring major changes.
- Provide Choice by Design: Privacy, Security, and trust by design: Design to allow actors (States, boards, schools, instructors, students, etc.) to choose which applications to use and how to use them in their particular environment.
- Leverage Investment: A design that fosters trust in all interactions while safeguarding user and entity data privacy.
- NDEAR is Federated, Unbundled: In order to fully utilize the systems that are already in place at the different administrative levels (Centre, State, and school), they must be upgraded in accordance with the NDEAR architecture principles, integrated with other NDEAR building blocks, and, if necessary, consolidated into unified platforms. This is necessary to give important stakeholders easier, more cohesive, and unified experiences while also bringing them in line with NDEAR.
National Digital Educational Architecture (NDEAR)
NDEAR (National Digital Educational Architecture) was established as part of the Digital First Mindset, under the Union Budget 2021–22, where the Center and the States/Union Territories use Digital Architecture to assist educational planning as well as teaching and learning activities.
To ensure that instructors, students, and schools have a smooth digital learning experience, NDEAR will be helpful for the Center and States in planning, managing, and supervising school education. The NDEAR’s institutional design, governance framework, technology, and data will be advantageous to both students and teachers as a whole.
The NDEAR project does not involve the creation of technological solutions for the educational ecosystem by the government. Through NDEAR, the government act as an enabler, offering a framework that allows anyone to create technology. The use of NDEAR frameworks, standards, and specifications would also qualify solutions as NDEAR compliant. Any technological solution that is NDEAR-compliant will be able to connect with other NDEAR-compliant technological solutions. State governments would be unrestricted in their efforts to develop solutions that meet their requirements.