EVENT REPORT
Indo-European Conference on Quality Assurance in Higher Education www.ieconqa.org
The Indo-European Conference on Quality Assurance in Higher Education, a two day affair took place at New Delhi, from May 6 -7, 2010. It was jointly organised by he University of Delhi, India-EU Study Centers Programme, and the Erasmus Mundus External Cooperation Window (EMECW) 13 – India project, as a followup to the ‘Joint Declaration on Education’ signed by the European Commission and the Government of India (Ministry of Human Resource Development) in 2008. The conference saw presence of eminent delegates and deliberations between the top European and the Indian experts on the established European practices and the Indian initiatives on quality assurance in Higher Education.
Inaugral Session with Prof S Thorat, Chairman University of Delhi, Prof AK Bakshi, Dr. Sidsel Hansson, Prof D Pental and Guest of Honour, Danièle Smadja
During the inauguration Prof. A.K. Bakshi, Director, ILLL, University of Delhi, gave a welcome note and invited Prof. Sukhdeo Thorat, Chairman, University Grants commission, as the session moderator; Prof. Deepak Pental, ViceChancellor, University of Delhi (DU); Dr. Sidsel Hansson, Project Coordinator, Erasmus Mundus External Cooperation Window 13; Ulrich Podewils, Team Leader, 42
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Session I panelists included Prof Arun Nigavekar,Prof SK Tandon, Prof Beena Shah and Prof. Giancarlo Spinelli
India-EU Study Centres Programme; and Guest of Honour, Danièle Smadja, Ambassador, Head of EU Delegation to India. Prof S Thorat addressed the gathering and brought out pointers such as improvement in the budget allocation by the government from Xth to XIth Five Year Plan by 9-10%. He mentioned that 1462 institutions had been added with plans of adding more higher education institutions by end of XIth plan, explaining that it was historically a remarkable expansion. He expressed his happiness for introduction of semester system at DU and stated that motivation has to be there to encourage system with a base of caution. He mentioned that EU has been able to maintain quality amongst the local higher education institutions with higher allocation from GDP to higher education, therefore, European institutions should be studied. There was also a mention that National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) has voluntary assessment which is not regulatory, yet. He expressed that the meet will benefit all from the deliberations that will be held during the conference. Tracing the history of the cooperation
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between India and Europe, Danièle Smadja spoke about the time at which two flagship programmes were introduced in India that is Erasmus Mundus and EU Study Centres Programme. She spoke about the student exchange programmes between the two countries and the need to provide solutions related to issues of higher education and societal changes. She further expressed that quality in education required a balance between innovation and traditional teaching-learning methods, along with improvements in administrative functioning of the institutions. She
Session II panelists included Prof Jan-Olov Hoog, Roy Ferguson, HA Ranganath, Hanne Smidt, Dr Surendra Prasad and Dr Seyed E Hasnain
mentioned that Indian higher education system is the largest in the world and also the most complex. Europeans, she explained, could bring something on table for India to bring about improved version of borderless delivery of higher education. Later a keynote address was delivered by Prof Sukhdeo Thorat, Chairman, UGC in which he discussed how collaborations can take place between Europe and India; issues of degree, credit transfers and other research processes; what