The following digital initiatives have been taken by Puducherry to alleviate the problem of remote learning for students: Community Radio The UT of Puducherry is exploring the feasibility of setting up Community Radio stations in 2 or 3 locations to cater the educational needs of the students and public. DTH TV Channel The UT of Puducherry is exploring the feasibility for tie-up for educational TV broadcast. Partnership with Civil Society State Project Office, Samagra Shiksha and Directorate of School Education, Puducherry is collaborating with Learning with Vodafone (Pratham Education Foundation), Sri Aurobindo Society, Azim Premji Foundation and Atal Incubation Centre, Pondicherry Engineering College to encourage the role of civil society in taking up Digital Education. Vetri Nichayam In order to address the needs of Class X students going for examination, Vetri Nichayam (Success Guaranteed), a programme was initiated through local cable TV. This involves one hour recorded session followed by 1 hour Question & Answer session. Virtual Control Room and telecasting the classes through local TV channel Dedicated subject wise WhatsApp numbers were created for doubts clarification to X std students. They can send their doubts through voice call and video recording. Tamil, English, Mathematics, Physics, Biology and Social Science subjects were covered. To facilitate online classes for Teachers The department, in association with the Atal Incubation Centre, Pondicherry Engineering College, conducted a webinar on how to conduct online classes for students. Around 3,660 teachers attended the webinar. This equipped teachers to conduct online classes. Online Textbooks The UT of Puducherry follows the textbooks of CBSE for class 1 to 5, and for class 6 to 12 it follows the neighbouring States of Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh. Online textbooks for these are available. Digital Repository A team has been formed to create a digital repository for ease of access of students. YouTube YouTube channel for Directorate of School Education has been created to upload the recorded classes & Webinar. No. of Subscribers- 4280 No. of Viewers -1,24,555 Conduct of Online Classes for Secondary & Higher Secondary Students Several schools have started to conduct online classes at their level. Capacity Building of Teachers through Webinars A series of webinars have been conducted for improving capacity building of all Heads of Schools and Teachers in various topics as shown below. From 6th April 2020 to 17th June 2020, 42 numbers of webinars were conducted. It is planned to continue the same. ICT Infrastructure All Secondary and Higher Secondary Schools are equipped with ICT Labs in UT of Puducherry. Level of Schools No.of Schools TICT Labs No.of Schools having Smart Classroom Govt.Higher Secondary Schools 59 59 47 Govt. High Schools 72 72 22 Govt.Middle Schools 48 - 13 Govt. Primary Schools 233 - 51 Total 412 131 133 Source : Remote Learning Initiatives Across India