Smart Schools is one of the seven flagship applications of Malaysia’s multimedia super corridor, or MSC, which aims to usher in a new era of education for school students, enabling them to practise self-directed and self-paced learning.

Under the contract, NIIT will create the entire science curriculum for primary and secondary classes. The curriculum will have simulation and animation created on a multimedia platform. Three multinationals -- NIIT, British Telecom and EDS -- are providing the technology for the project.

Announcing details of the project, NIIT''s Asia-Pacific operations head Rahul Patwardhan said, "We are proud to have won this prestigious contract. With this project we are assuming a big responsibility of participating in the MSC vision of shaping the next generation comprising technology savvy, creative and thinking citizens. We are committed towards enhancing the technology base of Malaysia by fully leveraging our expertise in creating educational multimedia software, training of diverse audiences in computers and systems integration."

With this contract, secured against stiff international competition, NIIT becomes one among the first 20 companies worldwide and the only Indian company to be awarded the MSC status. It also holds the distinction of being a member of the founders'' council of MSC.

NIIT will develop over 500 hours of learning material, including electronic courseware, teachers’ guides, and lesson plans, from class IV onwards. Over 400 lessons will be created by a separate unit of the company that will operate from New Delhi and Kuala Lumpur.

Malaysia is implementing the Smart Schools project in 90 schools in the pilot phase. The project will eventually be expanded to around 8,000 schools. The entire curriculum will be in Bahasa Melayu, the national language of Malaysia.

NIIT will interact with language and subject matter experts to devise the curriculum in the correct perspective. The first set of learning material will be ready by March 2000. NIIT plans to train a group of master trainers in the use of the material. They will in turn train school teachers.

NIIT has several other projects in Malaysia. The company started its operations there in the early 1990s, and has played an important support role in the setting up of the first virtual multimedia university in Malaysia, University Tun Abdul Razak, which has over 2,000 students. The primary study material for the university’s bachelor’s degree programme in information technology and management has been developed by the company.

Besides this, NIIT runs over 15 software education centres in Malaysia offering professional IT education. It has also executed software, networking and Internet-related projects for clients such as Fujitsu, EDS, NTT, DHL, Malaysian Satellite, Petronas and Golden Screens.