(1888PressRelease)
July 04, 2007 - Rajesh Sharma is just another good tutor. This engineering post graduate believes in combining normal lessons with learning games, applauds good performance, tries to relate math problems to real life applications and thus tries to keep interest of his students by all means he can. However, there is one point of difference; Mr. Sharma teaches students in America from whom he is 8,500 miles away and 9 1/2 hours ahead in time, in India. So while he is sitting in New Delhi, India, his students are based at Chicago, USA. His day starts from 5.30 am in the morning when his student does his homework and assignment at around his dinner time!
The work starts with a casual “hello, how are you?” And proceeds on to “let’s get on to some calculus today!” it started with technical support for their computers and outsourcing has become a way of life for Americans. “When they can sew clothes for us, make medical bills for us, teach us computers then what’s the problem with teaching our kids?” asks an enquiring American citizen Barbara, who’s also the mother of a sophomore.
The industry may still be in infancy but it’s destined to grow big time. India's abundance of engineering graduates who are best in subjects like math and science as compared to other tutors in the world offers it a competitive advantage in the education outsourcing industry. The best part about these online tutors is that they are willing to teach for a far less cost from a distance.
The phenomenon of educational outsourcing is hailed as a triumph of technology, it is already proving to be a boon for science and math starved American students. But critics have their own version of the outsourcing story. They have this strong worry about the lack of tutoring standards from overseas tutors. They are questioning the assumption that how well can someone teach over a physical and cultural divide.
No Child Left Behind (NCLB) act has proved to be a strong factor in helping the growth of the educational outsourcing industry. The fact that the outsourced tutors may be used to accomplish the supplemental education requirements of education starved American students is proving a boon for the online tutoring outsourcing industry.
"We didn’t knew who was to tutor our students, we had our apprehensions and came to learn their qualifications, we came to learn how well they are trained for their familiarity with the curriculum of the students they are going to teach," says Nancy brown, member of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT). Many people at AFT still have many apprehensions. It will take some time to get people accustomed to this outsourced model of education. People at AFT are still concerned about the probable lack of quality for tutors hired hastily under NCLB act, so the offshore tutoring raises even more issue than are seen in the States.
Companies like Transtutors (www.transtutors.com), Growing Stars are all based at the most happening outsourcing destination- India and preparing to take on the educational outsourcing business by storm. Transtutors is already getting students at America taught by teachers at India. “Initially it was an apprehension. We worked hard for the training of our tutors; the biggest challenge was to make them learn the accents of the American students and their slang” says the top executive of Transtutor which is based at New Delhi, India and is into online tutoring for two years now.
The companies based at America which are already into the online tutoring business are happy outsourcing their work to companies like Transtutors. “It reduces the hassles and still earns us good profit”, are the words of the director of a leading education outsourcing company based at America. People initially had their share of apprehensions but now everyone is happily silenced! Everyone understands that this is going to be the future of the education industry and resistance will only hurt them.
