A primary school teacher in Mullur in Karnataka state in India, has found a unique solution to ongoing internet connectivity problems that were making it difficult to hold his online classes. He has made a hand-built tree-house classroom, which makes it possible for better internet access.
Learning Spiral, an online exam provider in India, conducted a survey in February 2021 where they found that more than half of India’s student population does not have internet access.
Millions of students around India travel for several kilometres or climb up the hills in order to have access to an internet connection. There are others who climb trees in order to enjoy a better connection.
‘I thought that maybe if I climbed a tree, I would get a better network’
C.S. Satheesha, a primary school teacher at the Government Lower Primary School in Mullur village, has been teaching his classes online since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic outbreak.
After experiencing increased connectivity problems, he sought for a solution through building a treetop platform classroom on a mango tree near his home.
When I was conducting my classes online, I was getting a poor network connection. I thought that maybe if I climbed a tree, I would get a better network. Incidentally, I got a good network connection, so I built the treehouse there in the exact place.
There [are] a lot of disturbances at home. Inside my house, there [are] network issues, noise from children, noise from the TV, so I built the treehouse with all kinds of learning tools that would help me to conduct independent learning classes.
Majority of the people in India depend on 4 G mobile networks rather than WiFi connections. The tree-house is raised 6 meters from the ground and the teacher gets better internet connectivity from the nearby mobile network tower. This is because there is less interference from trees and buildings.
It took the teacher two months to construct the treehouse which was complete by April 2021. The house is connected to electricity from his house. The new house is built mostly using bamboo and other readily available materials from the teacher’s home. The cost of construction is estimated to be Euros 56.
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