INTELLIGENT TUTORING SYSTEMS FOR ENHANCING ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE OF SECONDARY STUDENTS IN INDIA

Background: The secondary education system in India is opening access and digital infrastructure, but a significant portion of classrooms have large within-grade learning dispersion, which limits teacher-centered instruction and leads to poor academic performance.
Objective: In order to synthesize evidence on Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITS) and PAL to enhance academic performance in secondary-stage students in India, a combination of national official data and a multiple-case case study of published PAL/ITS applications.
Methods: Explanatory multiple-case design that is desk-based and has embedded units (school contexts). The researcher triangulated: (i) national statistics and assessments (UDISE+, ASER 2024, National Council of Educational Research and Training large-scale assessment systems); (ii) peer-reviewed and working-paper RCTs evidence of PAL/ITS; (iii) program documentation and registry data. The researcher took out sample characteristics, measures, outcome measures (standardized test scores, exam results, use), and implementation processes and proceeded to within- and cross-case synthesis, taking into account measurement alignment and scalability threats. 
Results: In 2024-25, national indicators provide secondary GER 68.5% and secondary dropout 8.2%; schools with computer and internet access were 64.7% and 63.5% respectively. Evidence of the cases shows that large learning gains can be obtained on independent tests (math: 0.22-0.43 SD at scale; 0.37 SD in an efficacy trial) and grade level school tests might fail to reflect such gains when instruction aims several years below grade norms.
Conclusions: ITS/PAL is capable of significantly enhancing learning among post-primary students in India under realistic conditions of the public-system, but the improvement in performance requires dosage, device access, teacher integration, governance and redesigning of assessment. Existing ICT funding under Samagra Shiksha must be the policy pathways, in line with NDEAR interoperability, and meet child-data protection requirements in the then-developing data protection laws.