The app that grades homework and calms parent WhatsApp groups: inside Chennai’s ERP boom

A quiet shift is under way in Chennai’s classrooms. Several schools are adopting mobile or web-based AI-powered enterprise resource planning (ERP) tools such as My Classboard and Neverskip, which charge schools on a per-student basis and now handle everything from homework updates to fees, transport and parent-teacher communication.

The change is visible at Vellammal Bodhi Campus, where R Vidya’s son is in Class IX. She no longer waits for him to report how a test went; an app supplied by the school notifies her directly, complete with an assessment of his strong and weak points and 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,” Vidya said.

Some platforms go further than logistics. Answer keys are fed into the system and answer sheets are analysed, generating 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,” said a teacher at a prominent IB school on the OMR.

Parents largely welcome the shift, though access remains uneven. Beena, whose son attended Chennai Public School until Class 10, recalled a parents’ dashboard that made queries far simpler than the ‘chaotic’ group chats she deals with now, at his current school, which offers no such platform.

Educationists say the pandemic was the real trigger, having already forced schools to adopt digital teaching. “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]