THE BRITISH COUNCIL LAUNCHES INSPIRATIONAL LECTURE SERIES, ‘THE GREAT TALK’ IN INDIA

Left to right:Saveetha university vice chancellor,Dr.R.Rajagopal,Saveetha university Chancellor Dr.N.M.Veeraiyan,
Professor Sugata Mitra,British Council Director of South India-Mei-kwei Barker,

Left to right:British Council Director of South India-Mei-kwei Barker,Saveetha university vice chancellor,Dr.R.Rajagopal,SaveethauniversityChancellorDr.N.M.Veeraiyan,Professor Sugata Mitra, 

($1 million TED Prize winner Professor Sugata Mitra enthralls the audience with his GREAT Talk on ‘The Future of Learning’)

Chennai, 11 September 2015: The British Council launched THE GREAT TALK series in India today, which is aimed at motivating young Indian students to plan their careers effectively by interacting with UK laureates. THE GREAT TALK platform offers students a once in a lifetime opportunity to expand their horizons, meet with prominent educationists and explore new career directions.

Dr.N.M.Veeraiyan Chancellor of Saveetha University presided over the function 

and Saveetha university vice chancellor,Dr.R.Rajagopal welcome the gathering...

Saveetha medical college Director -Dr.Saveetha Rajesh,Saveetha Engineering college Director Dr. S.Rajesh,Saveetha school of Engineering Director-Ramya Deepak,British Council South India Director-Mei-Kwei Barker,Saveetha school of Engineering Principal Dr.P.Sankar were present. 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------A Proud full Response of MILA.

The innovative teaching system- MILA (Multiple Interactive Learning Algorithm) – a Saveetha University intiative, the brainchild of Dr.Deepak Nallaswamy, Director of Academics, Saveetha University, was briefed upon to '$1 million TED Prize winner Professor Sugata Mitra, Professor of  Newcastle University, UK' ,along with The British Council team members in a luncheon session, in the presence of University vice chancellor Dr.R.Rajagopal on 11 th september2015, by Dr.Pratibha Ramani, Asst Dean of Research , Saveetha Dental College. They were very receptive and responsive and eager to know more about the system and the discussion turned out to be a fruitful one as it was well received and applauded by the guests. 

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The GREAT Talk platform offers a compelling opportunity to Indian students to engage with distinguished UK personalities who bring insightful, real world experiences and outlook to their academic pursuits. The UK has a global reputation for excellence in education and skills. It is the second most desired destination for higher education. UK education has produced a diverse range of inspirational alumni who have gone on to achieve global success in many disciplines, including Oscar-

winning directors, Olympic gold-medallists, Nobel Prize-winners and world leaders.”

The inaugural talk of this series was delivered at Saveetha University in Chennai today by eminent Professor Sugata Mitra on ‘The Future of Learning’. TED Prize winner Professor Mitra’s experiments inspired the Indian Diplomat, Vikas Swarup, to write his debut novel that went on to become the Oscar-winning film of 2009 - Slumdog Millionaire. This multi-city initiative will also be organised in New Delhi, Mumbai and Kolkata with other inspiring UK alumni over the next few months.

Speaking at the launch, Mei-kwei Barker, Director South India, British Council said, “We are very grateful to Professor Sugata Mitra who accepted our request to give the inaugural lecture in the GREAT Talk series. There could not have been a more befitting start to this unique initiative we are launching today. The lecture was attended by over 1000 students and professors today and we are certain that upcoming lectures in the series will receive a similar response!”Professor Sugata Mitra, Professor of Educational Technology, The School of Education, Communication and Language Sciences at Newcastle University, UK said, “THE GREAT TALK is a delightful initiative by the British Council to engage, encourage and inspire young students. My talk today was focused on understanding how can we better prepare our children for the future. We need to design a futuristic learning methodology, which facilitates children to embark on intellectual adventures driven by big questions. In 2006, Newcastle University, UK gave me the opportunity to

help improve schooling across the globe and provided me with the support I needed for holistic research. Indeed, the UK welcomes the brightest and best international students at the world-class universities. I believe the UK Education offers students a sea of opportunities who are looking to make a mark for themselves.”

During his talk, Professor Sugata Mitra, shared his decade long journey that resulted in the building of ‘School in the Cloud’. He began his talk discussing the events that led to the ‘Hole in the Wall’ (HIWEL) experiment. In 1999, he embedded a computer within a wall in an Indian slum at Delhi for children to use freely. The experiment aimed at proving that children could be taught computers very easily without any formal training. He termed this as Minimally Invasive Education (MIE). The experiment has since been repeated at many places and has left a mark on popular culture Further in the talk, Professor Mitra took the audience through his thirteen years of experiments in children's education, which brought forward a series of startling results, such as, children can self-organize their own learning; they can achieve educational objectives on their own and can read by themselves. Finally, he spoke about the most startling result of them all: groups of children with access to internet can learn anything by themselves. Using the TED Prize, Professor Mitra has now built seven ‘Schools in the Cloud’, the glimpses of which were provided in the talk.