Chennai parents no longer wait for report cards: schools quietly hand this job to AI
Several Chennai schools have adopted AI-powered ERP platforms that update parents in real time on tests, attendance and report cards.
R Vidya, parent of a Class IX student at Vellammal Bodhi Campus in Chennai, no longer waits for her son to tell her how he did in a unit test or assignment. An app provided by the school notifies her directly about his performance, offering an assessment of his strong and weak points along with subject-wise insights.
“My son can also take tests on the app, designed by the school themselves. Apart from the results of tests and internal assessments, the school uploads report cards and attendance details, to ensure transparency,” she said.
Vidya’s experience is not isolated. Several city schools are adopting mobile or web-based AI-powered enterprise resource planning (ERP) tools such as My Classboard and Neverskip. These platforms, which charge schools on a per-student basis, inform parents about homework, fees and transport, while creating a shared communication space for parents and teachers.
The technology extends into assessment itself. Answer keys are fed into the system and answer sheets are analysed, offering insights into language through comparison. “It involves some work from the backend too on the teachers’ side. But the platforms are evolving. Once they notice a pattern, they automatically provide analysis without referring to answer sheets,” a teacher at a prominent IB school on the OMR said.
Not every parent has access to this convenience. Beena, whose son studied at Chennai Public School until class 10, said a parents’ dashboard there once made queries simple and direct. “School group chats are chaotic, with several unwanted messages… However, my son’s current school offers no such platform and they are missing out,” she said.
Educationists trace the shift back to the pandemic, which pushed schools toward digital teaching in the first place. “Today, ERPs have become vital to run a school, especially if the strength is high,” said Prem Shankar, chairman, Holy Sai Group of Institutions.
[Wikimedia Commons/by McKay Savage]
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