EDUSAT

                                  

                            EDUSAT

         EDUSAT is also known as GSAT-3, was a communications satellite which was launched on september 2004 by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).   EDUSAT is the first Indian satellite built exclusively to serve the educational sector. It is mainly intended to meet the demand for an interactive satellite- based distance education system for the country. 

     Satellites can establish the connectivity between urban educational institutions with adequate infrastructure quality education and the large number of rural and semi-urban educational institutions that lack the necessary infrastructure. Beside supporting formal education, a satellite system can facilitate the dissemination of knowledge to the rural and remote population about important aspects like health, hygiene and personality development and allow professionals to update their knowledge base as well. Thus, in spit of limited trained and skilled teachers, the aspirations of the growing student population at all levels can be met through the concept of tele-education.

     September 20, 2004 India's Geosynchronous satellite launch vehicle, GSLV successively launched EDUSAT the country's first thematic satellite dedicated exclusively for educational services into a Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit (GTO) from Satish Dhawan Space Centre SHAR, sriharikota. It was the first operational flight of GSLV, carrying the 1950kg EDUSAT lifted off from sriharikota at 4:01 PM about seventeen minutes aftet lift off, EDUSAT was successfully placed in GTO. EDUSAT was put into orbit at 1014 seconds about 5000km away from sriharikota. EDUSAT was developed by ISRO satellite centre, Bangalore. The projected life of the EDUSAT is 7 to 10 years and it can cover whole geographical India.

        It is a collaborative project of Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) and Department of Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO). EDUSAT will be implemented through the institutions such as IGNOU Nodal Institution, AICTE ,ICAR, NCERT, UGC.

         EDUSAT  can cover the whole geographical India with it's five sport beams covering the northern, north eastern, southern and western region of the country. The sport beams used in the EDUSAT  are more powerful than that of the INSAT-3B. As a result , it's signals can the received with a smaller satellite dish and consequently the reception terminal is cheaper.

              The EDUSAT is specially configured for an audio visual medium, employing a digital interactive class room and multimedia multicentric system. It is primarily meet for providing connectivity to the school, college and higher levels of education and also to support non formal education, including developmental communication.

Functions of EDUSAT 

• It covers all geographical area inside the country.
• It can provide interactive and cost effective education.
• It can provide consistency to information.
• The spot beams used in the EDUSAT are more powerful and signals can be received with a smaller satellite dish.
• It is a satellite fully dedicated to the cause of education.
• It is useful to implement virtual class room in remote and rural school. The teacher at the transmission end virtually becomes available to all the virtual classroom at the receiving end. This process can help in overcoming shortage of trained teachers if in service training is giving to the existing teachers in the most economical way.
• It can provide audiovisual medium and interactive multimedia facility.
• It can open up many possibilities like online teachings, video conferencing etc.
• It can be used at all levels of education, from primary school to professional courses.
• It can provide live lecture session from the best and expert teachers.
• It can facilitate provision of equality in educational opportunity.
• EDUSAT has enhanced distance education in the country, especially in medical, technical and higher education streams.
• The students will get the facility to see what they read in there textbooks and to do experiments with the help of multimedia technologies.