Utkal varsity to have high-end campus

BHUBANESWAR: Utkal University will very soon have a high-end campus, complete with e-classrooms and high speed connectivity. Under the National Mission on Education Through Information and Communication Technology of the HRD Ministry, Rs 1.5 crore has been sanctioned for Utkal University for the project. The project will focus on providing high speed connectivity, create e-content and e-classrooms. “We wanted to do something innovative and we can achieve this through this project,” said Pratap Rath, HoD of Computer Science department of the university.  BSNL will provide the high speed connectivity. The connection speed will be of one giga bytes per second (gbps) for e-content. The BSNL officials have  mapped the areas, informed Utkal University PG Council chairman PK Sarkar. The project aims at creating e-classrooms. Through e-classrooms a professor can teach four classes simultaneously. “There are many old Students who are interested in contributing through classes. But due to the low connectivity on our side, video conferencing is a big problem. This can be overcome through this setup,” said Rath.  There will be sharing of knowledge and information at the inter-departmental level also, he said.Every department will be encouraged to create e-content. The disability section of the computer science department will benefit from this. The computers can read out the e-content to 10 visually impaired students who are pursuing Masters course from the university. “Presently, we are identifying the points through which the connection will be given  across the university. After that the  BSNL officials will provide the connection through optic fibres,” added Rath. The hostels on the campus will also be covered. “We are hopeful that the project will be completed by March-end,” said Rath.