Satellite TV connects 1,000 schools

School curriculum on Internet:

President Mahinda Rajapaksa, launched ‘Nenasa’ - a state-of-the-art Digital Satellite Television based Distance Education Bridge, managed and operated by the Ministry of Education and the National Institute of Education (NIE).

‘Nenasa’ will connect 1,000 rural schools in Sri Lanka to high-quality rendition of the national curriculum, developed by the NIE over a digital satellite television broadcast medium.

The President together with Minister of Education, Susil Premjayantha, launched the broadcast from a classroom in a rural school in the Moneragala district - opening a new vista in access to education to students in Grades 9, 10 and 11 at the Ranjan Wijeratne Maha Vidyalaya in Pelwatta Moneragala and simultaneously to an estimated 500,000 other students accessing ‘Nenasa’ from across Sri Lanka, including the Northern and Eastern provinces.

The President said, “It gives me immense pleasure to be part of this event founded on the principle of rural empowerment, which is an integral focus of our Government as spelt out in the Mahinda Chinthanaya. Our Government is making every effort to harness the potential of rural Sri Lanka, with special emphasis on enhancing educational facilities in remote regions including the newly-liberated areas in the North and East.

‘Nenasa’ is a gateway towards achieving an empowered society in our march towards the future as one nation.

I take this opportunity to commend Dialog Telekom for its sincere commitment to create a knowledge-based society through its pioneering technology and for its laudable gesture in gifting ‘Nenasa’ to the people of Sri Lanka,” he added.

‘Nenasa’ will be dedicated towards broadcasting educational content and cater to the Ordinary Level and Advanced Level syllabus in Sinhala and Tamil. In addition, teacher-training and skills development would also be included in the program line-up.

These lessons will be supplemented by a Learning Management System (LMS) through which the interactive element of ‘Nenasa’ is facilitated.

The LMS enables children who have access to the internet to download educational material on Nenasa from the internet via www.nenasa.lk, which will effectively be the first time the Sri Lankan educational curriculum would become available on the internet.

It gives us immense pride and satisfaction to steer an education program of this magnitude that would contribute towards empowering and enriching the country’s future generations,” said, Group Chief Executive of Dialog Telekom PLC, Dr. Hans Wijayasuriya.