digitalLEARNING Magazine - May 2014

Asia’s premier Monthly Magazine on ICT in Education

volume 10

I issue 05 I may 2014 I ISSN 0973-4139 I ` 75

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Lovely Professional University, Jalandhar

Amity University. Noida

Private Universities Special

Changing horizon of

Karunya University, Coimbatore

higher education

NIIT University, Neemrana

Sri Sathya Sai University, Puttaparthi

Akshay Munjal Executive Director, BML Munjal University

Dr Pramath Raj Sinha Founder and Trustee, Ashoka University

Dr Madhu Chitkara Vice Chancellor, Chitkara University

KIIT University, Bhubaneswar

Career Point University, Kota

Dr K N Modi University, Newai

Rajendra Kumar Pandey Fr (Dr) Stephen Mavely President, Vice Chancellor, Assam NIIT University Don Bosco University

Prof G L Datta Chancellor, KL University

Prof Vijay Kant Verma Vice Chancellor, AISECT University

Dr Zora Singh Chancellor, Desh Bhagat University

P P Mathur Vice Chancellor, KIIT University

Dr Surekha Thacker Vice Chancellor, Dr CV Raman University

Prof ORS Rao Vice Chancellor, ICFAI University

Dr A K Srivastava, Director, National Dairy Research Institute

Upcoming Event

Dr Amir Ullah Khan Vice Chancellor, Glocal University

Dr Mithilesh Dixit Vice Chancellor, Career Point University

Prof VPS Arora Vice Chancellor, Supertech University

August 8 - 9, 2014, New Delhi

Contents

ISSN 0973-4139

volume 10 issue 05 May 2014

P 15

cover Story

Private Universities: Revolutionising India’s Higher Education Sector Cover story 17

Preparing Students for Life, not Just Exams Akshay Munjal, Executive Director, BML Munjal University

18 Providing Liberal Education

Dr Pramath Raj Sinha, Founder and Trustee, Ashoka University

20 ‘Need Facilitators, Not Regulators’

Dr Madhu Chitkara, Vice Chancellor, Chitkara University

22 Addressing the Changing Needs of Education

Fr (Dr) Stephen Mavely, Vice Chancellor, Assam Don Bosco University

23 Converting Challenges into Opportunities

Prof G L Datta, Chancellor, K L University

24 Institute-Industry Tie-ups Reduce Employability Gap

Prof Vijay Kant Verma, Vice Chancellor, AISECT University

25 Corporate Tie-ups Open Many Doors

Dr Zora Singh, Chancellor, Desh Bhagat University

26 Encouraging Research for Excellence

P P Mathur, Vice Chancellor, KIIT University

27 Need for Demand-driven Curriculum

Dr Amir Ullah Khan, Vice Chancellor, Glocal University

28 Spreading Global Knowledge

Dr Mithilesh Dixit, Vice Chancellor, Career Point University

29 Sincerity in Intent Determines tie-ups’ Success

Rajendra Kumar Pandey, President, NIIT University

32 Following Global Footprints for Excellence

Dr Surekha Thacker, Vice Chancellor, Dr CV Raman University

36 Leveraging Technology to Enhance Education

4

Prof (Dr) Devendra Pathak, Vice Chancellor, APG Shimla University

38 RUSA may create Enabling Atmosphere

Prof S K Kaushal, Vice Chancellor-cum-Chairman, Arni University

40 RUSA can Change Horizon of Higher Education

Dr A K Srivastava, Director, NDRI

leaders’ speak 42 Crafting a World-class Knowledge Centre

Dr Surajit Mitra, Director, Indian Institute of Foreign Trade

46 Preparing Indian Students for Global Career

Stephen Lofthouse, Course Leader, MSc, Big Data Analytics, Sheffield Hallam University

56 Providing Employment-ready Technical Graduates Kamal Raj Tyagi, Director, Sky Infotech

57 Partnership, a Key to Capacity Building

Professor Michael Thorne, Vice Chancellor, Anglia Ruskin University

Feature 50 A Bumpy Ride For New IITs course review 58 Fashion Designing: A career to break on the Red Carpet

Prof VPS Arora, Vice Chancellor, Supertech University

30 Fostering Strong Bonds to Benefit Students

37 Creating Leaders, Winners

Prof ORS Rao, Vice Chancellor, ICFAI University

education.eletsonline.com

event report 64 Towards Effective Delivery of Quality Education News 08 School Education 10 Higher Education 14 Campus

Asia’s premier Monthly Magazine on ICT in Education Volume

Issue 05

10

May 2014

Partner publications President: Dr M P Narayanan Editor-in-Chief: Dr Ravi Gupta Advisory Board

WEB DEVELOPMENT & IT INFRASTRUCTURE Team Lead – Web Development: Ishvinder Singh

Prof Asha Kanwar, President, Commonwealth of Learning

Dr Jyrki Pulkkinen, Senior Adviser, Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland

Dr Subhash Chandra Khuntia, Additional Secretary, Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas, Govt of India

Prof V N Rajasekharan Pillai, Executive Vice President, Kerala State Council for Science, Technology and Environment

Prof S S Mantha, Chairman, All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE)

Prof Parvin Sinclair, Director, National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT)

Executive – IT Infrastructure: Zuber Ahmed Executive – Information Management: Khabirul Islam Finance & Operations Team Sr Manager – Finance: Ajit Sinha Legal Officer: Ramesh Prasad Verma Executive Officer – Accounts: Subhash Chandra Dimri Manager Events: Nagender Lal

Editorial Team education Sr Correspondent: Ankush Kumar Correspondent: Seema Gupta governance Research Associate: Sunil Kumar Sr Correspondent: Kartik Sharma, Mohd Ujaley, Nayana Singh Health Sr Assistant Editor: Shahid Akhter Correspondent: Ekta Srivastava ICE Connect Assistant Editor: Rachita Jha Correspondent: Veena Kurup SALES & MARKETING TEAM: digital LEARNING National Sales Manager: Fahimul Haque, Mobile: +91 - 8860651632 Associate Manager – Business Development: Amit Kumar Pundhir, Mobile: +91 - 8860635835 Subscription & Circulation Team Sr Executive – Subscription: Gunjan Singh, Mobile: +91-8860635832 Design Team Assistant Art Director: Shipra Rathoria Team Lead – Graphic Design: Bishwajeet Kumar Singh Sr Graphic Designer: Om Prakash Thakur Sr Web Designer: Shyam Kishore Editorial & Marketing Correspondence digitalLearning - Elets Technomedia Pvt Ltd, Stellar IT Park Office No: 7A/7B, 5th Floor, Annexe Building, C-25, Sector 62, Noida, Uttar Pradesh 201301, Phone: +91-120-4812600 Fax: +91-120-4812660 Email: info@digitalLearning.in

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EDITORIAL

Private Varsities, an abode of Innovation India is among the youngest countries in the world, with every third person being a youth.

This young population is the reason why economists and policy leaders are optimistic about India’s future, and youth is expected to drive the country forward.

Though India set up centers of excellence after independence to nurture its young, their rising numbers surpassed the seats available in these institutes. The situation now is such that only those with more than 90 percent can hope to get an admission in the premier colleges. The solution to this, as proposed by educationists, is allowing private players to set up Private or Deemed Universities.

It is only in the last ten years that the sector has attracted significant capital. In fact, the Indian educational landscape today is dotted with Private Universities, many having achieved acclaim for raising the bar for educational standards.

The journey cannot be completed without the inevitable support from the Private and Deemed Universities. Equipped with the global best practices, technology-enabled pedagogy and linkages with the industry, Private Universities have the potential to take the Indian higher education system to new heights.

With this background, we have come up with a special edition on Private Universities. This issue highlights the viewpoints of Vice Chancellors and Chairman of various Private Universities on the key issues plaguing the education sector and the opportunities to address these. The issue also carries a special feature on new IITs and a course curriculum on Fashion Designing.

We are also proud to announce the fourth edition of World Education Summit (WES) 2014 (http://wes.eletsonline.com/), scheduled for August 2014, New Delhi. This will carry forward the incredible success of the 2013 Summit. This year, the Summit will highlight innovations and best practices in the education sector. The Summit will gather together ministers, policy makers of education from various countries, stakeholders from civil society organisations, educationists, academia, corporate houses, international and national developmental organizations, donor agencies and decision-makers from the education industry. It will aim at enriching global efforts towards an inclusive education and analyzing the role of governments in the development and implementation of education policies.

We hope to have you at this year’s WES, where education leaders from around the globe are expected to gather. The conferences, exhibition, workshops and the award ceremony at the WES will provide a wonderful opportunity to stakeholders in the field of education, all over the world, to create opportunities of progress at all levels, namely – global, national, and regional.

I invite all to join in this platform and be a part of the resurgence in the education sector.

Dr Ravi Gupta Editor-in-Chief Ravi.Gupta@elets.in

digitalLEARNING / May 2014

7

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Education

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Education department yet to amend teachers’ recruitment rules

I

t has been over a month since the central human development resource ministry sanctioned 1,100 teaching posts in Chanidigarh, but the Union Territory education department continues to sit on amendments in teacher recruitment rules which is mandatory to begin the recruitment process. This issue which is pending since 2011, has gained significance after the centre sanctioned 1,150 teaching as well as non-teaching posts in March under the Right to Education Act, 2009. While the department is awaiting for the lok Sabha elections to end to begin the process since the department cannot go ahead with the recruitment without making necessary amendments in its rules that was necessitated after the Right to Education Act, 2009.According to the act, the Union Territory will have to notify the amendments in its recruitment rules as per the guidelines issued by National Council for Teachers Education (NCTE) before recruitment.

Schools ask weak students to leave To secure 100 percent results in the board examination and to maintain a reputation, some of the schools of Chennai have gone to the extent of asking students, who perform poorly in class 9 and class 11 to leave immediately and join another school with a pass certificate.

One of the popular schools in Adyar recently gave more than 10 students of class 9 and class 11 to choose between repeating the class or leaving and joining another school with a pass certificate.

Director of matriculation school, R Pitchai stated that according to the education department rules, students cannot be detained till class 8 or sent out while studying in class 10 or class 12.

Inspection of RTE infrastructural norms compliance by schools to begin soon

Need for education beyond classroom, say experts According to experts, for the holistic learning and sensitization of students at an early age, education institutions should go beyond the bookish knowledge and beyond classroom. In panel discussion on “Education: What’s Going on in the Classroom or not;? experts from various fields expressed the need to engage students in healthy debates and discussions on varied topics like sex education, sexual violence and emotional quotient. They also mentioned that, education should be imparted with modes like movies, documentaries etc.

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May 2014 / digitalLEARNING

The primary education department of the Kolhapur zilla parishad (ZP) has formed 12 inspection squads in the district to improve infrastructural norms under the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education (RTE) Act, 2009 in private schools. The squad comprises a block development officer (BDO), a block education officer (BEO) and an education expert, who will visit the respective private schools in their talukas.

The squads will have to submit their report to the primary education officer by April 30. The district has as many as 280 private schools of which 145 have complied with all the 10 RTE infrastructural norms, including boundary walls, toilets, water facilities and kitchen sheds. The remaining 135 schools too need to comply with the norms at the earliest. We are sure this inspection drive will act as a catalyst for that said Kolhapur ZP primary education officer Smita Gaud. The higher authorities will then decide the nature and quantum of action against errant schools.

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Delhi Govt should increase seats for nursery admissions, says SC

T

he Supreme Court took over the matter in its hands to resolve the issues related to nursery admissions.

On 28 April, the SC raised question on the sudden notification that has been introduced in the rules of nursery admission, which might augment conflicts, sine the admission process is not fully complete now. Besides, the bench headed by justice H L Dattu asked Delhi government to add five to six more seats in all nursery schools in this admission season to protect the interest of the children by creating a room for the kids who fall in inter-state transfer cases who had gone ignored after the inter-state points category was scrapped. The court made it clear that the expansion of the seats will be a measure taken only for this year’s admission procedure to not make the parents arrived from different cities to suffer.

28 percent high school dropout rate in Goa

Goa, being the small state in the country still does not show an impressive growth in the education sector. According to the planning commission’s data, the state ranks seventh among the other states and union territories of India. It has a dropout rate of 28 percent from class 1 to 10. Other states like Haryana and Uttar Pradesh have less dropout rate of 19 percent and 24 percent respectively as compared to Goa. Puducherry exhibits the best figure with just 6 percent school dropouts. The statistics of the Planning Commission is based on the data of 2010-11. It is expected that there will be an improvement in Goa’s dropout rate with the Right to Education’s no-fail policy introduced in 2010 that prevents detention of students up to class eight.

Delhi High Court not to lift its stay on nursery admissions The Delhi High Court has refused to lift its stay on the nursery admission process. After hearing the various stakeholders, the division bench consisting of acting Chief Justice BD Ahmed and Justice S Mridul, extended its interim stay till April 2, 2014. The court also directed the Directorate of Education to ensure the rights of children who could have secured admission in the inter-state transfer category but are facing uncertainty due to its dismissal. It also asked the DoE to update its website with details related to the earlier draw of admissions conducted.

Earlier, the HC had rejected the data provided by DoE related to nursery admissions in unaided recognised private schools. According to the guidelines, out of 100, 70 points are given to kids who reside within 8 km radius of a school. Twenty points are given to children whose sibling is studying in the same school and five points for children of alumni.

Teachers of overstaffed schools to be transferred Teachers from overstaffed government schools in Uttarakhand will be transferred to the ones suffering from shortage of teachers, the state government said.

Chief Secretary Subhash Kumar has sought a district-wise list of government schools from the education department of the number of teaching staff in each school. Addressing the executive committee meeting of Uttarakhand Education For All Board, Kumar stated that strict action will be taken against the teachers who are not regular to school and get their work done by other teachers. He also said that FIRs will be registered against the teachers found guilty in this case.The Chief Secretary also approved a fund of `786 crore for the 2014-15 Annual Plan, in the education sector. digitalLEARNING / May 2014

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IIT-Guwahati among top 100 young varsities

T

he IIT Guwahati is the only Indian entry which has made it to the top 100 list of world’s dynamic young varsities.

The Times Higher Education 100 Under 50 universities ranking which will be announced on May 1. The evaluation of the world’s top 100 universities under 50 puts India’s lone entry IIT Guwahati at 87th position.

The ranking oversee the future by examining a new breed of global universities that have managed to join the world’s elite in a matter of decades rather than centuries, with the potential to become the next generation’s Harvard or Oxford.

India which was the only BRIC nation which did not had a single university in the world top 100 table, recently has come in the Times Higher Education rankings. While mainland China had two, both in the top 50 and Russia and Brazil had one each. It is the first time that India joined the top 100 Under 50.The 100 Under 50 is designed to be dynamic and forward looking to give a platform to the universities founded in 1964 or later.

Medical Values and Ethics to be a new subject in Medical Colleges At the third conclave of vice chancellors of health universities of India, organized by Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences (RGUHS) the highly debated matter in the meeting was to introduce a subject on Medical Ethics as a subject for MBBS students.

This led to turning the code of ethics and professionalism values to a proper subject, which shall also be evaluated through an exam.

To get approval on this action, Association of Health Universities of India are soon to appeal to the Medical Council of India (MCI) in written, with a proposal to make professionalism and a code of ethics as part of the MBBS course. They also want that a proper examination pattern should be conducted along with related assessments.

Though majority of Medical universities impart lectures on ethics, but very little is interpreted actually among students. Hence, this new course on medical values and ethics is soon to be introduced and incorporated in the syllabus across Indian medical colleges.

Efforts to make agri education more challenging Initiatives are being taken by the vice chancellor K Ramasamy to revamp the education process of Tamil Nadu Agricultural University by keeping the farmers in the forefront.

The university would first look into changing the curriculum on a par with the Indian Agricultural Research Institute, and get the students equipped and exposed to the global competitions.

Ramaswamy stated that, he wants to make agriculture education more challenging and competitive from the current year to improve the quality of education with the focus to retain and improve position in ranking of institutes across the country.

No new technical institution for a year

I

n the guidelines issued recently, UGC has decided to suspend approval and regulation of new technical institutes for a year. It means, no new technical institutes will be set up across the country and there will be no increase in the number of intakes in the existing institutes as

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May 2014 / digitalLEARNING

well in the academic year 2014-15.

In a notice given to the universities which were asked to grant affiliation to new engineering, pharmacy and hotel management colleges in March by the UGC, to neither invite nor process any application. The affiliation body All India Council for

Technical Education (AICTE) has merged with the affiliation process and now the approval of the new institutes will be done by the UGC. A UGC official stated that the commission felt the requirement of proper framework in order to implement the new process.

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Students design robots to aid agriculture in India With the aim to bring awareness to problems in the agricultural domain, the e-Yantra Robotics Competition was held at Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay. The theme of the competition was ‘Urban Agriculture’.

Some of the finalist entries at the competition were robots that can sow seeds in farms, robots that can remove weeds, robots used for fertilizing crops and robots that can pluck fruits from trees and accumulate at one place.

More than 6,000 students had registered for the e-YRC 2013 from across the country with several of them from institutions in smaller towns and remote corners of the country.

Second career option for retired defence personnel The directorate general of resettlement (DGR) has started new management programmes to assist the defence personnel adopt a second career after retirement. Addressing some senior army officials in Kolkata, Major General Amrik Singh, director general (resettlement) stated that a few courses giving wider choice have been added this year with higher potential of employability including a 24-week management programme for officers. DCR is a tri-service organisation that assists retiring servicemen adopt a second career with approximately 60,000 service personnel retiring every year at a comparatively young age. Majority of the retired personnel at this young age has numerous unfinished domestic responsibilities and look for second career option. Singh also interacted with nearly 50 armed forces personnel who are on the verge of retirement and are undergoing professional training courses in areas such as mobile repairing, IT enabled services and other entrepreneurial courses.

DU forms committee to oversee allotment of DCII courses A committee has been formed by the University of Delhi to watch over the process of allotment of DCII courses i.e discipline courses II or ‘minors’. The committee is chaired by the Dean of Students’ Welfare, J M Khurana, and principals of six colleges as members along with Satish Kumar, OSD examinations, as secretary, who met on April 23. The minutes of the meeting have been recorded which will lead to a set of guidelines for the allocation of DCII in colleges to follow. The committee will also be responsible for monitoring, implementation and successful execution of the programme. At the meeting, the committee also dealt with the challenges which most colleges are facing.

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May 2014 / digitalLEARNING

Dual accreditation must for tech institutes Dual accreditation has become mandatory for institutes in Maharashtra offering courses in engineering, pharmacy, hotel management, etc. According to new UGC regulations, such institutes will have to get an approval from the National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC). On the other hand, the programmes offered by them have to be approved by the National Board of Accreditation (NBA).

According to these regulations, the process of approval, which was earlier done by the AICTE, has been merged with the affiliation process and will be done by the universities. An official stated that the state can now control the mushrooming of colleges and the excess seats in these institutes which go vacant every year.

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A mobile app to inform students about timetable

A

mobile application named as “NexClass” has been created by two second-year IIT-Gandhinagar (IIT-Gn) students- Shashank Pareta and Abhishek Verma. This application is presumed to be of importance among IIT students as it informs them about their time-table as well as offers them a guide map to reach their classroom as per the schedule.

The students only need to remember their roll number and not the constantly changing timetable as with the new app will instantly tell about the class schedule and inform the cellphone’s owner about the next class, in time.

The mobile app also notifies about the classroom, direction, course name, etc.

UGC grants JNU `60 cr for research Granting Jawaharlal Nehru University, the status of University with Potential for Excellence (UPE), UGC has given grant of `60 crore to the university for research and infrastructure development. Instructing about the utilization of the fund, UGC has asked JNU to use it in two major research areas – life sciences, social sciences and humanities.

A part of the fund will also be used for the infrastructure development like the building of research laboratories. Vice chancellor of JNU, S K Sopory, stated that, they are suppose to utilize the fund for the improvement of instrumentation facilities, library upgradation, network connectivity and outreach programmes.

100 percent

Placement for Mica

Mica, the premier B-school in strategic marketing and communication in India has recorded a 100 percent placement for its 19th batch of PGDMCommunication students.

In the institute’s placement process called MICAlibre, out of 156 students 153 opted to be place through the institute’s campus placement. Two students also acquired international placement.

Around 85 companies visited the campus for placement where the highest salary offered was `23 lakh per annum, a hike from last year’s `19.6 lakh a year. The average CTC offered this was `9.3 Lakh, marginally higher than 2013.

DU rejects quota for Delhiites

Delhi University has rejected the Delhi government’s proposal for reserving 85 percent of seats in state governmentfunded colleges for students from the city, citing its central character.

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May 2014 / digitalLEARNING

The DU assistant registrar (academic), in response to a letter by principal secretary R K Verma, department of IT, wrote: “I am directed to convey that the University of Delhi, being a central university, the proposal submitted by you for reservation of seats in admission in DU colleges for students passing XII from the schools in Delhi cannot be acceded to.”

In a letter, Verma had drawn the attention of DU VC, Dinesh Singh, “to the shortage of institutions of higher learning in Delhi to provide admissions to all students passing higher secondary

examination from Delhi schools. Students from Delhi have to go to areas outside Delhi for higher studies. It also takes away opportunity for availing admission in undergraduate and postgraduate courses”.

Reservation in DU has become a political issue. While BJP has been demanding reservation for a long time, the Congress government, in one of its last order, decided to seek 85 percent reservation in 12 of the colleges fully funded by it and 50 percent seats in 16 colleges that are receiving 5 percent funding from state government.

Cover story

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Private Universities: Revolutionising India’s Higher Education Sector As private universities in India rise to MHRD’s challenge of meeting the raised GER, Ankush Kumar of digitalLEARNING looks at the roadblocks and opportunities these universities face

W

ith an aim to ramp up the higher education sector and stay competitive in the global economy, the Ministry of Human Resource & Development has set a target of achieving 30 percent GER (Gross Enrollment Ratio) for India by 2020. Currently pegged at 19.4 percent, India’s GER is far below the world’s average as Australia, Russia and US have GER of more than 75 percent.

The total population between the ages of 15 and 24 in India is 234 million.

If India is to meet its 30 percent GER target by 2020, about 40 million students would be enrolled in the higher education system in 2020. Currently, around 18.5 million students are enrolled in the higher education sector. The problem is that as increasing numbers come out of the high school system, we just don’t have the capacity to absorb them into the college system. There is a massive mismatch in the supply-demand of proportions that have never been seen anywhere or anytime in the world before.

For instance, to reach the target of the 30 percent GER, we need to create an additional capacity of about 25 million seats over the next decade. This requires an additional 10,510 technical institutions, 15,530 colleges and 521 universities.

Achieving this target seems to be slightly difficult and will require creation of additional enrolment capacity at an unprecedented scale. Accordingly, the 12th Five Year Plan envisages creating an additional enrolment capacity of

digitalLEARNING / May 2014

15

Cover story

10 million, which is expected to raise the GER from present level of 19 percent to 25.2 percent in 2017-18. The 12th Five Year Plan also acknowledges the need for a continued and growing role of the private sector in higher education.

India has one of the largest higher education systems in the world comprising of 650+ universities, 35,000+ colleges and numerous stand-alone technical/professional institutions with annual enrolment in excess of 25 million students. The institutional framework of higher education system consists of Universities established by an act of Parliament (Central Universities) or State Legislature (State Universities), Deemed Universities, Institutes of National Importance, Institutions established by State Legislative Act, colleges affiliated to a University, professional and technical institutions amongst others.

Figure 5: Indiaa GER in higher education (in %)

22373

11.9% 12.7%

13.6%

Act. Because universities and institutes are so tightly controlled, there is little autonomy and flexibility in governance structures. Private universities, like government-owned universities, have little scope for innovation in designing their course curriculum.

Establishing a private university typically takes at least three to four years.

“Private universities have the agility and freedom to operate within the state

Deemed to be Universities

129

Central Universities

45

Private Universities

173

Total

659 boundary. They can decide their curriculum, affiliations, accreditations, fee, duration of courses, student admissions, faculty recruitment etc. Government universities on the other hand need to comply with a whole range of norms by UGC and other regulatory Figure 8: Percentage share of private sector in higher education enrolments 60

54%

40

33%

20 2001

Source: Twelfth Five Year Plan (2012-2017) - Social Sectors

May 2014 / digitalLEARNING

1064

Source: UGC Higher Education at a Glance - June, 2013 and RUSA, 2013

59%

16

2752

1950-511 960-61 1970-711 980-81 1990-912 000-01 2010-112 011-12

312

Private, 12,823,000 , 58.9%

1954

1950-512 005-06 2006-072 007-08 2008-092 011-12 2012-13

State Universities

State Govt, 8,400,000 , 38.6%

4825 207

Total No.

Central Govt, 563,000 , 2.6%

8795

15%

0.40%

Universities

Figure 7: Share of higher education instituions in enrolment

18670

19.4% 11%

UNIVERSITY GRANTS COMMISSION Total No. of Universities in the Country as on 05.02.2014

India needs to make sure that private universities are encouraged, and that the legislation to create them is enabling. It’s a maze right now with multiple governing bodies that have conflicting mandates. Several states do not yet have a State Private University (SPU)

Figure 6: Enrolment in higher education (in 000)

2007

2012

bodies, but also enjoy funding and patronage of the state. They are also considered safer and have a wider recognition”, says Narayanan Ramaswamy, Partner & National Leader (Education Sector), KPMG India.

Seeing plethora of opportunities, many industrialists and corporate are eager to enter the higher education sector through private university model. They can easily notice the pool of young people that are considered country’s biggest strength. The demand for education in India is everlasting and will continue to increase; therefore it is hard to say that whether these universities will be sufficient to meet such demand. Many private universities have come up with innovative and attractive course curriculum. They have done a thorough research of all the streams and have concrete strategy to stay ahead of the competition. Many are concentrating on Liberal education with multidisciplinary fields. Others are providing intensive industry training programme in every semester and are focusing in practical education with more corporate exposure.

The Government should come up with policies which can boost private investment in higher education. The private university owners should involve in not-for-profit activity where the excess revenue should be invested back for the development of the university. If India needs to mark its global presence in the education field, the private universities will have to play a significant role. The canvas of our country’s higher education will remain incomplete without these universities.

Cover story

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Preparing Students for Life, not Just Exams Akshay Munjal, Executive Director, BML Munjal University talks about the vision and mission of the university Tell us about the developments that led to the birth of this institute.

My family has been into education since 1962. Our journey in the education sector started with a nursing college, Dayanand Medical College and Hospital, in Ludhiana in 1962. In early 70s, we started a chain of schools to provide affordable quality education.

We started with one school of 20 children and today, we have a chain of

schools where more than 40,000 students study in Punjab and Uttarakhand.

We also have a college for B Ed and M Ed in Ludhiana. After partition, we came to Ludhiana and in 1984 after Hero Honda was launched, our family moved to Delhi.

We have also come up with Indian School of Business (ISB), Ahmedabad and Mohali. We also started Munjal Global Manufacturing Institute (MGMI), which is a part of ISB Mohali. As a family, we have been into education for a long time.

How was your tenure with Hero Mindmine?

Before BML Munjal University, I headed Hero Mindmine, which is engaged in human capital training and development, for five years. It started in 1999 as a spoken English training company and soon became India’s largest vocational training company. We used to train call centre, IT sector employees along with several others at companies like Toyota, Maruti, Coco Cola, etc. We also did programmes with Gurgaon Police, Indian Army, Indian Air Force, etc.

Akshay Munjal, Executive Director, BML Munjal University

What is the USP of BML Munjal University?

Almost 70-80 percent of the highly qualified people are unemployable. By

2020-25, we are expected to have 500 million people below the age group of 20. Making all these people employable will be a huge responsibility. For doing our part, we are analyzing why are people unemployable? After a lot of research, we have learnt that people, who pursue studies, memorise things rather than understanding the concepts and practically applying them.

So, we will teach everything practically. We will not only prepare students for the exams, but for life as well. We have tied up with leading companies like Siemens, KPMG, etc. We also have collaboration with Oxford University and Imperial College.

What are the courses being offered by the university?

We are offering B Tech in six different disciplines. We will also start MBA, BBA and B Com from this August. Next year, we will be offering law, architecture, designing, etc courses.

Share information about the infrastructure and faculty you have in the institute?

The hiring process for all the faculties for the institute is complete. The faculty has come from different reputed colleges. We have a huge campus of around five lakh square feet. We will use technology extensively.

All the lectures will be recorded and preserved, so that if a student doesn’t understand a lecture, he can later go through the recording to understand it.

We are making a small replica of factory in campus, which will be equipped with advanced technologies.

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Providing Liberal Education Dr Pramath Raj Sinha, Founder and Trustee, Ashoka University talks about the advantages of studying in a private university What kind of pedagogical innovation you have added in your courses?

Overall, Ashoka’s curricular focus is on a liberal education and providing breadth, not just depth, of learning. Students can explore multiple subjects well into their four-year degree. When they do finally select a major, it can involve a combination of disciplines and they enjoy the flexibility to change tracks if they want.

Liberal education encourages a spirit of inquiry and there is a major emphasis on critical thinking in Ashoka’s curriculum. Most of our courses are based on a ‘reading, writing and reasoning’ pedagogy. High school education in India prepares students very poorly in these areas and it is important to go the extra mile

to close this gap. At Ashoka, we have a special focus on building the reading and writing skills of all our graduates, so that they can both develop their own perspectives and communicate them effectively.

All this is delivered through a classroom experience where questioning is encouraged. The true change in pedagogy, in the Indian context, is to move away from rote learning methods.

Another important innovation in the curriculum is the Ashoka Quest, a mandatory semester of full-time work experience, which is about learning by doing work at grassroots level. It is not a perfunctory internship, but an intensive and very real marriage of practical and academic knowledge.

How are you planning to stay afloat in such a cut throat competition among other universities/ institutes?

In the case of higher education in India, there is no question of competing, because massive demand exists. Even greater demand exists for education at the highest quality level, which is why the pull of universities abroad is so strong. There is an opportunity to create many more universities like Ashoka in the future. We plan to grow by delivering a level of quality that is not available at all in the country.

What is so unique about your university? Which is the most preferred course among students nowadays?

Ashoka is distinctive as it is the only example of a pure liberal arts university in the private sector in India. There are no real examples of this even in public sector and most private institutions focus on professional education. Ashoka is taking

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a bold step. People believe there are no takers for this kind of education in India and that it doesn’t guarantee a lucrative career. We have set out to prove that this is not the case globally and it should not be so in India as well. The option of a strong liberal education should be available to Indian students. We have already highlighted the unique way in which we are offering this in the above question.

Several majors seem to be popular among students. Many opt for economics in combination with another discipline like finance, politics and philosophy. Others want computer science (combined with entrepreneurship) and psychology as their majors. More importantly, people choose Ashoka because they are keen on liberal education. Many declare a preferred specialization, seek exposure to a breadth of subjects through their coursework, then revisit their choice.

Quality is a serious problem as no Indian university, with the exception of IITs and few others, ever features in any global ranking of the top 100 or top 200 global universities. What are your views on it?

Indeed, quality is a huge issue in India.

It’s a constant battle given the pressure of limited resources and huge numbers.

We should understand that our university system is very different from the global universities against which we are being benchmarked. One needs to calibrate differences when assessing quality that said, we should all be concerned.

Ashoka is convinced that it will be a top-quality university. The success of ISB (the Indian Business School) has demonstrated that this is possible. Within 5 years of its establishment, ISB was ranked among the top 20 in the world.

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‘Need Facilitators, Not Regulators’ Dr Madhu Chitkara, Vice Chancellor, Chitkara University, Punjab talks about the role of private universities in reforming the landscape of higher education What has been your mission while promoting the cause of education?

Chitkara University aims to be the most preferred choice of students, faculty and industry across the country and will be within the ‘Top Ten Private Universities’ by 2015. Its mission is to carry out the academic process for achieving excellence through active student–teacher participation, promoting research and development activities in collaboration with reputed industries and laboratories. It also aims to inculcate high moral, ethical and professional standards among students and contribute effectively towards societal and community development.

In terms of regulation of the higher education sector, what are the key challenges and prospects in reforming the landscape of higher education?

To reform the higher education, there is a need for an intention to raise standards of higher education by upgrading primary and secondary education system. It can also be done by meeting global standards of education, inculcating habit of research among faculty and more resources and fund opportunities to faculty and higher institutions.

What are your views on RUSA: Will it be the game-changer in higher education and how?

We are known for creating best regulators and systems. RUSA will be a gamechanger only if it acts as facilitator, resource provider and progressive monitoring agency flexible enough to shape

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media sites to promote education and learning. MOOC is going to be the future of education and so, ICT is a must.

What role do you think private universities play in the education sector in India?

Private universities have a huge and responsible role to play. We are more progressive, industry-oriented, updated, studentcentric with outcome-based learning.

Private universities should be encouraged.

Dr Madhu Chitkara, Vice Chancellor, Chitkara University, Punjab Indian higher education as per global standards.

Do you think industry-academia partnership is important to provide employable skills to students and how?

Sure. Industry-Academia interface is of utmost importance to produce industryready individuals. Academia cannot train youngsters as per industry requirement without having appropriate partnerships and employer engagement.

What are your views on the use of ICTs in education? How does the university keep up with the rapid technological changes?

It is need of the hour. All the changes we are noticing around are driven by technological changes. We are upgrading our labs continuously, using social

How has your university been able to provide the necessary knowledge for effective employability of students?

We have done it by industry interaction, employer engagement at all levels, best of faculty and learning-centric methodology and international collaborations.

How can India’s higher education system be made more robust?

It can be made robust by producing best faculty through research efforts, providing best of resources to those who are education providers, pioneers in trainings and problem-based learning, organizing international youth forums for university students and encouraging post doctoral research by faculties at foreign universities.

We need facilitators and not regulators.

What special efforts have been undertaken by your university to gear up to the needs of the present generation?

We have industry-driven courses, international exposure, best of faculty on board and student-centric environment.

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Addressing the Changing Needs of Education Fr (Dr) Stephen Mavely, Vice Chancellor, Assam Don Bosco University talks about the role of private universities in the education sector in India What has been the vision of your group in promoting the cause of education?

Don Bosco University is sponsored by the international educational society, the Salesians of Don Bosco, currently working in 132 countries and catering to roughly 15 million young people in a variety of settings – schools, colleges, universities, agricultural centres, technical institutes, rural development centres, children from the streets, immigrant population, refugee camps, etc.

Quality education especially for the marginalized, formation of the young for their insertion into the world of work, an integral formation of the young that makes them dependable human beings with a sense of commitment to society while fashioning a better future for themselves – these are some of our guiding principles.

With foreign collaborations being the key focus of educational institutes, what are the current and future plans your university in furthering these collaborations?

Right from inception, Don Bosco University set for itself an ambitious target of entering into collaborative relationships with a variety of institutions from around the world. Being part of an international society helped in this process. Currently, we have active MoUs with universities in Europe (Spain, Switzerland, Germany, UK, Ireland, Italy), United States, Asia (Japan, Thailand) and South America (Brazil, Equador, Argentina). Our MoUs are singularly focused on the following: Staff and student exchange programmes, joint research projects, cultural exchange,

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especially to make them available to those struggling to juggle the demands of their workplace and families.

Fr (Dr) Stephen Mavely, VC, Assam Don Bosco University semester abroad programmes and joint degree programmes.

What are your views on the use of ICTs in Education? How does the University keep up with the rapidly changing technological changes?

I, for one, firmly believe that investment in ICT is the way forward. I am convinced that more and more young people will enter the world of work at younger ages (just after or even during their high school), and that lifelong education will become the norm rather than the exception. It is here that ICT will play an irreplaceable role in providing education right at their work place or in their homes. Recognizing this decisive and irreversible trend in education, Don Bosco University has invested heavily in its online courses, which are finding a worldwide clientele in just three years.

We intend to continue on this path till all our courses will be available online,

What role do you think private universities play in the education sector in India?

The private universities are here to stay and have a key role to play in some or all of the following areas: a) in creating the type of capacity that our nation needs to increase GER dramatically in the coming years, b) in enabling academic institutions to address the changing needs of education in the rapidly changing social and educational scenario, c) in ensuring prompt attention to quality concerns and market sentiments, d) in ensuring swift response societal and industrial needs, e) in boldly experimenting with cutting edge courses and technologies, and f) in creating a sense of unease in the complacent attitudes of many of our public institutions in the areas of performance, output, accountability, etc. However, it cannot also be denied that institutions of dubious motives and performance have also come up as a result of the opportunities given to invest in private universities.

What is the significance of mandatory accreditation of higher education institutions?

Mandatory accreditation is probably necessary to jolt us out of our complacency. Too many institutions have settled down to a maintenance mode of existence with no importance given to innovation, growth, research and academic output. Accountability, performance appraisal, target setting, etc are the driving factors in good educational institutions in our country and abroad.

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Converting Challenges into Opportunities Prof G L Datta, Chancellor, K L University, Vaddeswaram, Guntur, AP talks about challenges in reforming landscape of higher education What has been the mission of your group in promoting the cause of education?

Koneru Lakshmaiah Education Foundation deemed to be K L University is the metamorphosis of K L College of Engineering set up in 1980 by the Koneru Lakshmaiah Education Foundation, which is presently headed by President Er Koneru Satyanarayana. The Engineering College was declared to be a deemed university in February 2009. Its vision is to become a ‘globally renowned University’ and mission is ‘to impart quality higher education and to undertake research and extension with emphasis on application and innovation that cater to the emerging societal needs through all-round development of students of all sections enabling them to be globally competitive and socially responsible citizens with intrinsic values’.

In terms of regulation of the higher education sector, what are the key challenges and prospects in reforming the landscape of higher education?

Some of the key challenges before the deemed universities are need for diversification of programmes, contributing to quality research output in terms of publications and sponsored projects and engaging quality faculty. It is also challenging to create state-of-art infrastructure and enable environment for effective teachinglearning and conduct extension activities to serve the society. Some of these regulatory requirements, though may appear to be challenges, but may act as boon to raise the standard of the university. Our university has converted these challenges into

tial and proven capability to impart quality education should be brought under the ambit of RUSA for meeting the target of 30 percent GER in higher education by 2020 in our country.

Prof G L Datta, Chancellor, K L University, Vaddeswaram opportunities where students and faculty work together in pursuit of knowledge in various disciplines of science, humanities, commerce, management and engineering.

Apart from bachelors and master’s degree programmes, we have research program leading to Ph D. 35 percent of our faculty have Ph D degrees and majority of the rest are pursuing Ph D. We have created state-of-the-art research labs, hostels, playgrounds and gym of international standard.

What are your views on RUSA: Will it be the game changer in higher education and how?

RUSA has the ability to do wonder if implemented effectively. It is, however, confined to public/government-funded/controlled institutions/colleges. Selected institutions in the private sector with research poten-

With foreign collaborations being the key focus of educational institutes, what are the plans of your university in furthering these collaborations?

K L University has collaborations through MoUs with foreign universities of repute belonging to almost all developed countries in the world for various programmes like faculty exchange, ‘twinning programmes’, joint Ph D supervisions, joint research projects, etc. We invite reputed experts from these universities to offer courses at UG and PG levels on a regular basis. We also take their input in revising our curriculum. Our university is a partner member of IUCE and we get a good number of faculty members from the US universities for conducting subject workshops every semester.

Do you think industry-academia partnership is important to provide employable skills to students and how?

Industry-Academia partnership is a must for providing employable skills to the students. A partnership can create scopes for experts from industry visiting the institutions and giving guest lectures, students visiting the industries and doing internships. It is also beneficial for faculty members visiting the industries to gain practical knowledge, which would be useful for delivering effective lectures.

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Institute-Industry Tie-ups Reduce Employability Gap Prof Vijay Kant Verma, Vice Chancellor, AISECT University talks about the advantages of private universities What kind of pedagogical innovation you have added in your courses?

A minimum two skill courses have been made compulsory at UG level to generate sense of honour for labour and provide soft and hard skill. We have also come up with value addition courses in the campus with help of industries/corporate.

The recent addition is Cloud Competency Centre with the assistance of Microsoft.

We also organise a project competition every year for UG students to motivate them to connect to society for using knowledge gained in the classes.

How are you planning to stay afloat in such a cut throat competition among other universities / institutes?

We are going to do it by focusing on our organizational mission to deliver quality

education in such a way that employability gap is reduced with assurance that pass outs will be truly professionals.

We will also act as an effective industryinstitute interface to ensure revision in curriculum for preparing industry-ready pass outs from the university.

We also do projects with industries to provide real life experiences to students.

What is so unique about your university? Which is the most preferred course among students here?

The university offers world class infrastructure, dedicated and expert faculty, industry grade labs and effective teaching–learning system that makes us unique. Engineering UG courses, commerce and management UG and PG courses are quite popular.

How important are corporate tie-ups for private universities in improving the students’ placements?

Corporate tie-ups for private universities are very important. We have gone for a tie up with HCL and Microsoft.

What kind of global collaboration that you have at your university?

Why do you think it is necessary?

We have collaboration with RPI, USA and Siegen University, Germany. With world shrinking globally, exposure with developed countries will provide growth avenues.

What is your modernization and expansion plans?

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We will start departments of law and physical education from the next session.

Meanwhile, an Energy Research Centre and e-Learning Centre are to commence shortly.

What are some of the advantages that you have over government universities?

We have fast curriculum updation, better institute-industry tie-ups, better infrastructure and facilities with reduced employability gap.

Quality is a serious problem-no Indian university, with the exception of IITs and few others, ever features in any global ranking of the top 100 or top 200 global universities. What are your views on it?

Research is the major area of evaluation in which Indian institutions lack. There is a need for government to think for better funding for research especially to private universities.

Education is the one sector untouched by the winds of reform.

There are several Higher Education Bills that are pending in the parliament. What are your views?

Reforms can be effective only if universities are active participants in reform process.

What is your expectation from the government?

Government should take up the role of facilitator rather than controller. It should also offer better support in funding and subsidy.

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Corporate Tie-ups Open Many Doors Dr Zora Singh, Chancellor, Desh Bhagat University talks about the importance of corporate tie-ups for a private university What is so unique about your University? Which is the most preferred course among students here?

Desh Bhagat University is known for cultural sharing, where students are exposed to meet different nationals from all over the world, and they learn from each other. Despite the fact that we are located in the semi-urban industrial town of Mandi Gobindgarh, we have been successful in creating international bridges through continuous student and faculty exchange programmes.

We are a university that prepares a student as an entrepreneur, as we train students for employability.

We believe in practical exposure than theoretical, so we plan our programmes in such a way that a student becomes job ready by the end of his course. Preferred courses are many, but to name a few, there is a great demand for management, computer science, science and engineering-related courses. Professional courses like airlines, tourism, hospitality, media and animation are in huge demand these days.

How are you planning to stay afloat in such a cut-throat competition among other universities/ institutes?

The present day educational scenario, especially that of the higher education, is very raw right now as these newly developed universities are still figuring out the right approach to meet the needs of the students seeking higher education.

However, the fee structure is still a gray area with not much clarity. We are work-

Dr Zora Singh, Chancellor, Desh Bhagat University ing on our strengths and our own catchment area.

Being an 18-year-old educational group, we don’t believe in just enrolling candidates to churn amounts from them. All our policy decisions are based on providing quality education through our strengths and following key parameters of self assessment and internally-developed standard operating procedures. We have our own revenue models and best practices that help us stay afloat and maintain a brand of quality education.

How important are corporate tie-ups for private universities in improving students’ placements?

In today’s scenario, corporate tie-ups have become quite important for a private university for the placements of its students. Various factors that are

explored through corporate tie-ups of a university with leading organizations that will ultimately act as catalysts towards final placements of students are below: • Corporate tie-ups open up the doors of designing a common platform between an industry and an academia to discuss the module of curriculum for integrating academic syllabus. Through this process, students will regularly update themselves with industry skill set & this will increase the employability level of students in placing them in various organizations by a university.

• Corporate tie-ups also accelerate the process of mutual acknowledgement of sharing the experience, expertise and capabilities of private universities and organizations & give due importance to collaboration & working relationship in education.

What are some of the advantages that you have over Government Universities?

Private universities are each intensely unique. From differences in curriculum and academic standards to mission statements, each private university creates an atmosphere that is truly its own.

The students – not politics, are the priority of the private universities. Instructors set the bar high at the beginning and keep encouraging the students to clear the bar over the four years of their stay. Most strive to cultivate the ideal atmosphere for academic success of their students. As a result, their students become profoundly capable contributors to the society.

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Encouraging Research for Excellence P P Mathur, Vice Chancellor, KIIT University talks about the ways to reform the landscape of higher education in India increase bureaucratic set up in the higher education system but if implemented seriously and passionately by the state governments it might yield some of the desired results. Efforts should be made to include the best private higher education institutions also in the fold of RUSA. Time has come to give due recognition to best private and deemed universities.

P P Mathur, Vice Chancellor, KIIT University What has been your mission while promoting the cause of education?

KIIT University was established to provide quality technical education in the country. It is a very young University and has been able to become one of the leading universities in the country. The University also provides social consciousness to the students.

In terms of regulation of the higher education sector, what are the key challenges and prospects in reforming the landscape of higher education?

The key challenges to the education sector are providing quality education and to get a place in the list of best education institutions of the world. For this, research and innovations have to be encouraged in the universities.

What are your views on RUSA: Will it be the game-changer in higher education and how?

RUSA has been contemplated as gamechanger in the higher education. It would

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With foreign collaborations being the key focus of educational institutes, what are the current and future plans of your university in the same?

KIIT University already has foreign collaborations with more than 80 educational institutions. Many of them fall in the list of top 200 institutions in the world. The University has ongoing exchange programmes for faculty and students. The University receives more than 1000 students from abroad every year for short-term and long-term programmes.

We are expanding the programmes and want to see KIIT University as a global University in the truest sense of the term.

Do you think industry-academia partnership is important to provide employable skills to students and how?

The University has strong links with the industry. In the School advisory Boards and Boards of Studies of the University, experts from industry are inducted. In addition, much industry-related courses and industry partnership programmes are available for the students. This has helped the University to achieve nearly 100 percent placement in all the branches in the past years.

What are your views on the use of ICTs in Education? How does the university keep up with the rapid technological changes?

The University has a strong ICT component in education. The University has provided 100 percent computer penetration with high speed internet connectivity. The University is keeping pace with changing technology by removing obsolescence. The University has subscribed to a large number of electronic resources.

What is the significance of mandatory accreditation of higher education institutions?

Mandatory accreditation of higher education institutions is a good step in which good performing institutions would get advantage and bad performing institutions would be identified and corrective measures will be taken. However, there is a great challenge in covering the large number of institutions in credible accreditation process.

How has your university been able to provide the necessary knowledge for effective employability of students?

The university tries to provide best learning experience in core subjects.

In addition, development of soft and communication skills is also taken up through credit and non-credit courses. Such an effort has increased the employability of the students. The university also provides overall personality development through various co-curricular and extracurricular activities.

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Need for Demand-driven Curriculum Our higher education model must recognise that India’s demographic dividend impacts nearly 250 million youth that make up 21 percent of India. They all are looking for jobs. We need to design our educational pattern keeping the same in mind, says Dr Amir Ullah Khan, Vice Chancellor, Glocal University

M

ore than 60 years ago, India decided to follow the model of higher education that was followed in the UK. The University Grants Commission Act was passed in 1956 and this statutory body came in to being that would regulate standards in Indian universities and give grants to all central universities. For 40 years, we continued this system.

Nearly two decades ago, in 1995, the Sikkim Manipal University was established as Indian’s first private sector

university. Since then a small number of such initiatives have taken shape and today, we have a little more than 170 private universities set up all over the country. The total number of universities is about 660, 45 of whom are central universities, 312 state universities and about 130 are deemed universities.

And all over the country, the debate on this privatisation has been going on relentlessly, including on the question of allowing foreign universities to set up campuses in India.

Today, no Indian university is ranked even in the top 200 in the world. The best universities are predominantly from the United States, but there are Japanese and Chinese Universities that are among the top 50. Indian universities suffer from poor faculty to student ratio, a pitiable research output, very little industry interface, and crumbling infrastructure by way of poorly equipped laboratories and meagre library resources. Despite a long history, our universities have never been able to establish any international reputation and this includes institutes that we are very proud of, namely the Indian Institutes of Technology and the Indian Institutes of Management.

In India, most rankings name Delhi University, the Jawaharlal University and the Calcutta University among the top universities within the country. Os-

mania University and the Central University in Hyderabad, Aligarh Muslim and Benares Hindu University and the Bombay University are the other top ranked institutions. The Birla Institute in Pilani is one solitary private institute that figures among the top institutes in the country.

None of our government-owned and run universities can compete with any well-known international university.

The gross enrolment ratio (GER) in India, that shows how many people between 18 and 25 enter college, is lower than 18 percent and pales in comparison with most countries around the world.

It indeed is time we visited this rather rigid system and allowed it to become far more inclusive than it is. Distance education, which has been so tightly regulated and under developed, must be catalysed to provide inexpensive and high quality education to millions of youth in remote locations, in a number of languages and covering a larger number of subjects and skills.

Curriculum that has always been supply driven needs to increasingly transform into delivering demand-driven output, keeping the potential employer in mind and incorporating industry interest. Private universities, if allowed to grow and unshackled from mindless restrictions, could play a great role in this area.

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Spreading Global Knowledge Dr Mithilesh Dixit, Vice Chancellor, Career Point University talks about challenges in reforming landscape of higher education What has been your mission while promoting the cause of education?

We started with a very simple vision to impart knowledge. Our vision of imparting knowledge did not end up in books, syllabus and curriculum or just making students job worthy. We went ahead to develop life skills for a lifetime and enable children and youth to be able to face challenges of life in all aspects of a good and a great living. We have envisioned a new dimension in learning. We have created paradigms to connect the individual to the institutional, national and even global transformation process. We focus on knowledge creation. We believe to follow excellence, strive for perfection and all else

will naturally fall in place. We will play a major role in positive change and development of both individuals and the society. It will also be a sustaining force.

In terms of regulation of the higher education sector, what are the key challenges and prospects in reforming the landscape of higher education?

Higher education is extremely diverse and the challenges and issues faced by higher education are just as diverse. We are required to meet global demand for skills with appropriate supply of skilled employable youth. The process of education is not merely digesting books. It is also about doing several co-curricular and extracurricular activities that give a broader meaning to life in general and learning in particular. I believe that opportunities for such holistic development are not enough.

We are in a phase of higher education where we need to review our fundamental structure, re-examine our programmes, pedagogy, delivery and student support methods. Learning and the advancement of knowledge is yet to become the focus of our research efforts, underpinning a system-level capacity for sustained expansion and for consistent growth of our learning outcomes.

With foreign collaborations being the key focus of educational institutes, what are the current

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and future plans of your university in the same?

We do not look at foreign collaborations as brand enhancement venture but as an investment in knowledge base. That is why we look for both institutional tie-ups wells as specific course-related tie-ups or just for exchange of knowledge. We are not bringing foreign names, but global knowledge.

It will empower our alumni to serve the national interests internationally and will project our culture and values.

We have already signed MOUs for exchange of knowledge and certification in some popular mainstream courses and would continue to do so in future. We will continue to develop mutually beneficial partnerships with globally-ranked and respected institutions overseas. This will entail staff development, intensive use of resources, increased use of innovative forms of delivery, changes to programme structures and increased delivery of programmes. It will also include global mobility of our staff and students.

What role do you think private universities play in the education sector in India?

Private universities have a role to play in social and economic regeneration. We need to distinguish by the quality and quantity of our alumni, the innovation across the spectrum of economic, social, civic and cultural arenas. We also need to deepen the quality and intensity of relationship with enterprise and adjust our strategy regularly in response to global change.

Critical thinking, adaptability and creativity will be key characteristics required of graduates in the future job market.

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Sincerity in Intent Determines tie-ups’ Success Prof VPS Arora, Vice Chancellor, Supertech University talks about importance of foreign university collaborations What is your vision of Supertech University?

Supertech University is being created to provide opportunity to the people of Uttarakhand and adjoining states to get quality education in domain of relevance at affordable cost. The University offers array of courses in different areas of knowledge including emerging innovative areas like public policy, infrastructure management, health care management, liberal arts and actuarial science. The University intends to give balanced focus on capacity building, consultancy, innovations, research, skill development, teaching-learning and Indian values and culture. The vision statement of the University is creation of an edifice of excellence aligned with global bests, imparting true education based on pillars of research, innovation, intellectual curiosity and freedom to pursue the same.

What are the special changes brought about by your university in pedagogy for making sure that the students are industry employable?

Industry-Academia interaction is not going to be a mere bullet point or a box ticking exercise in Supertech University. These meetings will be taken religiously and seriously to glean out the expectations of the industry which will be factored while formulating the curriculum.

There is a dedicated Directorate of Placement and Counseling in Supertech University which will on one hand ensure fixing of accountability on human resource responsible, and on the other constitute a driving force galvanizing and coordinating participation of all stakeholders in the process of placement and counseling of Supertech graduates.

Students have to be made conscious that the employer is going to test their worthiness before giving them the offer letter. Once the students realize this awareness, they would be prepared for the acid test. Usually when a student joins university after 10 + 2, for some time there is a feeling of having joined a Masti ki Paathshala. Surely, “Masti”, they must have, yet they should not lose the focus for which they have joined Supertech University.

Prof VPS Arora, Vice Chancellor, Supertech University When there is involvement of all stakeholders there is bound to be positive impact. There are many organizations wherein responsibility of placement has been entrusted to faculties, who in turn take it as an additional burden thereby adopting a very lackadaisical approach to the entire exercise. To avoid this pitfall, in Supertech University, a dedicated Directorate has been conceived so that the issue of placement gets the priority and focus it merits.

A major drawback commonly noticed amongst students is lack of communication skill. It is intended to address this issue from day one. There would be dedicated classes to impart training on communication skills, which will have a credit associated with it. Similarly, study of behavioral science and ethics will be a compulsory credit to impart attributes of tehzeeb and sanskar.

Do you think foreign university collaborations add value to the education provided in the private university and if yes, how?

We are living in a world which is ‘flat’, to borrow from Thomas Friedman. In an interactive and interoperable world, knowledge creation, preservation and dissemination cannot remain confined to geographic limits. To that extent collaboration with foreign universities has obvious advantages. However, to derive full dividend, it is important to consider what kind of MOU/ MOA exists with foreign universities, what is their standing in the respective domain and what is more significant and critical is that who is at the driver’s seat ensuring that the institutional arrangements are given a meaningful orientation and impetus, they fructify realizing their full potential.

It is a known fact that Indian Universities do not figure anywhere in university rankings. If Ivy League universities are ranked amongst the best year after year, there must be something substantial they may be engaged in so as to retain their pre-eminence in the field association with them is bound to reflect some glory on us.

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Fostering Strong Bonds to Benefit Students Rajendra Kumar Pandey, President, NIIT University talks about the role private universities play in the education sector in India What has been your mission while promoting the cause of education?

NIIT University’s vision is to be the leading center of innovation and learning in emerging areas of the knowledge society. Our mission is to foster research, discovery and sustainability, deliver distinctive education through the pioneering use of technology, develop talent for the sustainable growth of Industry and society and nurture a culture of seamlessness in all facets of life.

Do you think industry-academia partnership is important to provide employable skills to students and how?

The rapid pace of growth of knowledge and more specifically knowledge in the domain of science and technology demands innovative approaches in higher education. The response time to understand, meet and face these changes and challenges has to be fast. We believe the only way to be able to respond in a far more effective way to these changes is to go hand in hand partnering with the industry.

Exposing students to the corporate world by the way of frequent industry visits, internships, live projects and interaction with senior management from leading organizations makes for a tremendous difference in the understanding of required skills for industry and corporate culture.

What role do you think private universities play in the education sector in India?

The twenty first century has ushered

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in profound changes in the way society perceives and demands higher education from universities. The rapid pace with which technologies are changing has also put pressures on the academia to constantly adjust to these changes in a dynamic way. Private universities are uniquely positioned in responding to these challenges. The cultural divide between private university and the corporate world is also narrower, which helps in fostering stronger bonding.

The benefits of the bond obviously go to the students in terms of job opportunities. These universities also offer better campus facilities, IT infrastructure and freedom from red tape. These are some of the reasons behind the success of private universities in India.

How has your university been able to provide the necessary knowledge for effective employability of students?

Rajendra Kumar Pandey, President, NIIT University

Our strong linkages with industries, technology-based education, worldclass infrastructure, research-driven culture and seamless ideology make us unique.

The academic programmes at NIIT University have been designed to ensure that students get exposure to the corporate culture by way of industry practice, internship, corporate mentorship and foreign immersion. We also ensure sufficient exposure to R&D. Many of our students have thus been able to participate in national and international conferences in India as well as abroad and won awards.

We are indeed very proud to share that our students have received sponsored research project from DRDO. The University takes pride in providing 100 percent placement to all the students.

How can India’s higher education system be made more robust?

As we are aware, the number of academic institutions in India is just not enough to meet the targeted gross enrolment of 30 percent by 2020. The existing universities have been unable to compete globally in research or knowledge creation.

We, therefore, feel the nation needs to encourage the increase in number of institutions for higher education. To compete and to be acknowledged globally, we should also encourage foreign university collaborations and foreign immersion programmes. The industry should also be involved, so as to understand their social responsibility and come forth with their contribution.

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Following Global Footprints for Excellence Dr Surekha Thacker, Vice Chancellor, Dr CV Raman University talks about the role of foreign collaborations in the education sector in India What kind of pedagogical innovation you have added in your courses?

We have come up with project-based learning with emphasis on self learning and participative learning with participation from teachers/experts. We also have digital classrooms for distance learning and online learning material for self study.

How are you planning to stay afloat in such a cut throat competition among other Universities/ institutes?

We are working in the tribal block. We try to create awareness about need of education amongst rural/tribal folks and provide best facilities to students within their reach.

What is so unique about your University? Which is the most preferred course among students here?

CVRU is the premier university in Chhattisgarh and one of the first to implement semester system even in their UG courses. Our focus is on tribal students. We provide best education to them to bring them up to the level of urban students, expose them to newer techniques and make them employable and work-ready by the time they complete their education.

About 57 percent students in our university are poor and backward and they are offered scholarships either by state government or by the university.

We are proud to have 27 percent tribal girl students in Dr CV Raman University.

CVRU Teachers are motivated by the

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university to pursue further higher education and research and the cost is borne by university. Most preferred course among our students is engineering.

How important are corporate tie-ups for private universities in improving the student placements?

Industry-University interface and corporate tie-ups are very important for creating employment and employable students. Interface helps us to know what industry expects from education and guides us to impart ‘product specific’ and ‘process specific’ skills to our engineering, management or other students.

What kind of global collaboration that you have at your University?

Why do you think it is necessary?

We are in the process of global collaborations to widen our horizons and offer global exposure to our students. We are in discussion with few foreign universities for exchange of teachers/students and technical knowhow.

It is necessary because the world is now a ‘global village’ and thinking in isolation will stunt our growth.

What are some of the advantages that you have over government universities?

The university offers pace, resources, talent and intent. The pace of implementation of ideas, new curricula and new technologies are some of the advantages that we have over the government universities.

Private universities have good resource management, pool of good talent, creative freedom and zeal to march ahead.

Dr Surekha Thacker, Vice Chancellor, Dr CV Raman University Quality is a serious problemno Indian university, with the exception of IITs and few others, ever features in any global ranking of the top 100 or top 200 global universities. What are your views on it?

We lack sincere professionalism. We abstain from sharing and try to cocoon our talent. Talent sharing, creative freedom for idea implementation, sound financial health, Research oriented approach and global exposure are needed for excelling.

Also a right focus on India’s ancient science, rich heritage, herbal medicinesayurveda and other legacies plus the awareness of modern ideas about intellectual property-patents can give us the unique lead in global competition.

What are your expectations from the government?

The government should grant more freedom to good universities. Lessen discussions and focus on work. Follow global footprints and make a mark.

Cover story

Leveraging Technology to Enhance Education Prof ORS Rao, Vice Chancellor, ICFAI University, Jharkhand talks about the role of ICTs in Education and more What has been your mission while promoting the cause of education?

The ICFAI group has pioneered higher education in India, with pan-India presence, with 11 Universities (seven out of them being in East and North Eastern part of India) and 5 Premier Business Schools across India so that quality higher education is accessible to every Indian, wherever he is, only on the basis of merit. The group’s motto is ‘Meritum Ethicus’, meaning Merit with Ethics.

The ICFAI University, Jharkhand is one of the 11 Universities set up by the ICFAI group. The University’s mission is to groom its students into ‘competent professionals, with values’. It also strives to create an intellectually stimulating environment for research, particularly into areas, bearing socio-economic and cultural development of Jharkhand and the nation, as a whole.

Do you think Industry-Academia partnership is important to provide employable skills for students and how?

While Industry is the vehicle to drive the economy of India, Academia provides fuel (skilled manpower) to the industry.

However, the paradox is: while only a small percentage of graduating students are employable, the industry currently spends a lot of money not just to recruit people, but to retrain them so that they are made productive. In this scenario, there needs to be a symbiotic partnership between Industry and Academia, for mutual benefit. It should cover the entire academic life cycle of curriculum formulation, academic delivery, guest lectures, internships/projects, placements, etc.

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May 2014 / digitalLEARNING

manufacturing plants, animation films, etc. Besides, virtual labs and simulators can be used by students to conduct experiments where equipment is very expensive or calls for a hazardous environment. Video Conferencing facility can be used for bringing together remotely located teachers with learners (for lectures, seminars, etc) and employers and graduating students (for placement interviews).

Industry also needs help from academia in terms of executive development programmes for its employees (to enhance their capabilities) and consultancy and research & development (for new product development and solving customer problems).

What are your views on the use of ICTs in Education? How does the university keep up with the rapidly changing technological changes?

ICT is an important enabler to ensure effective teaching-learning processes so that requisite knowledge and skills are imparted to the students as per their interests and convenience. In the current scenario, wherein there is scarcity of competent teachers, ICT can complement classroom teaching, by way of video lecturers, video walk-throughs of

How has your university been able to provide the necessary knowledge for effective employability to students?

Our University analyses, on an ongoing basis, the trends in technology and job markets and the changing knowledge and skills requirements of the industry and updates curriculum every year. For instance, we have recently introduced courses in emerging technology areas like IT Infrastructure Management, Cloud Computing, Mobile Computing, Smart devices programming, etc in our curriculum for BCA and B Tech (Computer Sciences). Internships / Projects in industry for durations, ranging from two months (for MBA) to 7 months (for B Tech) are part of our curriculum so as to impart hands-on skills to the students.

In recognition of the importance of ‘character building’ for professional and personal success, we introduced ‘Values and Ethics’ in all of our programmes, in collaboration with Rama Krishna Mission Ashrama, Ranchi. In all, we ensure that all graduating students are imparted requisite knowledge and skills so as to make them not only employable but also happy in their lives.

Cover story

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Creating Leaders, Winners Prof (Dr) Devendra Pathak, Vice Chancellor, APG Shimla University talks about the importance of industry-academia partnership in providing employable skills to students What has been your mission while promoting the cause of education?

The mission and vision of the promoters of APG Shimla University, is to create leaders who inspire a vision, winners who set positive paradigm of action and achievers who have the will and strength to make the difference.

In terms of regulation of the higher education sector, what are the key challenges and prospects in reforming the landscape of higher education?

In Himachal, we had Himachal Pradesh Private Educational Institutions Regulatory Commission, which has since been struck down by High Court of Himachal Pradesh. However, state government is the regulator through its department of higher education. The government only decides about the number of intake of students, types of courses to be run, tuition fee and hostel charges without any value addition to curricula, assistance to training and development and employability. These are the real bottlenecks in ensuring viability in bringing changes in the higher education landscape.

What are your views on RUSA: Will it be the game-changer in higher education and how?

RUSA is really a revolutionary step aimed at galvanizing the present educational delivery, its pedagogy and methodology hitherto practised. Option for choicebased credit system opens creative avenues for the students to pursue their choice-based subjects adding passion to hobbies and studies.

With foreign collaborations being the key focus of educational institutes, what are the current and future plans of your university in the same?

APG Shimla University already has tieups with more than half a dozen foreign universities and at present, some 60 students from different countries are studying here. The number is likely to go up to 200+ during academic session 2014-15.

Do you think industry-academia partnership is important to provide employable skills to students and how?

Mismatch between the expectations of industry and delivery of academia has been the main stumbling block for employability of the graduating students.

We have been trying to bridge the gap by continuous interface with the industry and get our curriculum vetted by them.

What are your views on the use of ICTs in education? How does the university keep up with the rapid technological changes?

We have given utmost importance to introduction of technology and its convergence has been ensured in all streams, be it management, engineering or any other course.

What role do you think private universities play in the education sector in India?

With three million students seeking to pursue higher education in various streams, the central, state and deemed universities cannot cope up with their existing infrastructure and capacity of intake. Therefore, intervention of private universities is warranted to take care of the increasing demand for higher education.

How can India’s higher education system be made more robust?

How has your university been able to provide the necessary knowledge for effective employability of students?

Higher education in India can be robust if faculty is well qualified for dissemination of knowledge, emphasis is laid on original research resulting into productive development, adequate compensation, congenial environment, motivation and support are in place. Close rapport with industry and academia in tune with their expectation, course curricula matching to the needs of corporate and industries with proper infrastructure and lab facilities, etc. will help boost quality and standard of higher education raising the employability quotient of the students.

digitalLEARNING / May 2014

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Cover story

RUSA may create Enabling Atmosphere Prof S K Kaushal, Vice Chancellor-cum-Chairman, Arni University talks about the policies that can be a game-changer in higher education What has been your mission while promoting the cause of education?

Arni University is a vibrant, equitable and sustainable university, committed to teaching and research excellence at the service of its students, scholars and wider community. The mission of the University is to provide high quality education contributing to the advancement of knowledge that is socially relevant, and applying that knowledge to the scientific, technological and social-economic development of our nation and the wider world.

Our principles are to commit ourselves to the pursuit of truth, intellectual honesty, openness to ideas and excellence through the attainment of the highest professional and ethical standards in teaching, learning, research and service to the community in vicinity.

In terms of regulation of the higher education sector, what are the key challenges and prospects in reforming the landscape of higher education?

Our imperfect world is advancing relent-

lessly towards uncertain future scenarios, and we must try to redirect it towards sustainability, that is, towards a new way of doing things in order to improve our environment while at the same time, achieving justice, social equality and economic stability. However, change is impossible without learning, just as learning is impossible without change. In the text that follows, I will analyze the need for a new form of education in today’s society and identify the specific challenges that higher education faces.

1. Changes in Universities as institutions and at the level of internal organization. These changes should aim to improve the management of resources (human, economics, etc.) and be restructured to improve internal democracy. Universities must continue their mission to educate, train and carry out research through an approach characterized by ethics, autonomy, responsibility and anticipation.

2. Changes aimed at tapping the potential of information and communication technologies in the creation and

Prof (Dr) S K Kaushal, Vice Chancellor, Arni University

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dissemination of knowledge. The goal of such changes is to create what Prensky (2009) calls digital wisdom.

What are your views on RUSA: Will it be the game-changer in higher education and how?

RUSA is a good step. It will improve the overall quality of institutions and create an enabling atmosphere in the higher educational institutions where people will devote themselves to research and innovations.

Do you think industry-academia partnership is important to provide employable skills to students and how?

Industry-academia research partnerships have become an important part of good university and corporate R&D. Several basic trends and needs of the academia and industries have fueled these alliances. They include the decrease in government funding of academic research, an explosion in technology, a robust economy, and greater competition within industries. The results of these partnerships are mainly positive for all parties involved. Industry gets needed research, Universities get funding, and society gets new products and technology.

It’s a balancing act of mutual cooperation in which everyone has a shot at winning.

To remain competitive in the global economy, it is imperative that corporate sector accelerate their innovation process. The industry gains expertise in areas they need the most. And they have a hand in producing graduates who are better equipped to enter the business world. We cannot deny that industry has benefited immensely from these partnerships by fueling research in academic centers.

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Cover story

RUSA Can Change Horizon of Higher Education Dr A K Srivastava, Director, NDRI talks about higher education sector and its challenges What has been your mission while promoting the cause of education?

Our vision is to be the centre of excellence in education and research in the area of milk production, processing and management so as to serve as a valuable resource for dairy industry and society.

Our mission is to generate new knowledge by engaging in cutting-edge research and to promote academic growth by offering state-of-the-art undergraduate, postgraduate and doctoral programmes; to integrate, synthesize, and apply scientific and technical knowledge related to the production, processing and marketing of milk and milk products to societal problems, and their dissemination to serve the dairy industry, farming community and the nation.

In terms of regulation of the higher education sector, what are the key challenges and prospects in reforming the landscape of higher education?

The key challenges facing the higher education system in the country include poor funding (less than 1 percent of GNP) and poor governance leading to poor infrastructure, chronic shortage of faculty (30-40 percent vacant faculty positions) and thereby low quality of teaching and learning. The quality of education is also adversely affected due to outdated & rigid curricula, the absence of employer engagement in course content and skills development, and very few opportunities for interdisciplinary learning. The prevalent pedagogies and assessment system emphasizes only on rote learning giving students very little opportunity to develop a wider range of transversal skills, including critical thinking, analytical reason-

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the fund is to be routed through the State Higher Education Councils (SHEC), there may be a delay in getting the funds. However, I feel that, if implemented honestly and successfully, it will bring in a new era of quality assurance and accountability in state universities and colleges in India and can change the horizon of higher education of the country. We can only hope that this policy too does not become another scheme on papers and demonstrate poor execution due to various bureaucratic hurdles and inefficiencies.

ing, problem-solved and collaborative working. The present education system has been highly politicised wherein politicians acquire a great vested interest in the affairs of universities interfering in recruitment process and overall functioning of the university.

What are your views on RUSA: Will it be a game-changer in higher education and how?

RUSA seems to be one of the greatest reforms in the governance and funding of state universities giving way to a completely new approach towards funding, regulation and governance of higher education in state universities based on key principles of performance-based funding, incentivizing well performing institutions and decision-making through clearly defined norms. However, the scheme involves funding of universities by central and state governments in given ratio. There is an apprehension that it is often difficult to obtain the share of state funding. Moreover, the request for

With foreign collaborations being the key focus of educational institutes, what are the current and future plans your university in furthering these collaborations?

International collaboration gives students the benefits of shared experience and co-construction of knowledge with peers from diverse perspectives through interaction. NDRI Deemed University has international collaborations with Ridet Institute, Palmerstone North, New Zealand; Erasmus Mundas Programme, Brussels, Belgium and DAAD, Germany.

Do you think industry-academia partnership is important to provide employable skills for students and how?

There is currently limited collaboration of academic institution with industry. There is a strong need to merge the discoverydriven culture of the university with the innovation-driven environment of the industry. But to make the chemistry work, each side must overcome the cultural and communications divide that tends to impair industry-university partnerships and weaken their potential.

leaders’ speak

Crafting a World-class Knowledge Centre Dr Surajit Mitra, Director, Indian Institute of Foreign Trade (IIFT) talks to digitalLEARNING’s Ankush Kumar about the role IIFT plays in disseminating knowledge to India and overseas How has been your journey in the education sector? What made you move to the administrative field?

I started my career as a teacher and taught in Delhi University, Jawaharlal Nehru University and North Eastern University for a total of three years and then, I shifted to administration. Even when I was in administration, I used to take off for academics. I took three years off to do Ph D in Cambridge and went to Oxford for a year to teach. And for a year, I was visiting professor for Centre for Policy Research. I have been doing it off and on.

My shift from academics to administration happened by default. I have put 36 years in administration, before I finally, came back to academics.

Does teaching political economy helps in getting into administration?

In the beginning of my career at JNU, I used to teach political economy as we had only one centre at that time, Centre for Political Studies. There wasn’t any economics department in JNU. So, I specialized in political economy but most of my teachers were economists.

Administration is not a raw structure of taking dare administrative decisions.

Today, government, policy making, etc. are linked to economy and society. If you don’t have a good understanding of what is happening, it becomes very difficult on anybody’s part to do a good job.

For example, if you are in finance ministry and don’t understand the basics of inflation or fiscal deficit, you are in

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Dr Surajit Mitra, Director, Indian Institute of Foreign Trade (IIFT)

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trouble. Now, administration is also becoming very specialized. If you are in petroleum ministry and don’t understand the economics of energy, then, you can’t be a successful bureaucrat.

It is also becoming very demanding on the part of the administrators to move from one department to another and you are also given a very short span of time to acquire the skills of the department. In a way, it is very challenging.

IIFT was set up by the government to help professionalize the country’s foreign trade management? Still we are counted among import-centric nations. Is there a need to set up more such colleges?

IIFT was actually established in 1963

by Ministry of Commerce with the vision of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, who thought of having an institution, which facilitates foreign trade. But it has gone through a great deal of metamorphosis over the last 50 years. We are celebrating our 50th year, which started from May 2013. Firstly, it became a management institute generating human resource for external trade. It did well in this role. Then, it became a research centre and also took up special things like SME development, WTO, Technology Trading, etc. Today, it is a full-fledged academic institution and a think tank.

It is also a coronary institute to the various departments of the government.

We give advice on the policies too. We have three-fold business unlike most of the academic institutions. It’s a very challenging and demanding job. We are innate importing country, which will continue till we find alternatives. We are innate importer due to energy imports. As an emerging economy, we will require more and more energy. Energy requirements and import requirements have to be balanced with the exports, which has been done successfully. Going up to 400 billion dollars of export is not a joke. In last 10 years, the exports have tripled. Now, the world is very much competitive. We have a number of institutions today who are looking

after particularly exports. But there are no standards. So, we need to upgrade these institutions to a level, which IIFT has achieved. Instead of making many institutions, we require robust and efficient institutions.

The craze for MBA and particularly International Business has gone down over the years? What exactly seems to be the reason behind it?

Your observation is slightly superfluous. It is absolutely need-based requirement. When exports are going up from 100 billion to 400 billion, we require manpower training, people who understand world economy, etc. And secondly, simultaneous processes are working like globalization. And then organizations like WTO are coming in who define rules of the game. People require training and need to understand market. If he doesn’t know what a supply chain is, how is he going to handle it?

Nobody is going to teach him. We have to learn by ourselves and for that, we need to have a formal training. So, there

recession, companies’ intake is less.

Institutions like us, who believe in 100 percent placements don’t get right kind of placement. It’s a challenge for us.

The students also become very choosy because of the pay package. It is also an opportunity because in slowdown, people require expert handling and knowledge.

So, we orient our students to see how they should face this challenging time when they take up jobs. When you look at our placement profile, lot of people from financial organizations has taken our graduates. Because they found them adequate to their job as they are undergoing massive problems. We train them accordingly.

IIFT relies on research work. How do you think it helps in grooming the students?

We as an academic institution had a role to play in this country. We thought of providing people with indepth knowledge and research as they will be teachers of tomorrow. More than 75 people are currently working

We need to upgrade the institutions to a level, which IIFT has achieved. Instead of making many institutions, we require robust and efficient institutions is a great deal of requirement for what is called export-oriented training in our country. After about 10-15 years, each village will start exporting. Can you understand how much expertise will be required in the country to help the exports? Therefore, there will be a requirement whether there is a craze or not.

The craze comes from the pay package and facilities available. For last three years, there is global recession. So, pay packages have shrunk and people are looking for alternatives.

How does recession impact the institutes providing international campus placements?

It is both, a challenge and an opportunity.

Challenge to the extent that due to

on various aspects like export, trade, etc. Faculty also learns in the process.

Tell us some of the key achievements of the institute under your leadership.

Under my leadership, the third EIITF Conference was organized in January 2013 where delegates from 11 countries participated and a total of 66 papers were presented by the scholars.

The Centre is also planning to launch ‘Business Incubation Cell’ towards hand-holding entrepreneurs and MSMEs to reach out to International Markets.

Recently, the Centre has signed an MOU with CII for closer cooperation to develop MSME sector.

digitalLEARNING / May 2014

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Securing the

Virtual World “N

o army, air force or navy can ignore the cyber world and live with it. Wars of this century will be fought not just on land, air and water, but also in the virtual space.

So, with an aim to counter cyber attacks, India would soon set up a tri-service cyber command.” said army chief Gen Bikram Singh.

The ministry of defence has a draft on the subject ready which the cabinet committee on security, headed by the prime minister, would be taking up for discussion in the days to come. “A note for the cabinet committee on security has been prepared for setting up the tri-service cyber command,” Gen Singh said.

Sources said the office of the chairman, chief of staff committee, has written a detailed note to defence minister AK Antony regarding setting up cyber command. Officials, privy to drafting the cabinet note, told that the need to have a cyber command has been felt for a long time, as the cyber security infrastructure of the country is “weak”.

This is evident from recent incidents of cyber attacks on India. Last year, Chinese hackers broke into sensitive computer systems at the headquarters of the Eastern Naval Command in Visakhapatnam, where the indigenous nuclear submarine Arihant has been undergoing sea trials.

Recently, Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) computer systems were breached and sensitive files were leaked. A top defence ministry officer admitted that India has delayed on the cyber security front. “Cyber command would ensure both offensive and defensive cyber security capabilities. Issues like cyber warfare, cyber terrorism and cyber espionage would be taken care of by a cyber command,” the officer said.

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Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, while addressing the combined commanders’ conference in November, highlighted the need for developing capacities to counter what he described as “global surveillance operations”.

NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden

had allegedly collected information and intercepted communications in India which also stressed on setting up a cyber command. As per a recent report, the US is the biggest buyer of malware in the world. Global cyber espionage networks are being actively used to spy on other

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countries. The command and control servers of malware FinFisher were also found in 36 countries, including India.

According to the National Security Database (NSD), there are less than 5,000 reverse engineering experts in India at present. NSD in collaboration with various academic Institutions across India aims to increase the number of reverse engineering professionals in the country to 1 lakh by 2015, through training and awareness.

“Hacking has become a growing threat to Indian IT industry. Some recent data theft cases by hackers has made India’s $100 billion IT industry, a primary target. The acute shortage of reverse engineering professionals will further hit the IT industry and the economic loss will grow exponentially due to piracy and insecure coding,” says Rajshekar Murthy, Director, National Security Database.

Reverse engineers can play a key role in combating the increasing incidents of cyber attacks and piracy. As the $100 billion information technology industry seeks to chart a new course by fostering software product companies, reverse engineering will become a promising field for jobs in the IT and software development sector.

This was stated at a recent summit organized by National Security Database, an initiative of Information Sharing and Analysis Center (ISAC) in association with Ground Zero Summit 2013. The seminar was organized to identify and highlight the need for credible security professionals in India, especially in reverse engineering, to protect the critical infrastructure and economy of the country.

“Today, reversing techniques are used for ’studying’ viruses and malwares to help catch the criminals, create ‘patches’ to clean the viruses from computers and mobiles and also test closed systems and technologies for quality assurance and security vulnerabilities. Reverse engineering experts are immensely useful in the intelligence and defense sector for offensive research such as exploit development and embedded systems security. Companies can also hire reverse engineering experts to oversee security

aspects during product design stage and protect their software from being copied or have security issues”, says Murthy.

National Security Database has developed Intensive and in-depth reverse engineering boot camps conducted by Information Sharing and Analysis Center (ISAC) approved partners. The program helps engineers to understand different aspects of application security, learn anti-cracking techniques and to create secure code for internal use that cannot be easily hacked. Through these programs, the engineers also learn different approaches for reverse engineering and application to get a strong foundation in dealing with new malwares and gain expertise to analyze it.

Talking to digitallearning correspondent, President Amit Kumar (Cyberfort Technologies) said, India requires more than a million cyber security expert to safeguard India’s virtual space.

Cyberfort Technologies continuously doing cyber security awareness among student, corporate and government agencies without charging any fee as a part of corporate social responsibility.

Indian government is serious about cyber security but major failure is consciousness in developing pool of human resource in the field of cyber security. Amit says, government should make compulsory cyber security training for all government officials, who engage in securing digital and virtual space of GOI. Recently, several government and political parties’ website were hacked by unanimous hackers. As said that prevention is better than cure, vaccination of cyber security should be must for every individual, who are using and engaged in virtual space.

Cyber Safe Elaborating on the skill-set required to succeed in the field of information security, Bezawada Bruhadeshwar, International Institute Information Technology, Hyderabad, says, “It’s a field that requires your keen interest, professional training and thorough knowledge of operating systems, programming, networks and protocols. Cyber criminals strike through virus attacks, destroy systems,

modify and steal data from your system without your knowledge. The first and foremost job as an information security expert are to detect and analyse the vulnerabilities and then plug the loopholes to protect the system, network and data.

Cyber security experts need to know about coding of some basic languages and database handling skills.”

Diverse Domain If you are a trained professional in this field, you can find placement as network security systems manager, network security administrator, network security engineer, web security administrator, web security auditor, application security tester, ethical hacker, information security analyst, database and software developer, data security specialist, and chief information security officer.

An information security specialist can also start his own venture to provide security solutions to a variety of companies and government departments.

Cyber security experts are a desired lot in banks, energy sector, hotels, airlines, healthcare, telecom companies, infrastructure, transportation, law enforcement, defence, emergency response systems and ITES companies, among others.

Certified Career Graduates with a degree in computer science or engineering can opt for various full-time and short-term courses in information security, like MTech and MSc in Information Security, degree and diplomas in information security and network administration. Amit Kumar cyberfort says, “You need to be trained and certified from a reputed organisation.

International certifications like Certified Ethical Hacker (EC-Council ) and GPEN can do wonders to one’s career as a cyber security expert. Salaries in this field range from `3 to 5 lakh per annum.

With experience and desired expertise, the package may go up to ` 10-12 lakh per annum, and even to a crore.”

For establishment of cyberfort study center contact – Dr Rajesh Kumar Mobile: +91-9031489275,9973195996 email-rajesh@cyber fort.com) digitalLEARNING / May 2014

45

leaders’ speak

Preparing Indian Students for Global Career Stephen Lofthouse, Course Leader, MSc, Big Data Analytics, Sheffield Hallam University, talks to digitalLearning’s Ankush Kumar about the university’s Indian operations and its courses Please tell us about the Indian operations of Sheffield Hallam University and its tie-ups and partnerships in India?

Sheffield Hallam has a tradition of welcoming students from India. Our New Delhi office has a dedicated team that provides advice and help on studying with us. In addition, we have partnered with institutions like Symbiosis International University, Pune, and TA Pai Management Institute, Manipal in India. Our Directorate of International Development as well as our New Delhi office staff and academics from the university frequently visit cities all over India for recruitment events. They also visit our partner institutions and education fairs. In addition, our extensive network of agents across India offers students support and advice about the courses and opportunities available to students choosing to study in Sheffield Hallam. We also offer scholarships to Indian students, including our Transform Together scholarships for full-fee postgraduate study and our Capture the Hacker scholarship competition for computing students.

How do you see growth prospects of the Indian education sector?

Is there enough scope for foreign universities?

It can be difficult keeping up with the increased demand for skilled professionals in a fast-growing economy like India.

Sheffield Hallam is well-established in teaching specialist courses in new fields, from logistics and supply chain management to Big Data analytics. We have strong links with major employers and

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regional, national and international organisations and professional associations.

How do you define ethical hacking? What kind of scholarship schemes you are providing to Indian students?

Ethical hacking generally invokes two responses. One is a negative view that question teaching students how to perform hacking. What will stop them from using these skills in a malicious way?

We take a positive view. We think providing people with the skills and a positive nurturing environment is the best way to ensure a responsible approach.

This allows industry to employ individuals who have a deep knowledge of how the hackers break into systems. Therefore they can thoroughly test their own systems before a more unscrupulous individual does this for them.

We are currently running the Capture the Hacker scholarship competition – capturethehacker.info. Indian students are invited to analyse a number of interesting files which contain suspicious activity. The best five students’ entries will be selected for interview, with the student best performing student being awarded a full fee scholarship to the MSc Information Systems Security degree.

How important would a degree like MSc Information Systems Security be for the Indian market, where ethical hacking is still new?

Like any new market area, experts and leaders are needed to help it mature and grow. By studying a degree like MSc Information Systems Security, students are benefiting from decades of expertise as tutors retain close ties with industry.

Ethical hacking is a new concept because companies are generating more and more data, so the scale of digital data is increasing by immensely every day. As more Indian companies generate more data, then they are likely to look to IT professionals to help them keep that data secure and safe. A specialised degree like MSc Information Systems Security would help a candidate stand out from many other IT professionals with a more generic skill set.

You are also offering MSc in Big Data Analytics. Please tell us what the course consists of and why Big Data is an expanding area in major businesses and organizations?

Companies today amass large amounts of data in the course of their everyday business. Social media and mobile phones, too generate data and make it available to companies. Thanks to advances in computing, hardware and software companies can now analyze this data in real time and better respond to and serve their customers.

Our MSc Big Data Analytics course develops students’ skills in two main areas: data analysis and storage and ma-

In the West, it appears malicious hacking is here to stay. Data theft, ransomware and corporate espionage appear to have turned into a profitable business for criminals.

India is already an IT powerhouse. As the data Indian companies hold becomes more valuable, more attention from criminals will turn to them. That is not the say the hackers are not already targeting Indian systems; the companies being breached may just not know about it.

Please tell us about the links and tie-up that Sheffield Hallam currently has with businesses and professional organizations?

Students studying MSc in Information

“India is already an IT powerhouse. As the data Indian companies hold becomes more valuable, more attention from criminals will turn to them” nipulation. In the first semester, students cover modules on data quality, statistical modelling and Big Data & Distributed systems. Students use industry-leading SAS analytics package together with Hive, Hadoop and Pig. In semester two, students continue to use the SAS software in the Data Mining module, while studying an elective module and their SAP certification. In the third semester, the modules build on previous work. Advanced statistical modelling further builds students’ skills in the use of the SAS analytics software and the module Handling Data in the Cloud deals with the storage and manipulation of massive data sets. Students finish their studies by completing a dissertation with a topic of their choice.

In addition to their core studies, students also undertake industry projects, working with local businesses on a real world problem that they are facing. Students also undertake SAP Certification in Business Intelligence and Business Warehouse and also have the opportunity to sit the SAS 9 base exam.

According to you, what is the future of computer hacking in India? How will you compare it to the current scenario?

System Security focus on both, the technical and managerial aspects of information security. Having a partnership with the British Standards Institute (BSI) allows us to include the professional BSI ISO27001 lead auditor training course and certification in the course. Students gain an understanding of how to audit an organisation’s information security practices.

We also work with several businesses that help shape the course and look at our graduates. We’ve had people from companies such as, Mozilla, RSA and Blackberry give talks. We are also hosting Steelcon, North England’s first ethical hacker conference - www.steelcon.info in July 2014.

How can SAP be used globally to manager business operations and customer relations?

Sheffield Hallam University has had a relationship with SAP for over 15 years.

During that time, we have produced highly skilled SAP qualified graduates who have gone on to forge successful global careers. As SAP moves to embrace new technologies like cloud and Big Data, our courses have changed to ensure that the graduates we produce possess the skills and knowledge that industry needs, to succeed. digitalLEARNING / May 2014

47

special feature

Online Learning Marketplace A default purification of knowledge-transaction Technology: A recent TV commercial by GE shares a simple truth about technology: “...it doesn’t discriminate between people, no matter who they are, where they’re from...technology opens the door every day and tells that there is hope...”. It is an undeniable fact that technology doesn’t discriminate, offering its benefits (and limitations) to everybody who come to explore it.

A classic example is the recent revolution in technology-enabled marketplace that has ushered a newer paradigm for the consumers.

A Marketplace Experience: I intended to buy a Sony tab from an online marketplace <ebay.in> where it was being offered at a much lower price than the MRP. It was as good as bought,

but then eBay prompted a notification asking me to check the same commodity on a ‘partner site’ - <snapdeal.com> - which was offering the same thing at a price lower than eBay! Finally, I got my Sony Tab from Snapdeal!

As a buyer, I was delighted by the choices offered by both the marketplace sites Eventually, both the sites found a loyal and a returning customer in me.

Such is the impact of marketplace! Sellers aim to satisfy the customers, while doing the right business.

An Eye-Opener: Prof. PremVrat, Vice Chancellor, ITM University, in his talk during last year’s World Education Summit, shared a research done on Private Engineering Colleges in India. Identifying some parameters as a direct influence to the performance of an educational institute.

The study ranked, in terms of priority, the following: Quality of faculty, Teaching Learning process, Leadership, Quality of admissions, Alumni Relations, Physical Infrastructure, Collaboration, Sport Activities and Cultural Activities.

It then compared the ‘what-shouldbe’ ranks to the ‘what-actually-is’ ranks. The results were shocking!

The importance of Sports and Cultural activities is placed prior to that of Teaching-learning process and institutional leadership. While the parameters of Alumni Relations, Collaboration and Quality of Admissions were almost similarly treated, there was still a deferration from the ideal score. The biggest shocker, however, was the facts, that even though we have entered the age of online education and eLearning, institutes continue to prefer physical infrastructure over the quality of faculty. They perhaps forget that teachers make an educational institute, not the tall buildings or majestic domes. The research was published in the May 2013 issue of Industrial Engineering Journal.

The objective of education has been marred by the intrusion of ‘business vendors’, who neither understand education nor respect it.

Am I against the Education-Business?

No, I am not against Education-business, but what worries me is the loss of the focus from the primary purpose of education. I started this article with a correlation of Technology with nondiscrimination and hope, now I shall try to elucidate with the following ex-

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ample of Online Learning Marketplace which is absolutely pro-student and non-discriminative to the Education Providers. The final hope that is summarized below is a hope of giving required importance to the Quality of Faculty and Teaching-Learning Process which is being diminished in the abovementioned research outcome!

Online Learning Marketplace (OLM) OLM is a place where knowledge-transaction is considered as the primary purpose of the business. The conventional mentality sometimes hesitates to accept students as consumers, and teachers as sellers. But the fact remains unchanged that in knowledge transaction, students consume the knowledge imparted by the teacher.

Example: The following example will illustrate how an OLM (online learning marketplace) benefits both the students and teachers/teaching institutes: l Let us suppose there is an Online Course on Robotics available on the OLM, from a premier institute like IIT; priced at `50,000/-. l A similar course on Robotics, with similar modules, is also available, but from a non-reputed Institute/ individual (Say XYZ); priced at `10,000/-. l The online marketplace is a smart ecosystem. Based on a built-in algorithm, it promotes the course from IIT, to students interested in the field of ‘Robotics’. The course gets 1000 interested students (in Business jargon, we call them ‘Leads’). Eventually, 50 students enrol in the IIT Robotics course (we can now safely call them ‘Closed leads’). There are 950 students still interested in ‘robotics’ but may not be willing to pay such a high price. l By that same in-built algorithm, Online Learning Marketplace promotes the Robotics course from XYZ, to the rest of the 950 interested students (by the way, they are still ‘leads’, not ‘closed leads’).

l

l

l

l

l

l

l

Since the XYZ course is priced at a lower price, (with perhaps an added feature of ‘money back guarantee’), 1% of the 950 join the course offered by XYZ. As a thumb-rule, quality of education needs to be given priority in order for a course to be featured in OLM! As a result, XYZ imparts an excellent course to those 9-10 students who got enrolled.

50% of the enrolled students give ‘excellent feedback’ on XYZ’s course.

This feedback helps XYZ’s course index better and gain a better searchability in the OLM. As a direct consequence, the next batch of the same robotics course from XYZ will have every possibility of getting more students.

Slowly XYZ develops a brand and gains greater visibility. Thanks to the smart, default mechanism of the Online Learning Marketplace.

In this process, everyone wins; the IIT, the students and XYZ. The ultimate winner is theeducation!

Conclusion If one understands the business of knowledge, and its primary purpose, the Online Learning Market place can be a place of huge success. It can bring great opportunities for online teachers as well as online learners; beyond our imagination. More importantly, it can strengthen the education fraternity by doing away with the nitty-gritties, through its default mechanism, thus making sure the focus lies on Knowledge-transaction alone.

An Online Learning Marketplace WizIQ.com is an Online Education Plat-

form equipped with a state-of-the-art virtual classroom and other advanced teaching-learning tools for online delivery of courses.

The site has not stopped its efforts only by providing a set of teaching tools to the teachers; it has also endeavoured to create an Online Learning Marketplace (OLM) to strengthen the primary purpose of education. WizIQ connects teachers and learners via its OLM which eventually benefits learners to have access to the best teachers from their fields of interest and it also helps teachers to get learners for their courses. The inbuilt algorithm of Online Learning Marketplace of WizIQ provides a plethora of choices for the consumers (as learners) and helps the quality teachers to get more business through the default leaner-feedback based rankings in the online search.

This mechanism of WizIQ Online Learning Marketplace even assures a not-so popular teacher/teaching institute to improve its ranking just by focusing on the quality of teaching and delivery of the courses. If the teacher/ teaching institute focuses consistently on the knowledge-transaction and improves on student satisfaction/feedback, the search-rank gets better. This eventually makes the teacher/teaching insti-

tute to become comparable with the socalled branded teachers/institutes easily.

Isn’t it thought provoking?.

About the author: Kalyan Sarkar presently takes care of Team Academic Liaisons at WizIQ.com. He is an MSc & M Phil in Clinical Psychology. Before joining WizIQ, he has served the Indian Air Force for more than 15 years; he also is credited with a degree in Mechanical Engineering and a Masters in Mathematics. Readers may send their feedback and queries to know more about Online Learning Marketplace @ WizIQ.com, to kalyan@wiziq.com. digitalLEARNING / May 2014

49

Feature

A Bumpy Ride For New Eight new IITs came into existence in 2008, making quality education available to more students.

Unfortunately, the new IITs have been receiving a lot of flak for not being on par with their older brethren in terms of faculty, infrastructure and students, and tarnishing the brand IIT. Anushi Agrawal of Elets News Network (ENN) finds out how fair is it to compare the six-year-old institutes with decade-old institutions and the advantages that new IITs have in experimenting and inducting new ideas to achieve excellence

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IITs

education.eletsonline.com

I

ndian Institutes of Technology (IIT), the premier institutes for engineering in the country, figure prominently among Indian higher education institutions known outside the country. They are internationally respected for the quality of their teaching and for the quality of their graduates. They have one of the most expansive selective processes in the world, where more than 500,000 students take the entrance exams each year. The Indian education system rests its hopes on them to break into the world college rankings, which has been an elusive dream for India till now.

Established in 1950 in Kharagpur with more centers in Mumbai (1958), Chennai (1959), Kanpur (1959) and Delhi (1961), the government of India cleared the establishment of eight more IITs in 2008. The IITs were approved to be set up in Bihar (Patna), Rajasthan (Jodhpur), Odisha (Bhubaneswar), Andhra Pradesh (Hyderabad), Gujarat (Gandhinagar), Madhya Pradesh (Indore), Himachal Pradesh (Mandi) and Punjab (Ropar) at a total cost of `6080 crore for 6 years period with the aim of increasing the output of high quality Engineering and Science graduates, post graduates and PhDs, teachers for Engineering and Science subjects at College/University level and research and development and Intellectual Property generation in Engineering and Science,. Approval was also granted to form societies for creating legal entities for new IITs. It is to be noted that 90 faculty positions were sanctioned for each of the new IITs. It has been a roller coaster ride for the eight new IITs since then. They have had their share of accomplishments and pitfalls over the years.

While some of the new IITs have had a good placement and boast of high quality research publications, foreign tie-ups, quality students, there have been some disappointments as well.

Even after six years, these institutes face the problems associated with establishing new institutes, like poor infrastructure, location disadvantage, shortage of experienced faculty, and difference in average packages offered. But the most daunting task for new IITs is to carry the baggage of Brand IIT. In six years, the new IITs are expected to be on par with the 50-year-old institutions. “The current buzzwords in higher

and technical education are access, affordability, equity, excellence, expansion, inclusion, quality, etc., which are largely absent during the initial years. While it will take some more time for the new IITs to evolve into mature centres of excellence, they have several things going for them,” says Dr R Natarajan, former Director, IIT Madras and former Chairman, AICTE. Undoubtedly, IITs have been producing highly skilled and competent professionals, researchers and academicians that have dazzled the world with their brilliance. This is the single most important reason which attracts a large number of students to these institutes. But when the students start having the same expectations from the new IITs, it is a cause for concern. The new institutes are on a bumpy ride to achieve the level of IITs’ excellence, as they were set up by an Act of Parliament, without any ground work.

Where lies the problem?

When the government declared in 2008 that it would open eight new IITs, academicians criticized the move as well as the timing of the declaration. It was just before the general elections in 2009 when eight new IITs were announced. The government received flak from many quarters for its decision to open IITs without any planning.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s own scientific adviser CNR Rao called it a disaster. “Opening so may IITs in one year is a disaster. I had no idea that so many IITs have already come up in our country. This is not a play. To open IITs, you need proper planning. There are makeshift campuses and some are even attending classes in old IITs,” said the renowned scientist in 2008 while attending an event at the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI). Union Minister Kapil Sibal, who was Minister for HRD, Science and Technology and Telecom in 2011 also pointed out that the eight new IITs that were permitted to set up in 2008 do not have the necessary infrastructure and are not up to the mark, making it difficult for the country’s prestigious institutions to retain faculty. The Minister blamed the state governments for not allotting the required land for setting up permanent campuses for these institutions.

Therefore, problems for new IITs started right from their inception. Since the establishment of

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Feature

new IITs was not backed by proper planning and ground work, they continue to suffer its implications even today. As the institutes were opened in a rush, no planning was done for providing quality intellectual and infrastructural resources. “Some of the new IITs suffer from problems like accommodation and working from multiple campuses.

The policy has been implemented in a hurry. Now, it has become a double challenge for new IITs to manage the existing campus and overlook the progress of new campus. Some preparation should have been done before opening new IITs,” says a concerned Professor MK Surappa, Director, IIT Ropar.

All the eight IITs are still functioning from temporary campuses and have not been able to get the permanent campus constructed because of several reasons like finalisation of land and delay in construction activity. This has hin-

The IITs at Gandhinagar, Mandi and Indore are laying emphasis on interdisciplinary research and teaching. Those at Gandhinagar and Mandi are keen on academic diversity and the humanities, with courses on social sciences, music, arts, theatre, etc.

For the 12th Five-year Plan, government had allocated nearly ` 12,500 crore for the IITs, of which the new tech schools were to receive a little over ` 6,000 crore. But construction delays and rising cost of infrastructure development pushed the funding requirement of the new IITs alone to ` 14,000 crore 52

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IITs were approved to be set up in Bihar, Rajasthan, Orissa, Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh and Punjab at a total cost of `6080 crore for six years.

Eight new IIT approved in 2008

Year of Inception

IIT Bhubneshwar

2008

IIT Gandhinagar

2008

IIT Hyderabad

2008

IIT Indore

2009

IIT Jodhpur

2008

IIT Patna

2008

IIT Ropar

2008

IIT Mandi

2009

Being new is not a disadvantage to these institutes but can rather provide an opportunity to innovate and experiment and help in leapfrog the years and bridge the gap between old and new IITs.

dered the growth plans of the institutes.

Since they are working out of temporary campuses, it becomes difficult to provide accommodation to faculty members. “The new IITs, during the initial years, operated from temporary campuses, with many problems. Until the new campuses are fully developed, they will suffer from this disadvantage,” warns Dr R Natarajan. All the IITs have begun the construction of their permanent campus and most will be completed within two years. Currently, most of the new IITs have infrastructural issues.

Students complain of lack of proper space in classrooms, labs, library and sporting facilities. Some of them do not have sufficient accommodation facility for faculty which becomes an important

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There will be comparisons between the older ones and the newer ones; this is inevitable. In a few years, say 3-5 years, the newer ones and the older ones will be more similar and the comparisons will be fairer - Dr R Natarajan, Former Director, IIT Madras and Former Chairman, AICTE

The policy has been implemented in a hurry. Now it has become a double challenge for new IITs, to manage the existing campus and overlook the progress of new campus. Some preparation should have been done before opening new IITs - Prof MK Surappa, Director, IIT Ropar concern as most of the new IITs are located in remote areas and the faculty is not comfortable travelling long hours every day to the campus. Setting up IITs in remote locations has proven difficult for the institutes. Commenting on the problem of being located in a remote area, Professor Surappa says, “Government should not start any institution of higher learning like IITs in remote locations. It is very disadvantageous. People should be able to fly in and fly out. At the same time, it would have been different if we would have been based in Chandigarh. The resources are very limited here. It slows down the process of growth of an institution.”

Opening IITs in remote areas also affects their ability to hire good educators. As Dr R Natarajan points out, “For the faculty members, some of the major sources of need and attraction are, in addition to job satisfaction, a job for the spouse, a school for the children and a hospital for the parents. Until these are developed, either within the campus or in the vicinity, they will have to put up with much inconvenience.”

Most faculty members are not ready

do that, making it difficult for the new IITs to attract and retain talent. At the same time, senior professors from the older IITs are not willing to move to newer ones. “We look for teachers who have done research work, mentoring work, teaching, and take administrative responsibility. Such faculty, which is there in old IITs doesn’t move to new IITs. Lack of mobility of IIT faculty has further reduced the pace of development of new IITs,” says Professor MK Surappa. Dr Sudhir K Jain, Director, IIT Gandhinagar feels, “Higher education in India generally and all IITs, new and old, are facing challenges in faculty recruitment. In our case, we have addressed the issue with a vibrant visiting faculty programme that brings faculty from all over the world. The only challenge we have in faculty recruitment is self-imposed, in that we are striving to hire only the best scholars for our institute.” Also Professor MK Surappa observes that “old IITs have a system in place, faculty take administrative roles as well. Our new faculty is not sure how to solve a particular problem and they turn to the director for the same which

make the process slow.”

The new IITs attracted a good number of companies for their campus placement. But still “there is slight hesitation from company’s side in hiring from new IITs. The number of companies coming to older IITs like IIT-Delhi and IITMumbai are certainly more than what comes to our campus. There is a mental block in this regard. Moreover, there aren’t good hotels in Ropar and we have a modest guest house. Hence, recruiters have to put up in Chandigarh and travel to Ropar every day for the recruitment exercise, which is not very convenient for them,” observes Professor MK Surappa.

The six-year-old IITs have a huge name to live up to. There are misconceptions about the quality of students and faculty at these institutes. In truth, these institutes too admit the creamy layer of the students taking the entrance exams. The new IITs are part of the group that selects 10,000 students out of 500,000 appearing for IIT-JEE, so they too get the best of the lot. Moreover, each of the new IITs is being mentored by an older IIT so that the tradi-

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Feature

tions and practices at all the IITs remain the same. Pointing out that the students from new IIT are at equal pedestal with the students of old IITs, Dr Sudhir K Jain says, “Nearly 10 percent of our graduating students from the first two batches are pursuing studies at some of the world’s top institutions. Nearly a third of our graduated students have studied abroad. On the placement side, well over 90 percent of students who registered for placement through our student placement office were satisfactorily placed. Leading companies, such as Ricoh, Infosys, National Instruments, GSFC, DRDO, Cognizant, Dover Corporation, Goldman Sachs, Texas Instruments, Tata Power, L&T, Eclerx have recruited our students because they recognise that something distinctive and different is taking place at IIT Gandhinagar.” It is a fact that only the students at the top of the heap get the opportunity to study in these institutes. “Admissions to the new IITs and the older ones are through the same JEE; for the more preferred branches, such as Computer Science and Engineering or Mechanical Engineering, the new IITs are getting top ranked students. The quality and qualifications of the faculty members

IIT were set up with the aim of increasing the output of high quality Engineering and Science graduates, post graduates and PhDs, teachers for Engineering and Science subjects at College/University level and research and development and Intellectual Property generation in Engineering and Science

The need of the hour for new IITs is to leapfrog and achieve in few years what the older IITs have achieved in decades.

Interestingly, the new IITs are better equipped to do it. Their new and permanent campuses have state-of-the-art facilities.

They have the liberty and opportunity to innovate and experiment in establishing the new institute

Eight new IITs that were permitted to set up in 2008 do not have the necessary infrastructure and are not up to the mark making it difficult for IITs to retain faculty are similar, the curricula and the Teaching-Learning-Assessment processes are comparable and the research culture and performance are similar,” says Dr R Natarajan. He also warns that “there will be comparisons between the older ones and new ones; this is inevitable. In a few years, say 3-5 years, the new ones and the old ones will be similar and the comparisons will be fairer.”

The way forward For the 12th Five Year Plan (2012-17), the government has allocated nearly `12,500 crore for the IITs, of which the new schools are to receive a little over `6,000 crore. But construction delays and rising cost of infrastructure devel-

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opment has pushed the funding requirement of the new IITs to `14,000 crore. It is a long road ahead for new IITs before they can be on par with older siblings in terms of infrastructure and putting a basic system in place, but they have many things going for them. “The new IITs do not have any baggage or legacy issues.

They have come into existence when technology is playing a significant role in technical education, such as the availability of several technology tools, learning resources and tech-savvy faculty members and students. Their (planned) campuses are more modern and are better planned. They have an ambition to be better than and different from the older ones,” says an optimistic Dr R Natarajan.

The new IITs need to leapfrog and achieve in few years what the older IITs have achieved in decades. Interestingly, the new IITs are better equipped to do it. Their new and permanent campuses have state-of-the-art facilities. They have the liberty and opportunity to innovate and experiment in establishing the new institute. “As a new institution, we are more nimble and flexible than older institutions. Naturally, we don’t have the same infrastructure and systems. But we have leveraged these to our advantage. For instance, onethird of our students who we send for studying abroad, or the nearly 15 to 20 per cent of the visiting faculty at the institute, add an exciting global dimen-

education.eletsonline.com

Citations

Average Citations

h - Index

S. No.

Institution

1

IIT Ropar

310

967

3.12

15

2

IIT Indore

343

875

2.55

15

3

IIT Patna

396

846

2.14

14

4

IIT Bhubaneswar

390

957

2.45

13

5

IIT Hyderabad

529

856

1.62

12

6

IIT Gandhinagar

184

314

1.71

8

7

IIT Mandi

138

166

1.2

7

8

IIT Jodhpur

124

181

1.46

6

No. of Papers

We have the advantage of the IIT brand and the IIT experience, as well as the nimbleness and the global context that allows us to dream big and bigger.

- Dr Sudhir K Jain, Director, IIT Gandhinagar sion to the educational experiences of our students and faculty,” shares Dr Sudhir K Jain. He further adds proudly, “Three of our undergraduate students last year registered US patents. Nearly a third of them will get overseas experience. We offer exceptional compensation to our graduate students and upto `2 lakh to PhD students to present papers at international conferences. In addition, we offer $12,500 for a semester abroad for our PhD students.

I believe very few institutes can match our educational experience and student support.”

The old IITs took almost five decades to prove their mettle. Now they have a system and hierarchy in place which makes it a little difficult for them to tackle fresh challenges or change their style of working. The new ones have the opportunity to deal with the problems, fresh ideas and initiatives. They should be aiming to break away and experiment with different strategies and not just copy the older IITs. Some innovation can indeed be seen in these institutes. The IITs at Gandhinagar, Mandi and Indore, for instance, are laying

emphasis on interdisciplinary research and teaching. Those at Gandhinagar and Mandi are keen on academic diversity and the humanities, with courses on social sciences, music, arts, theatre, etc. The problem of faculty crunch can also be tackled if the faculty is given ample opportunities for research. They will also opt for a new IIT, irrespective of the remote location of the campus.

The new IITs are also investing a lot of time and effort in developing their new campuses. They are enthusiastic about inducting new ideas into their campus buildings. IIT Gandhinagar takes extensive inputs from students in terms of designing the new campus and also orgainses picnics at the permanent campus’ construction site. Dr Sudhir K Jain at IIT Gandhinagar also emphasises on community outreach to help sensitize students on need to work towards betterment of underprivileged members of the society. IIT Jodhpur also desires to have a green and interactive campus and it’s quite possible for them to do so as their campuses are being built from scratch. Such changes are difficult to make for old institutes.

Clearly being new is not a disadvantage to these institutes but can rather provide an opportunity to innovate and experiment and help in leapfrog the years and bridge the gap between old and new IITs. If implemented well and executed diligently, the advantage of being new can actually put the new IITs ahead of their veterans. An enthusiastic Dr Sudhir K Jain said, “Our achievements and aspiration of becoming the best educational institute in India and among the best in world is possible because we are new. We have the advantage of the IIT brand and the IIT experience, as well as the nimbleness and the global context that allows us to dream big and bigger.” Going by the current rate of progress and enthusiasm among the members of new IITs, it is no wonder that they will come on par with the old one in matter of years. “New IITs are good as old ones. Eventually the performance and outcome of an institution will answer all the doubts and misconceptions. People will recognise the new IITs and verifiable data will answer all the queries,” says Professor MK Surappa. But new IITs should realise that their real competition is not the old IITs but the Ivy League institutions.

They should aim at making a mark in the world rankings for India. “We are laying the foundations with the quality of our faculty, the strategic development of our infrastructure, and the evolution of our institutional culture to aspire to be among the best in the world,” says Dr Sudhir K Jain. The way forward for new IITs is to go global and not be restricted to being on par with old IITs or being best in the country. Dr R Natarajan sums up on a positive note, “They should benchmark themselves with world class universities, and aim to match them and be better than them.

All world class universities are researchfocused, they should create researchled institutions. They should establish partnerships with our strategic sectors, such as Space, Defence, Nuclear Energy, and the several industry sectors, in order that their academic activities are in sync with their needs.”

digitalLEARNING / May 2014

55

leaders’ speak

Providing Employment-ready Technical Graduates Kamal Raj Tyagi, Director, Sky Infotech talks to digitalLEARNING’s Gandharv Walia about the role of the company in providing practical technical knowledge to the graduates How did you get the idea of coming up with Sky Infotech?

I did my schooling, graduation and post graduation from Roorkee. After completing my studies from IIT Roorkee, I joined a good MNC as a software engineer. After taking up the job, I realized whatever I had learnt in my education was not being used in corporate world. I also learnt that students are only getting theoretical knowledge in the colleges. They are later left in the lurch as they have to find a job on their own with the same. The students learn more than 48 subjects in BCA or MCA. The languages, which colleges teach, do not exist in the market. On seeing this, I decided to do something to change the scenario.

Before starting my own show, I had a three-and-a-half years experience with eight MNCs in IT market. I realized that many companies like Microsoft, Oracle, etc have a large number of Indian workers and India is the main manpower resource provider. It would be great if we are able to provide a large number of employment-ready engineering graduates by giving them practical technological knowledge. I decided that I will start this business.

Please tell us about the birth of the Sky Infotech.

My father, a government servant, raised his three children with utmost care. Belonging to a middle class family, I didn’t have enough money so, I took loan. I and my wife started the company and tried to serve quality employment-ready technical graduates to the market. I also hired some professionals. Firstly, we used to take interview of students to understand about their interests as there are many things in IT, which one can go for.

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May 2014 / digitalLEARNING

Parents want their kids to become engineers, but don’t know what he will be able to do better.

He has programming skills or networking skills or can create logic. At first, I taught one technology, which is most sought in the market, to a student by giving only practical training.

Kamal Raj Tyagi, Director, Sky Infotech

What is the reason of Sky Infotech’s success?

It is not sure that a mechanical engineer, with complete theoretical knowledge and degree, will be able to repair a car while the same will be easily done by a mechanic, who is illiterate, but has practical knowledge. I implemented the same in IT. We removed the theoretical portion and gave training on computer system. Softwares are developed in the market in this way only. I taught them practical work, which is done in the market. Now, the students can prepare their resume properly and write a technology’s name, which they know genuinely. So, when the student goes for an interview, interviewer will understand that he knows the job. Slowly, Sky Infotech established in market and started outsourcing. Many MNCs tied up with us for manpower outsourcing.

A fresher, who enters market, runs from pillar to post, but doesn’t get a job.

Even if he gets a job, company trains him for more than three months and then is able to get work from him. So, companies are able to get work done from employees after a hectic three-month training period. But if a company takes our students, it will not have to spend time and money on troublesome training.

As we provide employment-ready technical graduates, the companies can get work from them since the date of joining and don’t have to go for any training of the new employees. This will also ensure a lot of perfection in the work.

What are the things that make Sky Infotech special?

Sky Infotech teaches students upcoming technologies, which is not done anywhere else. We are preparing manpower in advance for different technologies like ERP, Dotnet, Java, etc.

We have provided more than 10,000 professionals to the IT market.

What are the qualities of a good leader?

A good leader is one, whose workers perform their duties diligently irrespective of his presence. And he is able to work with team and also more than the team.

education.eletsonline.com

leaders’ speak

Partnership, a Key to Capacity Building Even as the country debates on Foreign Universities Bill, Professor Michael Thorne, Vice Chancellor, Anglia Ruskin University, in an interview with Mohd Ujaley, says “passing of Foreign Universities Bill will enhance the quality of education in India and be a game-changer” What are the major trends you see in global education, especially after dismal performance of the major world economies?

I think, without any doubt, the future of the world depends on education for two reasons. One is to bring the world together for political stability. The more, we understand each other, the better we engage. Second reason is that the economies of all the countries are going in the same direction and the future will depend on how our educated work force acts. So, being involved in university education, the most important thing to me is to educate as many people as possible till university level.

I also see a lot of partnership happening for capacity building. India is a very vibrant democracy and we need to engage with each other at various levels to improve the quality, increase capacity of our universities and teachers.

Foreign Universities Bill is pending in Indian Parliament. It is believed that if it gets passed, the demand for international education will decline as Indian students will have an opportunity to get the same in India itself. How do you look at it?

We look at it the other way round. Countries, which have already allowed such partnerships, have been benefited in providing quality education. It has also added to the capacity of the country to get more people educated till university level.

We are hopeful that bill will be passed because this legislation has potential to bring foreign universities to India and thereby increase the capacity of India to

Prof Michael Thorne, Vice Chancellor, Anglia Ruskin University educate more people. There is a shortage of quality staff worldwide so, partnership can bridge this gap. For example, UK is adding the capacity of university education of Malaysia for many years, although there are still quite a lot Malaysian students who come to UK, but there are also very large number of Malaysian students, who are being educated the same course in Malaysia in partnership with Malaysian universities that has really worked well for both the countries.

As you mentioned about collaboration, do you have any plan to partner with any of the Indian universities on capacity building of the teachers?

At this moment, we don’t have any plan, but we are waiting for the bill to be passed. The legislation will allow us to do

the things, which we have been doing in other countries. For example, in China, we work in collaboration with a University in Beijing, where we share students.

The students study some year of their course in China and while some time in UK with us. The faculty members also come along with them. We also send our staff to teach in China, this is a two-way partnership and it really works very well.

We have also been asked to assist in training the teachers of some universities as UK is good in this domain. So, for me, passing the bill will complement with what is going on here in India and across the world. It will add to capacity and change the way we impart education. May be the number of students going to other countries for studies will change, but the partnership and exchange will grow.

One of the challenges of international education is to deal with the issue of cultural shock.

There have been cases in the past, especially in Australia, where Indian students were mistreated.

How do you intend to check it?

Nobody seeks international education to put themselves through cultural shock, it is indeed a challenge. We care for students coming to UK. I take personal interest in students’ affairs and their adjustment to our university culture. I feel when you are 7,000 miles away from your home, family needs to be assured that their offspring is doing well. So, we take it very seriously. There is a lot of activity in place to help students cope with cultural shock.

digitalLEARNING / May 2014

57

course review

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May 2014 / digitalLEARNING

education.eletsonline.com

Fashion Designing: A career to break on the Red Carpet The world is changing constantly, and fashion changes more than anything else. Gone are the days when fashion designing was considered as soft option for making a career or livelihood. The Indian fashion industry is evolving and so are the opportunities to make a career in it. After pursuing degree in fashion design, the students have a wide array of opportunities in the sector which is seeking a talented workforce. With the rising standard of living and awareness of designer clothes or stylish clothes in India, the demand of fashion designing professionals is certainly in rise. With plethora of career avenues in the domain of lifestyle, student with creative skills groomed correctly can get placed under various streams, depending on his/her interest and expertise. Roselin Kiro of Elets News Network (ENN) finds out what it takes to be in the fashion industry

Currently the domestic Indian Textile market is worth $25 billion and growing at an annual rate of 15-20 percent. digitalLEARNING / May 2014

59

course review

“Unfortunately some of the student see only the glamour part of the fashion designing which is quite misleading The fashion shows are the end product of lot of hardwork” John Lakra, Discipline Leader- Fashion Design, ITM Institute of Fashion, Design and Technology

I

n today’s world, fashion designing is one of the most lucrative, appealing, glamorous and exciting career options. But people still have a misconception that it is something to do with glamorous women, clothes and parties. According to Arun John Lakra, Discipline Leader- Fashion Design, ITM Institute of Fashion, Design and Technology, “Designs being a very unconventional profession, people were wary about it till a few years back. But with globalisation, fashion or design has come a long way and has become a household word”. Like any other profession, this profession too calls for clearance of entrance exam, degrees to acquire and interviews to crack.

Importance of a degree in Fashion design There are successful stories of people with a professional degree and without one. But it is always good to have a degree. People are realizing the importance of getting professional training before entering the trade. Fashion designing courses help students in identifying their strengths and weaknesses

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May 2014 / digitalLEARNING

and prepare them for the fashion industry, not just creatively, but also by introducing them to its business end.

Along with learning how to design clothes, niche subjects like fashion forecasting, fashion merchandising, pattern making & illustration, fashion marketing, fashion writing, and celebrity styling also come within its ambit, and are gaining popularity.

Gateway for fashion professionals Fashion designing being an art-form, calls for individuals who have an artistic and creative bent. A budding fashion designer must be good at combining colours, tones and shades, in addition to being good at drawing and sketching.

Meghna Ghai Puri, President, Whistling Woods International Says, “Apart from basic qualifications, one of the key aspects we look for in our candidates is passion for fashion and a desire to succeed. Apart from just academics, we look at what students have done with respect to extra-curricular activities. The school provides good exposure to students at an early stage.

education.eletsonline.com

Hence we need to ensure that the candidates we take will make the most of it and be great flag-bearers for the school in the long run”.

There are also professions like makeover artists which is again a creative, fun and glamorous job in the fashion industry. According to Aashmeen Munjaal, makeover expert and Director of Aashmeen Munjaal’s Star Salon’n Academy “Professionally, a makeover artist is someone who makes use of cosmetic techniques and processes for films, television, photography, theatre, fashion shows and other related productions.

In its simplest form, makeup artistry enhances a person’s appearance, bringing out colour and features and hiding or smoothing out flaws, using cosmetic products. With a rapid growth in the en-

Career Options in fashion • Designer • Stylist

tertainment, fashion, advertising, media and other related industries, the scope and growth of fashion makeover is exponential” In addition to possessing creative skills, the students must also be good at communicating their ideas, both verbally and by drawing. A good fashion designing institute polishes the student’s communication skills, in addition to teaching designing. This career best suits the candidates who are open to learning and think out of the box.

The onset of the International fashion market in India has given an impetus to the fashion industry which has emerged as the booming industry and a career as a fashion designer is like a pot of gold. Many young people who are attracted by these attributes decide to foray into the fashion industry Designers like Rohit Bal, Ritu Beri, Ritu Kumar, Satya Paul, Tarun Tahiliani, Sabyasachi etc have achieved global success and are inspiring youngsters to choose fashion designing as a career,

• Fashion Media

Career Oportunities

• Fashion Retailer

In the past decade, the world of fashion in India has changed dramatically. It has grown far beyond the art of just designing clothes. Students graduating from fashion designing institutes nowadays have a wide array of opportunities in the industry. These includes fashion designer, stylist, costume designers, fashion illustrators, fashion journalist, academicians and can also pursue to be textile designers and specialist.

• Fashion Entrepreneur • Fashion Communication • Décor Designer • Celebrity Stylist • Fashion illustrator • Fashion Journalist • Textile Designer • Academician

According to a recent study, India’s fashion designing industry aims to grow to Rs 1000 crores from the current ` 180 crores within the next five to ten years.

digitalLEARNING / May 2014

61

course review

List of Institutes offering Fasion Designing Programmes S. No.

Name of the Institute

City

Programme

Duration (in years)

1

Ansal University

Gurgaon

B.Des-FT (Fashion and Textile) B.Des-ID (Interior Design) B.Des-VC (Product Design)

B.Des-FT -Four B.Des-ID - Two B.Des-VC -Four

2

Apeejay Institute of Design

Delhi

Bachelor of Design in Fashion Design

Four

NA

Pune

Bachelor of Design

Four

280000

Bangalore

Fashion and Apparel Designing (B.Sc. FAD)

Three

NA

Bachelor of Science in Fashion design

Three

NA

Fashion Designing

Four

110000

1. BSc in Fashion and Apparel Design 2. Diploma in Fashion Design

1. BSc - Three 2. Diploma - One

NA

B.A. (Hons.) in Interior Design ( 3 yrs International Degree ) Diploma in Fashion Design Diploma in Fashion Marketing Diploma in Fashion Design B. A. Interior Design

B.A. (Hons.) in Interior Design - Three Diploma in Fashion Design - One Diploma in Fashion Marketing - Two Diploma in Fashion Design - Two B. A. Interior Design - Three

NA

Master of Design Product Design Master of Design Product Design

Master of Design Product Design - Two and half Master of Design Product Design - Two and half

B. Des. (Fashion Design)

Four

NA

UG course - four PG course- two Diploma course- 12 months

NA

1. B.Design - four 2. PG Diploma - Two 3. Short Term course - One

NA

3 4

Symbiosis Institute of Design Vogue Institute of Fashion Technology

5

Northern India Institute of Fashion Technology

Mohali

6

International Institute of Fashion Design

Chandigarh

7

J.D. Institute of Fashion Technology

Delhi

8

ITM - Institute of Fashion Design and Technology

Mumbai

9

National Institute of Design

Ahmedabad

10

National Institute of Fashion Technology

Delhi

1. UG course 2. PG course 3. Diploma course in Fashion Designing 1. B.Design Fashion Design, Lifestyle Accessories, Textile Design 2. PG Diploma Fashion Design 3. Short term course- Interior Design

11

Pearl Academy

Delhi

12

Satyam Fashion Institute

Noida

13

Whistling Woods International

Mumbai

Diploma in Fashion

Two

Gujarat

1. Graduate Diploma Programme In Design (GDPD) 2. Post-Graduate Diploma Programme In Design (PGDPD)

1. Four 2. two years six months

14

62

Total Fees (in INR) B.Des-FT -11.4 Lakh B.Des-ID - 1.14 Lakh B.Des-VC -11.4 Lakh

National Institute of Design

May 2014 / digitalLEARNING

Master of Design Product Design 256000 Master of Design Product Design 250000

8,36,520

NA

education.eletsonline.com

One can become a celebrity stylist, a fashion editor or editorial stylist, a shop window designer, a fashion consultant for commercials, an apparel or accessory designer, a merchandiser, a fashion buyer and a retail expert or an entrepreneur who brings international fashion brands to India.

Sanyogeitaa Chadha, HoD-Fashion Design, Pearl Academy says,“At Pearl Academy we believe that students need to have a clear vision about their future, and honing their skills are our responsibility. We provide students with focused career related courses which empowers students to gain expertise in the field of their choice”.

At present, the fashion media industry is also booming in India. It is one of the most high paying sectors, and a big new opportunity in the country with so many fashion magazines around.

Indian Market Scenario Fashion designers should be aware of the fashion market requirements. Economically, India is progressing rapidly and today there are even better future prospects. Therefore the country is witnessing rapid growth in many sectors which also includes the fashion industry.

The Indian fashion is also becoming popular abroad because of its cheap labour and excellent craftsmanship.

According to a recent study, India’s fashion designing industry aims to grow to `1000 crores from the current `180 crores within the next five to ten years.

The current market scenario of fashion industry is witnessing an aggressive and more robust approach from foreign

“India is now the centre of attraction and a platform for several international brands putting Indian consumers on global platform.

The sector is seeking for talented workforce” Meghna Ghai Puri, President, Whistling Woods International

“We look for students who are passionate about their future and are not afraid to take the road not taken. In the fashion Industry it is important to have a positive attitude in addition to a desire to excel”.

Sanyogeitaa Chadha, HoD-Fashion Design, Pearl Academy brands to create distinction in the consumer market. Therefore the Indian designers need to explore these new opportunities.

Many individuals are turning up to choose careers in fashion designing today as there are many areas of work and countless opportunities within this field.

The way out The Indian fashion industry is budding and still in its fledgling stage. Therefore the industry offers plenty of opportunities for the talented, hard working and enthusiastic people. A good understanding of the audience’s lifestyle and cus-

tomers needs and requirement is what is needed in a skilled fashion designer. In this competitive profession it is the best of best who can ultimately survive. The designers need to have skills to express their ideas clearly and most importantly, they must be original and have fresh and innovative ideas.

However, a fashion designer needs to combine his creativity with managerial skills to sustain in the industry. Thus if one can create magic with colours, shapes and designs, then obtaining a professional course to begin a successful career in the alluring world of fashion designing is the way out for him.

digitalLEARNING / May 2014

63

Event Report

Towards Effective Delivery of Quality Education Shobha Mishra Ghosh, Sr Director, FICCI shares the proceedings of the FICCI School Education Conference 2014

S

chool education has a significant role in laying the foundations for knowledge and skill development that subsequently shape the country’s economy. The government has universalized school education through various schemes such as Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha Abhiyan, Right to Education Act, launch of vocational education programme in schools through the NVEQF, etc. These efforts have helped the country achieve almost 100 percent Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER) at the primary level. But despite these efforts, the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) of Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) placed India at second position from the bottom out of 73 countries in Mathematics, Reading and Science.

High drop-out rates from upper primary level onwards coupled with the shift in enrolment from public to private schools at secondary level and parents supplementing classroom instruction with tuitions has further aggravated the situation.

To address some of the quality issues and actively engage the stakeholders including educationists, policy makers and the industry, Federation of Indian

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May 2014 / digitalLEARNING

Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) organized its first School Education Conference on 10th March 2014 at its premises in New Delhi, titled ‘Towards Effective Delivery of Quality Education’.

It provided a platform for knowledge sharing on ushering changes that will have a long term impact on school education in India and had group discussions on topics listed below.

Teachers’ Education - Leading, Learning and Teaching in The Digital Age This session showcased the role of technology in creating scalable, high quality teacher training and education. Participants made presentations and brainstormed ways of effective use of these tools by teacher training institutions to propagate as well as monitor their use.

Leveraging Assessments to Improve Education Quality Moving From Inputs to Outcomes A joint report by FICCI and CSF titled “Guidelines for Large Scale Learner Assessments (LSA)” was released during the conference, which highlighted reasons for LSA and emphasized the importance of measuring learning outcomes in a valid, reliable and recurring manner.

The guidelines highlight best practices for design, implementation and analysis of state-led LSAs and are supplemented with assessments conducted in India and abroad. Further, a discussion paper on holistic development of children by focusing on critical Non-Cognitive/CoScholastic (NC) Skills and means of assessing them was also released.

Private Sector Contribution to K-12 Education A joint report by FICCI and EY titled “Private sector’s contribution to K-12 education in India” was released. It highlights the contribution of private providers to quality in school education. The report also has some international case studies and brings out some key challenges that the private sector faces and thus restricts its participation.

Public Private Partnership (PPP) in Education: The Road Ahead The FICCI – CSF Report on “Public-Private Partnerships in School Education: Learning and Insights for India” released during the conference, traces the evolution of PPPs in education in India and defines the need and opportunity for school model of PPP implementation. It synthesizes insights and learning from international experience and examines the opportunity for the private sector to partner with the government to improve the quality of school education in India.

The main agenda for FICCI is to take forward the recommendations proposed in the Reports and support the Government in developing policies that would lead to quality improvement in school education in India.

When The World Talks Education...

4th

digital LEARNING

World Education Summit 2014

8 - 9

August, 2014, New Delhi

Come visit the 4th World Education Summit to

Meet, Discuss and Disseminate Knowledge World Education Summit 2014 organised by digitalLearning magazine aims to build a strong community around all the stakeholders of education, providing various business and networking opportunities for clients, partners and education leaders of both school and higher education. With rapidly changing dynamics of education, WES provides an ideal platform to all the stakeholders to come together and deliberate, discuss and explore the horizon.

World Education Conference: The conference would be a unique platform for sharing of knowledge, challenges, ideas and best practices among the stakeholders in the domain of education. Bureaucrats, tecnocrats, academicians, industry personnel and civil society members along with education experts, senior leaders and management teams of various schools, foreign education representives , practitioners, business leaders would all benefit through the thought provoking sessions, workshops and round table discussions etc. The conference would have two parallel tracks: School Education Track

Higher Education Track

Nominate for

World Education Awards 2014

WES Awards 2014

Rewards the best practices and projects in

School Education

Higher Education

Government Sector Initiatives

Private Sector Initiatives

Skills & Vocational Education

Non-Government Sector Initiative In Education

and avail early bird

discount till 30th April

For more details on categories: http://wes.eletsonline.com/2014/awards/

World Education Expo The two day Exhibition will attract more than 500 stakeholders from government bodies, private sector, NGOâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s and educational institutions. The Exhibition would put the spotlight on education sector. WES 2014 will have ample space for Edupreneursâ&#x20AC;&#x201C; global or national to showcase their education technologies, new ideas & innovation and best teaching learning practices.

Generate tremendous business leads

Drive brand promotions

Network with third party vendors, partners & channel

Maximize brand visibility

For Programme details contact: Seema Gupta, seema@elets.in, 08860651643 For Sponsorship/ Expo details contact: Fahim Haq, fahim@elets.in, 08860651632 Amit Kumar Pundhir, amit@elets.in, 08860635835 Organisers

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