Raghav Gupta, MD, India and APAC of online EdTech platform Coursera says, “skills pay the bills,” as it expands online learning in India with new partnerships and degrees.
While investments by VCs in EdTech firms have dried up over the past several months, the EdTech sector still seems to be booming, thanks to a perfect storm of factors.
Rural folks are tapping into the power of mobile devices and the internet to access learning opportunities. The government is backing up this trend with its National Education Policy (NEP) that supports hybrid learning models. And the demand for tech-savvy and human-skilled professionals is rising, as businesses embrace technology as their core strategy and tackle global challenges like climate change and DEI.
Raghav Gupta, the MD of Coursera for India and APAC, explains these drivers of growth in a nutshell: “Technology is the business, human skills are the edge, and climate change along with DEI are the priorities,” he says, speaking exclusively with ET Edge Insights.
But how can campuses keep up with this fast-changing landscape?
“The answer is collaboration,” Gupta says.
Bridging the education gap
By partnering with other universities, campuses can offer their students a wider range of courses and perspectives. Imagine a Delhi University student learning about climate change from Yale or Python programming from Michigan. That’s the power of EdTech and Coursera is leaving no tack unturned to tap this opportunity.
“Our platform Coursera for Campus is enabling this collaboration between these universities. Existing regulations facilitate this collaboration. The NEP international credit framework allows 40% of credit to come from online platforms. Hundreds of campuses in the country are taking the approach where around 80-85% of education is provided on campus and the remaining 15% is from edtech platforms,” Gupta says.
Skill building is extremely important, and the best way they can be built is by learning directly from the industry. A report from McKinsey stated that over the next five to 10 years, 20% of the global workforce will be in India.
“On a lighter side, and we say this at Coursera, it is that ‘skills pay the bills.’ The industry as an educator is becoming important. There are around 30 micro-credentials on our platform, and these were taken by around 9 lakh people in India last year,” Gupta says.
For instance, if someone is pursuing an MBA course and wants to work as a digital marketer, they can learn social media marketing from Meta or data analytics from Google. Also, people with industry micro-credentials are more likely to be hired.
A couple of days back, The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Guwahati launched an online Bachelor of Science (Hons) degree programme in Data Science and Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Coursera. Additionally, both IIT Guwahati and Coursera will come together to provide carrier and counselling advice, to help enrolled students get placed.
Coursera Coach: A generative AI app
Raghav and his team have been working tirelessly for the last six months to create a revolutionary app that will make learning more fun, interactive and personalized for both learners and educators.
The app called Coursera Coach is based on ChatGPT, a state-of-the-art natural language generation model that can converse with users on any topic. Coursera Coach is integrated with the Coursera platform, and it acts as a 24X7 virtual tutor for learners who want to master new skills and advance their careers.
The app combines the best of generative AI and human expertise to create a unique and rewarding learning experience for everyone.
“Coursera Coach is more than just an app. It is a vision of how online education could be in the future. It is a way of empowering learners and educators to achieve their full potential. However, we don’t limit the use of Coach during exams” Raghav says.
With Coursera Coach, learners can ask questions, get explanations, receive feedback, and explore related topics anytime they want. The app uses ChatGPT to generate natural and engaging responses that are tailored to the learner’s level, goals and interests. The app also ensures that the responses are accurate and relevant by limiting the scope of ChatGPT to the Coursera content and courses.
Coursera Coach is not only a smart assistant for learners, but also a powerful tool for educators who want to create and update their courses with ease and efficiency. The app offers a feature called Course Builder, which allows educators to leverage ChatGPT’s ability to generate high-quality content on any subject.
“With Course Builder, we are providing the faculty with the power of 20 teaching assistants to modernize their curriculum and engage with students. They can use it to turbo charge their content and course creation,” Gupta says.
Course Builder also helps educators to engage with their students more effectively by providing them with insights and suggestions on how to improve their teaching methods and materials. The app uses ChatGPT to analyze the students’ performance, feedback, and preferences and then generates personalized recommendations for the educators on how to enhance their courses and increase student satisfaction.
India business growth
India is Coursera’s second largest market after the U.S.
Will it be able to surpass the U.S. and emerge as its largest market by size?
“As MD of the country, I really hope so. One thing that we know is that by the end of this year, the number of learners in India on Coursera will be bigger than all of Europe’s learners combined. During the pandemic, we had around 50 lakh people who were learning on our platform in India. Today this number is around two crores. Whether it will overtake the U.S. is something we will have to wait and see,” Gupta says.
