Indian Journal of Educational Technology Volume 4, Issue 2, July 2022 243 General Article National Repository of Open Educational Resources —a digital repository of learning resources: SWOC analysis Sumana Bhattacharyya M. Phil. Student, Department of Education, Diamond Harbour Women’s University, Sarisha, West Bengal Email: bsumana787@gmail.com Abstract After mass use of the internet open access has reached a new dimension in the forms of open access journals and open access digital repositories. So, a digital repository is a place where one can store, search and find digital content anytime anywhere in and around the globe. This paper aims to critically evaluate the open educational resources, e-books and courses available in the National Repository of Open Educational Resources (NROER). In this paper, the researcher retrieved 19,496 OERs including 440 e-books, and 14 e-courses from NROER while browsing the website concerned. The paper also tries to analyze the generic features of OERs including e-books and courses available in NROER. After surveying NROER, the content has been analyzed in respect of type, sources, subject, education level, target group, language, etc. After analysis OERs and e-books of multidisciplinary subjects, languages, and Secondary level e-documents have been observed. It is also observed that NCERT is the main source of OERs in NROER. To conclude, it may be opined that NROER will play a vital role in the development of the Digital Library. Keywords: Repository, Open Access, National Repository of Open Educational Resources (NROER), e-books, Open Educational resources (OERs), Open education. Introduction The open access publishing movement started its journey in 2003 to provide access to resources to all without any cost. Later open access publishing has been divided into two types-Green Method i.e. self-archiving in repositories and Gold Method i.e. submission of open access papers in online journals. Here, the repository is a virtual place where something is stored for future access. In this regard, the  National Repository of Open Educational Resources (NROER) is a digital platform for sharing open educational resources related to school and teacher education, developed by the Department of School Education and Literacy, Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India in 2013 in New Delhi and run by the Central Institute of Educational Technology, National Council of Educational Research and Training, Homi Bhabha Centre for Science Education, Mumbai manage this NROER on the Meta Studio platform having registered users of 20,957 at the time of data collection. As per data available on the repository, total of 19,496 OERs including 440 e-books in many subjects, languages and formats are available in NROER for the purpose of Primary, Secondary, and Senior Secondary education under Creative Commons CC BY-SA 3.0 License. So, Open educational resources popularly known as OERs can be accessed freely under an open license and used for teaching and research purposes. OERs include e-books, text, audio-visual materials and any other documents used for teaching-learning Indian Journal of Educational Technology Volume 4, Issue 2, July 2022 244 and research purpose. Here, CC license means creative commons license in which the author gives rights to anyone to use, share, attribute and remix his/ her OERs with different types. It is also noteworthy that 14 online and blended e-courses are available in NROER. In NROER, these open educational resources have no technical and price burden except a few copyrights and licensing restrictions for users. The users not only use these resources, but also they can reuse them with proper attribution. Literature Review The following related studies have been found after consultation with both foreign and Indian literature: Upneja in his paper discussed Indian OER initiatives and their usage by information professionals. In it, he showed that among information professionals, the National Digital Library of India (NDLI) has gained the highest popularity as per the highest usage frequency (17.59 per cent) followed by Study Webs of Active–Learning for Young Aspiring Minds (SWAYAM) (15.60 per cent) and then followed by ePathshala (14.04 per cent) (Upneja, 2020). Chakrabarti in his paper related to institutional repositories studied 75 websites of institutional repositories through content analysis with respect to their generic features and revealed that many multidisciplinary subject-oriented repositories are available. It is also observed by him that a huge number of open educational resources have been found in these repositories (Chakrabarti, 2017). Thakran and Sharma in 2016 investigated the role of OERs in Indian higher education amidst lacking trained faculty and geographical variation regarding accessing education. Both the authors gave a brief overview of initiatives of OER in India to overcome the barriers of educational challenges faced in higher education (Thakran & Sharma, 2016). Dutta in 2016 threw light on the possibilities and challenges in connection with OER in Indian higher education. In this respect, the author enumerated some initiatives of the Government of India like NROER, SHAKSHAT, NKN, EKLAVYA, NMEICT, NPTEL, OSCAR, E-grid, etc. (Dutta, 2016). Khan, in his paper, discussed about NROER and its various activities in the field of School Education. He tries to investigate the OERs of NROER with special emphasis on Physics in pre-primary and secondary levels of education (Khan, 2015). Das in 2014, in his paper, defined the term OER and international policy related to OER. He then emphasized Indian initiatives of the OER through the support of National Mission on Education through ICT (NME-ICT) (Das, 2014). Objective of the study The main objectives of the study are stated below: • To identify the existing OERs and to analyze the generic features of OERs including e-books available in NROER in terms of type, sources, subject, education level, target group and language. • To present SWOC analysis of NROER Methodology The data relating to NROER in terms of type, sources, subject, education level, target group, language have been collected from the website concerned and the relevant information as per the objectives mentioned above has been extracted, summarized, tabulated, and analyzed using MS Excel. For analysis of data, content analysis of the website of NROER and case study method have been acquired. For the quantitative analysis of the data the percentage is worked out. Qualitative analysis was Indian Journal of Educational Technology Volume 4, Issue 2, July 2022 245 done after browsing the repository concerned and also after consulting the review of related studies. The period of data collection was from 16.06.2021 to 20.06.2021. Analysis and Interpretation of Results According to the objective stated above, the following tables and figures have been prepared below for minute analysis. These figures and tables are stated below- Table-1: Type of OERs available in NROER Type Number of OERs Percentage Documents 5934 30 Interactives 1453 08 Audios 2956 15 Images 2582 13 Videos 6571 34 All Files/Total 19496 100 (Source: NROER, 2021) Figure-1: Type of OERs available in NROER (Source: NROER, 2021) Table 1 and figure 1 present 19,496 homogeneous collections of open educational resources in NROER. The total collection includes 5,934 documents, 1,453 interactives, 2,956 audios, 2,582 images and 6,571 videos. The above table clearly shows that 33.71 per cent videos are available in the repository immediately followed by 30.44 per cent of documents. Indian Journal of Educational Technology Volume 4, Issue 2, July 2022 246 Table-2: Sources of OER in NROER Sources of OERs Number of OERs CIET,NCERT 6771 NCERT 12701 Explosive 181 VIDYA’S ONLINE 20 Arvind Gupta 1726 Vigyan Prasar 383 CCRT 449 UNICEF 282 (Source: NROER, 2021) Table 2 states that NCERT is the highest contributor of OERs followed by CIET, NCERT. There are other partners like Azim Premji University, Gandhi Smriti Darshan Samiti, Society for All Round Development, Vidya Online, etc. who/which contributed OERs to NROER. Some noteworthy contributions have been observed viz. 181 images of Explosive, 1,726 videos of Arvind Gupta- author of Science Books for Children, 383 videos of Vigyan Prasar-autonomous organization under Department of Science and Technology, 443 images of CCRT out of 449 images, 223 audio files of UNICEF out of 282, etc. The total number of resources presented in the above table exceeds the total number of OERs (19,496 OERs) because some OERs may be the sources of more than one institution e.g. NCERT and CIET. Table-3: Subject-wise distribution of OERs in NROER Subject Number of OERs Percentage Accountancy 159 00.82 Art 573 02.94 Biology 487 02.50 Chemistry 265 01.36 Economics 386 01.98 Education 968 04.97 Environmental Studies 503 02.58 Geography 458 02.35 History 2288 11.74 Language 2967 15.22 Mathematics 1716 08.80 Physics 227 01.16 Political Science 240 01.22 Psychology 183 00.94 Science 4100 21.03 Indian Journal of Educational Technology Volume 4, Issue 2, July 2022 247 Social Science 1409 07.23 Sociology 200 01.03 Others 2367 12.14 Total 19496 100 (Source: NROER, 2021) Figure-2: Number of OERs available in NROER (Source: NROER, 2021) Table-3 and clustered bar chart (figure-2) show that most of the OERs belong to Science (4,100 OERs i.e. 21.03 per cent) compared to Language (2,967 OERs i.e. 15.22 per cent) and Social Science (1,409 OERs i.e. 07.23 per cent). There are other notable subjects like Mathematics (1,716 OERs i.e. 08.80 per cent) and History (2,288 OERs i.e. 11.74 per cent) which can be specially mentioned. In NROER, 1,823 audio files out of 2,967 in language, 2,100 video files out of 4,100 in Science and 457 videos out of 968 OERs in education have been also observed. Table-4: Education Level-wise distribution of OERs in NROER Level of Education Number of OERs Primary Level 7479 Upper Primary Level 5943 Secondary 9034 Senior Secondary 5907 Not Mentioned 1091 (Source: NROER, 2021) In NROER, Secondary level OERs are available in large numbers (9,034 OERs) followed by Primary Level (7,479 OERs) and then followed by Upper Primary Level (5,943 OERs). The notable attribute of the study is that total of 1,091 OERs do not belong to any specific level of education. The total number of open educational resources presented in the above table exceeds the total number Indian Journal of Educational Technology Volume 4, Issue 2, July 2022 248 of OERs (19,496 OERs) because some OERs belong to more than one level of education. Here, the Secondary level denotes Class IX and Class X, Upper Primary Level denotes Class VI to Class VIII and Primary Level denotes Class I to Class V. Table-5: Target Groups–wise distribution of OERs in NROER Target Groups Number of OERs Teachers 17428 Students 18068 Teacher Educators 4245 (Source: NROER, 2021) Table 5 states that most of the OERs available in NROER for students (18,068 OERs) are followed by Teachers (17,428 OERs) and then followed by Teacher educators (4,245 OERs). The total number of resources presented in the above table exceeds the total number of OERs (19,496 OERs) because the target users of some OERs are both teachers and students. Here, the Teacher Educator indicates those teachers who give training to pre-service teachers and help them to teach effectively. Table-6: Language-wise distribution of OERs in NROER Language Number of OERs Percentage Assamese 52 00.27 English 13102 67.20 Gujarati 03 00.02 Hindi 4011 20.57 Manipuri 30 00.15 Marathi 400 02.05 Others 1898 09.74 Total 19496 100 (Source: NROER, 2021) Table 6 indicates the availability of language-wise OERs in NROER. OERs in the English language are available in large numbers (13,102 OERs i.e. 67.20 per cent) followed by Hindi (4011 OERs i.e.20.57 per cent). The OERs in other languages like Manipuri, Gujarati, Marathi, Assamese, etc. are also available in NROER. The main attribute of the study here is that 52 videos are available in Assamese and 400 videos are available in Marathi. In this respect, it may be remembered that the almost same result has been observed by Chakrabarti and Maharana in 2019 in their paper related to Library and Information science. They observed that 95 Open Access Repositories in Open DOAR are available in English. So, English is the main source of OERs not in education discipline, but also in other subjects (Chakrabarti & Maharana, 2019). Indian Journal of Educational Technology Volume 4, Issue 2, July 2022 249 Table-7: Distribution of e-books according to Subject in NROER Subject Number of e-books Percentage Rank Language 20 04.55 xx Mathematics 51 11.59 3 Environmental Studies 09 02.05 xx Science 98 22.27 1 Social Science 59 13.41 2 Art 01 00.23 xx Accountancy 21 04.77 5 Psychology 09 02.05 xx Sociology 18 04.09 xx Economics 12 02.72 xx Political Science 18 04.09 xx Geography 27 06.14 4 History 19 04.32 xx Biology 10 02.27 xx Physics 19 04.32 xx Chemistry 19 04.32 xx Business Studies 12 02.72 xx Others 18 04.09 xx Total 440 100 xx (Source: NROER, 2021) Figure-3: Number of e-books available in NROER (Source: NROER, 2021) Indian Journal of Educational Technology Volume 4, Issue 2, July 2022 250 Table 7 and clustered column bar (figure-3) represent the subject-wise distribution of e-books i.e. ‘Device independent digital books’ i.e. a book available in such a format to read it on an electronic device and shows 440 e-books in NROER which can be read by scanning QR codes. QR- coded e-books can be downloaded through QR Code Readers available in a large number. It also shows that most of the e-books belong to Science (98 e-books i.e. 22.27 per cent) compared to Social Science (59 e-books i.e. 13.41 per cent). There are other notable subjects like Mathematics (51 e-books i.e. 11.59 per cent) and Language (20 e-books i.e. 04.55 per cent) which is noteworthy. Table-8: Distribution of e-books according to the Level of education in NROER Level of education Number of e-books Percentage Primary Level 028 06.36 Upper Primary Level 018 04.09 Secondary 110 25.00 Senior Secondary 093 21.14 Not Mentioned 191 43.41 Total 440 100 (Source: NROER, 2021) In NROER, Secondary level e-books are available in large numbers (110 e-books i.e. 25 per cent) followed by Senior Secondary Level (93 e-books i.e. 21.14 per cent) then followed by Primary Level (28 e-books i.e. 06.36 per cent). It is also observed that 191 e-books have not been assigned to a particular level of Education. These e-books may be assigned to either a primary or upper primary level or the Secondary or Senior secondary level. Table-9: Distribution of e-books according to Target Groups in NROER Target Groups Number of e-books Teacher 423 Students 440 Teacher Educators 000 (Source: NROER, 2021) Table-9 gives an overall picture of e-books according to Target Groups in NROER and finds that 423 e-books are best suited for Teachers and 440 e-books are best suited for Students. On the other hand, no e-books have been found suited for Teacher Educators. Some e-books may be considered for both teachers and students. Indian Journal of Educational Technology Volume 4, Issue 2, July 2022 251 Table-10: Distribution of e-books according to the Language in NROER Language Number of e-books Percentage English 183 41.59 Hindi 138 31.36 Others 119 27.05 Total 440 100 (Source: NROER, 2021) Table 10 presents the distribution of e-books according to Language in NROER. e-books in the English language are available in large numbers (183 e-books i.e. 41.59 per cent) followed by Hindi (138 e-books i.e. 31.36 per cent). The 119 e-books in other languages like Assamese, Marathi, Gujarati, Manipuri, etc. have been found at the time of searching in NROER. Table-11: Distribution of e-Courses according to the Subject in NROER Subject Number of e-Courses Percentage Mathematics 04 28.57 Science 5 35.71 English 2 14.29 Values 1 07.14 Research 2 14.29 Total 14 100 (Source: NROER, 2021) Figure-4: Number of e-courses available in NROER Indian Journal of Educational Technology Volume 4, Issue 2, July 2022 252 Table-11 and figure-4 show the distribution of e-Courses according to Subject in NROER. These e-courses are blended i.e. type of continuing education programme aimed to provide students with instructions through classroom and online delivery. From the above table, it is clear that 35.71 per cent of e-courses belong to Science subject followed by 28.57 per cent of e-courses belong to Mathematics then followed by 14.29 per cent of e-courses belong to English. The main attribute of the study is that 13 e-courses belong to Grade 8 and Grade 9 except one Mathematics e-course for secondary level. Table-12: Distribution of e-Courses according to Unit specified Unit Number of e-Courses 1 08 2 03 3 01 4 02 Total 14 (Source: NROER, 2021) Table 12 indicates the distribution of e-courses according to the Unit specified. From the above table, it is found that most of the e-courses have one unit i.e. 8 e-courses out of 14 e-courses and 3 e-courses have two units. It is also noted that 2 courses have four units and 1 course has three units. It is observed that 1-unit e-course is mostly because 13 e-courses belong to Grade 8 and Grade 9. SWOC analysis of the findings SWOC (S-Strength, W-Weakness, O-Opportunity and C-Challenge) analysis of NROER may be enumerated based on the findings from the above tables and figures to find out the real picture. Strength i. In NROER, OERs including e-books are of several types like Video, Image, Audio, etc. ii. These OERs may be used as teaching and learning aids. iii. OERs of Science stream have been found in large number in respect to Social science and Language. iv. All OERs including e-books are available here under the CC-BY- SA license i.e. anyone can edit and remix the e-books, even for commercial purposes without changing the original license and with full credit to the creator. v. The  books of NCERT  are in  the format of Flipbook i.e. e-book looks like a real book having a page- turning facility and flipping sound.  vi. Vigyan Prasar, Gujarat Institute of Educational Technology (GIET), SIE, SCERT, SIERT, CCERT, SIET and other stakeholders shared their resources in the NROER platform, vii. OERs on Themes and topics in different subjects like Economics, History, Biology, Political Science, Physics, Chemistry, Geography, Language and Mathematics which are mapped to the National Curriculum Framework, 2005 are available on a separate webpage for easy access of documents. Indian Journal of Educational Technology Volume 4, Issue 2, July 2022 253 viii. Total of 14 online and blended e-courses are available in NROER where teachers and students can participate. Weakness i. The textbooks of NCERT are openly licensed to download and also can be shared non-commercially without changing with proper attribution. It encourages creation and sharing of duplicate OERs. ii. Some of the OERs in NROER have not been accessed at the time of data collection. iii. The stakeholders are unaware of NROER, support from management, insufficient fund and lack of ICT infrastructure have been observed. iv. No search facility for multilingual OERs has been found. Opportunity i. Anyone knowing the internet may use the OERs and access e-courses in NROER. ii. Academicians may contribute OERs according to the prescribed format of NROER. iii. OERs are available in Indian languages like Manipuri, Gujrati, Assamese, Marathi, etc. besides English and Hindi which are beneficial for students of all provinces of India. iv. This platform is very helpful for sharing OERs easily. These OERs help to build a National Digital Library. Challenge • A lack of skilled personnel and lack of preservation policies have been observed while browsing the website concerned and collecting data. • Lack of policy for checking plagiarism of OERs has been observed. • Anyone may use these OERs for commercial purposes violating open licensing as these E-books are easily available to download. The Way Forward It is a matter of great joy that India is not far behind in hosting National Repository in the arena of School education. In this repository, a large number of open educational resources are available to students and academicians at any time anywhere. From the above-mentioned SWOC analysis, it may be pointed out that the organization concerned should have to minimize the weakness and threat and maximize the strength and opportunity to develop NROER and increase awareness regarding NROER. It is also observed from the related literature reviews that the academicians and students are not all fully aware of the use of e-books available in NROER. The awareness programs and workshops regarding use of e-books and their deposit by the academic community should be organized from time-to-time. The organizations concerned with NROER should approach various institutions to submit their intellectual output to NROER. Most of the institutions in India do not have sufficient infrastructure regarding the creation of e-books for school education. So, NROER in India should provide adequate infrastructure and other support for the creation and maintenance of e-books. For future sustainability, the content collection and functional development of NROER should be done to create a digital society. Indian Journal of Educational Technology Volume 4, Issue 2, July 2022 254 References Chakrabarti, A. (2017). Growth and Development of Indian Institutional Digital Repositories in Open DOAR: A Bird’s Eye View. World Digital Libraries-An international journal. 10(2), 75 – 88. Chakrabarti, A., &Maharana, B. (2019). LIS Open Access Institutional Digital Repositories in Open DOAR: an appraisal. 2757. Retrieved from https://digitalcommons. unl.edu/libphilprac/2757 (Accessed on 28th April, 2021). Das, A. K. (2014). Open Educational Resources (OER): Policy Perspectives and National Initiatives. In: CSIR-NISTADS (ed): India - Science and Technology, volume 3. Delhi: Cambridge University Press India, ISBN 9789384463045, pp.16-21 Dutta, I. (2016). Open Educational Resources (OER): Opportunities and Challenges for Indian Higher Education. 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