This analysis is in respect of the news article written by Tanya Roscorla titled “A GPS System for Student Information Is in Development” released on June 20, 2012.
The author reports that after the completion of the project, the development of the educational positioning system will enable over 80 million students to track their academic educational performance from childhood through college (Roscor, 2012). The educational positioning system (EPS) operates in the same way as GPS system. The new system will enable both parents and students to monitor performance and track their records over their academic and career period.
The GPS systems are technological systems used to help people locate their destinations. The GPS system uses radio signals to transmit and receive critical information using the satellites systems. The Lorne College has initiated the system to take care of its growing student population, which stands at 90,000 students (Roscor, 2012).
The Lone Star College has established the project that will see its students benefit a great deal. The author reports that the IMS Global Learning Consortium is the primary concept holder that is working in collaboration with the Lone Star College by providing governance, including standards and protocols (Roscor, 2012).
The EPS system has reported significant advances in the monitoring process, which promises to shift the costs from users. According to Tanya Roscorla, the new educational positioning system has numerous advances. The article reports that the EPS system is user friendly, which has ease-to-use interfaces and its ability to offer continuity. This means that once records are inputted into the system, a student or any user can follow-up the performance over a long time (Roscor, 2012).
While the EPS system enables students to manage their performance, the author reports that it has the ability to help in career development. Instead of students visiting their faculties to follow-up their records and figure out what they want to achieve in their future career, the EPS can help learners develop their career plans that may influence their college life and life after college (Roscor, 2012).
Using this system, the students can develop their theoretical plans that would serve to give them an insight into their future progress in terms of choice of courses. The ability of the system to synchronize their educational needs vis-à-vis the available resources, students can graduate faster and chase for their career dreams.
After meetings that took long hours of deliberations, the Chopra and Educational Department’s Office of Educational Technology and the White House of Science and Technology policy, it was agreed that schools and colleges should be encouraged to implement the EPS and GPSD system to help their students make necessary follow-ups on their academic and career developments (Roscor, 2012).
Although the system promises a lot of benefits, the article reports that the new system still remains expensive. According to the news article, the main advantage of the system is that it does not compete with the student enterprise system. The new system will be beneficial to the students since it will help students taking distance and open learning courses taken off-campus (Roscor, 2012).
This system will help learners and their parents change their careers and professional engagements. However, initial hard costs that include installation and acquisition remain high. Surveys indicate that mobile data charges are relatively high, which makes it expensive for users to acquire and use the GPS technology (Roscor, 2012).
Reference
Roscor, T. (2012). A GPS System for Student Information Is in Development. Web.