Developing internationally competitive human capital is critical to significant economic gains. Helios Consult Limited, Philips Consulting and Softcom Limited came together to create a solution to help achieve human capital development starting from the senior secondary school by Introducing the Knowledge Tab to the market as a commercial product.
They had initially launched this solution in Osun State, Nigeria, as Opon Imo. The state government bought the solution and provided it to students of senior secondary schools in the state. Opon Imo, as the project is christened, is currently being used in Osun State and has earned then some awards.
The Full Offering
The tablet is a platform to power a full fledged solution. The entire solution contains the tablet as the platform that contains; 56 E-textbooks covering the 17 subjects offered in the West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE), National Examination Council (NECO) and Senior School Certificate in Education (SSCE), lesson notes on all 17 subjects, over 29,000 simulated past questions spanning over a period of 10 years, 51 video tutorials, other extracurricular subjects and applications such as local language, local history, Dictionary, Koran, Hadith, Bible, Health book, Aldiko Reader 2.0 etc.
Students can study on the tablet, write their class work and assignment on it and then pass it on to their teachers for grading. The version of the Knowledge Tab that the teacher and principal are going to have would be allowed to connect to the Internet. The system is such that the principal and the education district will be able to see at a glance all what the students are doing as well as each teacher’s activities.
I asked how the technology was built and I was told that they’ve integrated everything with the Internet. I am suspecting they’ll be using some form of cloud service to manage the entire system wirelessly.
It is striking that the tablet lasts as long as 8 hours+ and there’s access to all the subjects that students in Senior Secondary Schools in Nigeria offer plus a few extras. While I was going to school secondary school in the early 1990s, I was privileged to have just English and Mathematics textbooks. I usually borrow the other subject textbooks from friends and share with them or get one that has been used by a senior that has moved to a higher class. If I had the Knowledge tab in my days, I would have access to all the materials and textbooks that I need in a single electronic tablet; a win for me and my parents.
Pricing
With all that is bundled with the tablet, one is going to be sold for N59,000. That’s the price that was revealed as an event that was held in Lagos two days ago. There’s a discount for any order from 50,000 units and above. I am sure than there is going to be other charges included when deploying the entire solution to include the dashboard to the teachers, principal and education district.
Features of the KnowledgeTab
It is powered by Google’s Android 4.2 software with a 512MB of RAM, Front 300K pixel camera (no back camera) and an internal storage capacity of 32 GB.
Content and packaging of tablets are moderately customizable to accommodate unique needs.
Carefully designed to be highly resistant to extreme heat, rain (water), fire and everyday wear and tear.
It is durable and comes with a leather pouch
Long lasting battery life to reduce dependency on erratic power supply
All content is accessible without need for internet connection.
How does a student keep the tablet charged with the poor power supply that we have in Nigeria? I was told that in Osun State where the tablet has already been deployed, they have partnered with the schools to provide charging stations that uses solar powered panels.
This is not close to a solution that can replace physical textbooks yet; but I think they’ve started something great. What is left is for them to see how they can evolve the solution to make it the mainstay for the improvement of a competitive human capital globally.
