Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham ranks amongst top 100 for sustainability: THE Impact Ranking 2021

 

Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham has also scored fifth rank for 'quality education' and eight for'gender equality' globally. In 'good health and well-being' Vidyapeetham stands at 37th position and for 'clean water and sanitation' at 52nd.

THE Impact Ranking 2021: The Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham is the only Indian university to secure a rank amongst the top 100 in the third edition of Times Higher Education (THE) Impact Ranking. The varsity bagged the 81st position in the university rank list, which consists of 1240 universities from 98 countries and regions. The rankings are evaluated on the universities’ performances of the United Nation’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals.

Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham has also scored fifth rank for ‘quality education’ and eight for ‘gender equality’ globally. In ‘good health and well-being’, the varsity got 37th position and for ‘clean water and sanitation’, it is at 52nd. Previously, the university had its name in the 301-400 set of rankings.

Besides, there are two other Indian universities in the 101-200 band, JSS Academy of Higher Education and Research, and Lovely Professional University. The JSS Academy stands at 49th position for ‘zero hunger’, for ‘good health and well-being’ at 52nd, joint 81st for ‘climate action’, joint 70th for ‘life on land’ and 97th for ‘responsible consumption and production’.

• Rank 81: Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham
• Band 101-200: JSS Academy of Higher Education and Research
• Band 101-200: Lovely Professional University
• Band 201-300: KIIT University
• Band 201-300: VIT University
• Band 301-400: University of Calcutta
• Band 301-400: Don Bosco University
• Band 401-600: BS Abdur Rahman Crescent Institute of Science and Technology
• Band 401-600: Chitkara University
• Band 401-600: Mahatma Gandhi University
• Band 401-600: Manipal Academy of Higher Education
• Band 401-600: National Institute of Technology Rourkela
• Band 401-600: Nitte
• Band 401-600: Thapar University

List of World’s Most Impactful Universities

1. University of Manchester, UK
2. University of Sydney, Australia
3. RMIT University, Australia
4. La Trobe University, Australia
5. Queen’s University, Canada
6. Aalborg University, Denmark
7. University of Woolonngong, Australia
8. University College Cork, Ireland
9. Arizona State University, US
10. University of Auckland, New Zealand

In the overall ranking board, the top score has been secured by a UK-based university – University of Manchester. Russia is the most represented in the table with 75 other institutions, followed by Japan with 73.

Source: Indian Express, 21/04/21

Think global, promote local

 

What can India do to promote more quality Ph.D programmes and avoid playing the “catch up” game with institutes abroad?

India needs to increase the quality and quantity of its research. There are many compelling reasons for this; a critical one being its necessity for the innovation ecosystem. It is clear that economies have become much more innovation-driven. And innovation uses new knowledge to generate value.

For example, algorithms created by machine-learning researchers are being used for innovation in a range of sectors and domains. Further, in the process of innovation, knowledge gaps are often found and further research is required to plug them. Therefore, a thriving innovation ecosystem requires a parallel in research and both need to thrive cohesively.

The Indian research ecosystem is relatively small and far behind leading nations in terms of quality and capability. Perhaps the most important indicator of the health of the research ecosystem is the quality and quantity of the doctorates it produces.

In the U.S., while two million graduate from Bachelor’s programmes, the corresponding number for Ph.D is 185,000; i.e. about 9% of undergraduates go on to do Ph.Ds. In India, the total number of students enrolled in undergraduate programmes is about 28 million, and the corresponding number for Ph.D programmes is around 140,000 or less than 0.5% of the graduates.

There is no doubt that there is a need to increase the number of Ph.Ds. The near-term goal must be to encourage 1-2% of graduating students to opt for Ph.D. But there has to be an equal increase in quality. For this, we need to attract bright and talented graduates into Ph.D programmes. Currently, many students who join Ph.D programmes are those who could not get a job, or want to prepare for a competitive exam, or are teachers who need a Ph.D for promotion. In addition, we should also ensure that their output is of high quality. The institutes also need to have the systems and faculty in place to achieve this. In the U.S., the top 50 institutions account for 50% of the Ph.Ds.

Luring talent

To understand what may motivate graduates, a small survey was done a few years ago. Graduating B.Tech students in some IITs were asked what they would require to enrol for a Ph.D programme in India. While better stipends and infrastructure were among the answers, a top sentiment was “the ability to spend a year in an overseas university”.

This can be addressed by providing Overseas Research Fellowships (ORFs) to top universities to send Ph.D scholars abroad. The only condition should be that the work done during the overseas period must form part of the Ph.D thesis, preferably under a joint programme with or a co-guide from the foreign university.

This programme could be awarded only to those institutions that have a good ranking and rigorous Ph.D evaluation systems, a good past record of producing quality Ph.Ds, and the capability and research record/standing. ORFs could be awarded each year to 100 institutions, leading to a rejuvenation of the programme. If 25 ORFs worth $20,000 each were awarded to an institution, the total would be $50 million per year. This is not a large amount, even by Indian standards.

Collaborative efforts

In the next round, the the number of ORFs given to an institution can be based on how many it was able to utilise, the universities its students went to, the number of joint publications, support provided by partner universities, and so on.

Given that ORFs can be established only with universities that are not likely to dilute their standards, a programme like this will raise the bar for Indian students. Another key advantage would be that the student is enrolled in an Indian institution and will go abroad only for a year and return to India to complete the Ph.D. The genuine collaboration in such programmes can lead to other collaborative research projects.

There is no doubt that we need to attract talented students to go in for research and also ensure that the output is of good quality. Without increasing the quantity, quality and variety of research, India risks playing the “catch up game” perpetually.

Pankaj Jalote

The writer is a Professor and Founding Director of IIIT-Delhi and the author of Building Research Universities in India (Sage Publications

Source: The Hindu, 4/04/21

IISc tops ARWU ranking 2020, Calcutta University best Indian varsity

 ARWU ranking 2020: The Indian Institute of Science (IISc Bangalore) has secured the top position among the best higher education institutes in India, while Calcutta University became the best varsity in the country, as per the recently published Academic Ranking of World Universities (ARWU 2020).

As per the recently published Shanghai Ranking, the other top higher educational institutions in the country are- Indian Institute of Technology (IIT-Madras) (rank 2-4), University of Delhi (rank 2-4), Indian Institute of Technology (IIT-Delhi) (rank 5-7), Indian Institute of Technology (IIT-Kharagpur) (rank 5-7), Jawaharlal Nehru University (rank 5-7), Aligarh Muslim University (rank 8-9), Vellore Institute of Technology (rank 8-9), All India Institute of Medical Sciences (rank 10-15), Anna University (rank 10-15), Bharathiar University (rank 10-15), Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur (rank 10-15), Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee (rank 10-15), Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research (IISERs) (rank 10- 15).

Meanwhile worldwide, the Indian institutes are not even in the top 100 list, the best higher education institute, (IISc Bangalore) is in the category of 501- 600. West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee congratulated Calcutta University for securing the top position.

Source: Indian Express, 3/04/21

India score in QS subject ranking: 25 programmes, 12 institutes in top 100

 TWENTY-FIVE PROGRAMMES — mostly in engineering — offered by higher education institutions in India rank among the top 100 in the world in their respective subject categories, according to the latest edition of the QS World University Rankings by Subject. Last year, this number stood at 26.

While the number of Indian universities/ institutes in the top 100 subject rankings has increased from eight to 12 this year, IIM-Calcutta, which is embroiled in a turf war between its Board and director, suffered its worst-ever ranking. While IIM-Ahmedabad, IIM-Bangalore, IIM-Lucknow and IIM-Kozhikode have more or less maintained their positions in the Business and Management Studies category, IIM-Calcutta slipped from the 101-150 band last year to 451-500 band this time.Except one, all the 25 programmes are in institutions run by either the state or union government. The O P Jindal Global University is the only private university to have entered the top-100 club. Its law programme is now ranked 76th globally. And, interestingly, 17 of the 25 globally ranked Indian programmes are in engineering. IIT-Madras’s Petroleum Engineering programme registered the best performance among Indian institutes — 30th in the world.

The four new universities/ institutes in the top 100 subject rankings are: IIT-Guwahati (for petroleum engineering), Jawaharlal Nehru University (anthropology), Anna University (petroleum engineering), and O P Jindal Global University (law).

IIT-Bombay has cornered more top 100 positions than any other Indian institution. Seven of its programmes (art and design; computer science and information systems; chemical engineering; civil and structural engineering; electrical and electronic engineering; mechanical, aeronautical and manufacturing engineering and mineral and mining engineering) are among the best 100 in the world. Last year, it had nine — chemistry and materials science engineering do not feature in the top 100 this year.

IIT-Delhi has four programmes among the top 100 and IIT-Madras has three. IIT-Kharagpur and IISc Bangalore have recorded two programmes each. IIM-Ahmedabad and IIM-Bangalore are ranked 80 and 76, respectively, for business and management studies.

While the public Institutions of Eminence (IoE) such as the IITs are better-represented in the QS World University Rankings, the private ones have made a mark in the Subject Rankings edition. Among the private IoEs, Birla Institute of Technology and Science has entered the rankings (151- 200 band) for Pharmacy and Pharmacology, Mathematics (451-500 band) and Business and Management Studies (451-500 band). Jamia Hamdard and Manipal Academy of Higher Education have been placed in the 101-150 band and 151-200 band, respectively for Pharmacy and Pharmacology. The Vellore Institute of Technology has broken into the top 300 for Electrical and Electronic Engineering (251-300 band).

QS World University Rankings by subject calculate performance based on four parameters — academic reputation, employer reputation, research impact (citations per paper) and the productivity of an institution’s research faculty.

Source: Indian Express, 5/03/21

Employed learners must exceed full-time learners for higher education justice

 The ugliest word for teacher is lecturer because education needs instruction diversity — adhyaapak (information provider), upadhyay (combiner of information and knowledge), pandit (deep-subject knowledge), acharya (imparts specific skills), drushta (visionary view of a subject) and guru (awakens potential). Improving India’s higher education justice and worker productivity needs the broadening of our education ambition of Gross Enrollment Ratio (proportion of our 15 crore university-age kids getting degrees) to include Employed Learner Ratio (proportion of our 55 crore labour force in formal learning). I make the case that enrolling five crore new employed learners needs five regulatory changes.

Rabindranath Tagore said we don’t learn from experience but from reflecting on experience. So, let’s reflect on recent global and domestic education experiences. Multi-decade structural changes include a new world of organisations (less hierarchical, lower longevity, shorter employee tenures, higher competition), a new world of work (capitalism without capital, soft skills valued more than hard skills, 30 per cent working from home), and a new world of education (Google knows everything, so tacit knowledge is more valuable than codified or embedded knowledge and the notion of life as 25 years each of learning, earning and retirement is dated). These shifts are complicated by a new world of politics (tensions between global and local, tradition and modernity, spiritual and material), third-party financing viability (50 per cent of the outstanding US $1.5 trillion student debt may have to be written off), and fee inflation (the average cost of a US college degree rising by roughly 500 per cent over the last 30 years challenges the model of a sage on stage delivering full-time learning in a physical classroom on a beautiful campus).

The specific experience of a large, poor, and diverse country like India — we have 3.8 crore students in 1,000-plus universities and 50,000-plus colleges — is also instructive. We confront a financing failure in skills: Employers are not willing to pay for training or candidates but a premium for trained candidates; candidates are not willing to pay for training but for jobs; financiers are unwilling to lend unless a job is guaranteed, and training institutions can’t fill their classrooms. The social signalling value of a degree matters — IIMs and IITs are good places to be at but better places to be from.

Many people can’t pay for education out-of-pocket. The income support of learning-while-earning is crucial to raising enrollment. Many students lack employability and workers lack productivity because learning is supply-driven. Learning-by-doing ensures demand-driven learning. Employers running formal apprenticeship programmes have evidence that suggests these programmes aren’t dead weight costs but pay for themselves via lower attrition, higher productivity, and faster open-position closure.

The de facto ban on online degree learning with only seven of our 1,000-plus universities licensed for online offerings means only 40 lakh of our 3.8 crore university students are learning outside physical campuses. Most tragically, high regulatory cholesterol creates an adverse selection among entrepreneurs — most educational institutions are started by criminals, politicians, or landlords rather than principals or teachers.

In 1973, economist Arun Shourie wrote in the Economic and Political Weekly that “India is not held back by one control or one licensing procedure. We are being held back by the premises, the unverified assumptions, and the attitude that underlie all controls.” He could be writing about education today: Regulations sabotage the creation of a fertile habitat for employed learners that needs flexible admission criteria, rolling admissions, continuous assessments, degree modularity, and four classrooms (online, onsite, on-campus, and on-the-job).

We need five changes. First, modify Part 3 of the UGC Act 1956 (UGC Rules regarding Fitness of Universities) and Part 8 of the UGC Act (UGC Regulations 1985 regarding the minimum standards for grant of the first degree) by including skill universities as a new category focused on creating employable graduates. Second, remove clauses 3(A), 3(B), and clause 5 of UGC ODL and Online Regulations 2020 that restrict licencing and prescribe a discretionary approval process and replace them with a blanket and automatic approval for all accredited universities to design, develop and deliver their online programmes. Third, modify clause 4(C)(ii) of UGC online regulations 2020 to allow innovation, flexibility, and relevance in an online curriculum as prescribed in Annex 1-(V)-3-i) that allows universities to work closely with industry on their list of courses. Fourth, modify clauses 13(C)(3), 13(C)(5), 13(C)(7), 18(2) of UGC online regulations 2020 to permit universities to create partner ecosystems for world-class online learning services, platforms, and experience. Fifth, introduce Universities in clause 2 of the Apprentices Act 1961 to enable all accredited universities to introduce, administer and scale all aspects of degree apprenticeship programs.

These five changes would enable enrolling five crore incremental employed learners — 1.5 crore employer-paid degree apprentices, one crore employer-paid online degree programmes, 50 lac employer-paid onsite degree programmes, and 2 crore employee-paid degrees pursued part-time online.

Half Lion, the wonderful biography of Narasimha Rao by Vinay Sitapati, describes a note handwritten by the newly-appointed education minister where Antoine de Saint-Exupery’s quote, “A rock pile ceases to be a rock pile the moment a single man contemplates it, bearing within him the image of a cathedral”, is followed by Rao’s thoughtful rumination on education: “Women and Child Development. Health. Youth Affairs. Culture. Labour?”

The insight of Rao’s 1985 note — education is organised vertically in government but reforming it requires thinking horizontally, holistically, and imaginatively — is a project that NEP 2020 takes forward with vigour. But the 15-year “Purna Swaraj” road-map for Indian universities under NEP needs acceleration because more employed university learners will be a sword and a shield for India. A sword because it could catalyse learning, skills and advancement for five crore workers. And a shield because it could catalyse higher productivity for the more than 20 crore Indian workers who toil in “employed poverty” across agriculture, informal employment, and informal self-employment. Completing the proposed five flick-of-pen reforms will take months not years. Any takers?

This article first appeared in the print edition on February 18, 2021 under the title ‘Reform lessons for education’.  The writer is co-founder of Teamlease Services

Source: Indian Express, 18/02/21

Study centre at IIM Shillong to help implement NEP in Northeast: Jitendra Singh

 The A P J Abdul Kalam Study Centre at IIM-Shillong, which is supported by the Ministry of Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER), will help in the implementation of the new National Education Policy (NEP) in the Northeast, Union Minister Jitendra Singh said on Thursday.

Singh said this after a meeting with the management of IIM-Shillong represented by its Chairman Shishir Bajoria, member Board of Governors Atul Chandrakant Kulkari and others.

Hailing the NEP, brought by the Union Education Ministry with the intervention of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, as the biggest path-breaking reform in India since independence, Singh said, the new policy is not only progressive and visionary but is also in keeping with the emerging needs of 21st century India.

The A P J Abdul Kalam Study Centre at IIM-Shillong will help implement the NEP in the Northeast and it may also undertake a study to understand how best this can be done, he said.

The minister said the centre also gives the young scholars and students enough room to decide their options depending upon their aptitude and their personal circumstances from time to time

Singh said the entire Northeastern region is faced with the challenge of mass exodus of students to different parts of the country in pursuit of higher education in streams of their preference.

He said, it is therefore, for the educationists in the Northeast to work out a comprehensive and effective plan to make use of the best practices incorporated in the NEP for the benefit of the students in the Northeast by overcoming the peculiar constraints of the region.  

The minister said the centre may also undertake a study to understand how the different streams and subjects available in the central institutions be introduced in the Northeast so that the students of the region can take the benefits of chosen subjects.

The centre can also suggest ways and means to involve the state run colleges and institutions in carrying out the academic programmes initiated by the central government.

It can also play the role of resource centre as well as coordinator between the central and state governments on the one hand and among the various education institutions of the region on the other hand, in order to ensure that the benefits of the NEP percolate down to the last student. 

Source: Hindustan Times, 29/01/21

International Education Day: Engineering, diverse cultural experience attract foreign students to India

Twenty-one-year-old Rhythm Patel, a Qatari resident of Indian origin, chose India to study computer sciences after finishing school. Patel says he had offers from universities in the US and Canada but the quality of education here was a clinching factor for him. He chose IIIT-Delhi for B.Tech in Computer Science and Engineering. “Contrary to public opinion, some colleges in India have a very good quality of education. If one graduates from a top institute in India like IITs, IIITs, and NITs, it also opens many doors for securing a job,” Patel tells indianexpress.com.

Promising ‘quality education’ at a reasonable price as compared to other countries, engineering education in India seems to be a preferred choice for foreign students, especially from South Asian countries. According to the Education Ministry’s latest AISHE report, the number of foreign students in India has gone up from 6,988 in 2000 to 47,427 in the academic year 2018-19. Much like Indian students, engineering and medicine courses are popular among foreign students.

Course-wise, BTech is the most preferred choice, with the gender ratio, however, remaining skewed in favour of male students. BTech is followed by BBA, BSc, BA, and MBBS courses. Like with Indian students, in the medicine stream, enrolment of female students is higher for foreign students too; with 58.92 per cent of total foreign enrolments in the stream being that of women.

The recent employability report by the Times Higher Education (THE) reported that India is among one of the biggest study destinations for foreign students because of the ’employability’ factor it offers. The report also claimed that traditional foreign destinations such as the US and the UK are struggling to “compete in terms of value for money” with these younger nations. Students and their parents are motivated by the ability to get a job rather than the brand, as per the report, and in the coming decade, universities will have to focus on their employability more.

Atal Zadran, an Afghanistan national, studied BCA from Bangalore University. Like Patel, he had the option of studying in any other European country but he decided to study in India. After securing high grades in BCA, he got a job in his own country. Three years ago when Zadran wanted to pursue higher studies, he decided to return here. Apart from the “updated MCA curriculum”, he says he prefers India because it offers “peace of mind” and a “cultural familiarity”.

Non-STEM courses not as popular

India is the favourite destination for students from Africa, Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan. As per the Education Ministry data, Nepal sends the most number of students to India.

Desmond Papa Wusu Mill, a 23-year-old student from Ghana, is in his second year of Mass Communication at Lovely Professional University (LPU), Punjab. But his first choice was engineering because he had heard greatly about India’s reputation as an emerging IT giant. It was during his engineering degree here that he discovered his interest in a course in public relations.  “During my stay here in India, despite initial adjustments to adapt to the culture, I could easily interact with people despite us having different accents in English.

Cultural Mix a USP

Mazharul Miraz, a 24-year-old Bangladeshi student at LPU says that India gives an “experience of not just studying in a country but a united entity with multiple countries”.

“India is a combination of multiple countries. It has such a diversity in terms of languages, cultures, and cuisines that I have learned a lot of management and public dealing skills along with my engineering degree. When I had joined I was a bit scared because people from different parts of the nation have entirely different viewpoints, but they all deal with each other very nicely. This cultural experience helped in giving me a well-rounded experience,” he said.

Shahid Nawaz Khan, a resident of Kuwait and a B.Tech student from IIIT-Delhi, says there is an environment of competitiveness here which drives “me to achieve my full potential”. “Having been brought up in a very protective environment in Kuwait, moving to any other country at that time seemed like a daunting task, and coming to India was not such a big step. My parents were a little skeptical about the pollution in Delhi,” says Khan.

Gopal Rizal, a 34-year-old Bhutanese student pursuing PhD in nanotechnology at IIT-Guwahati, claims that he had to move his classes online due to the pandemic shortly after he had started studying here. Even as his academic studies are continuing online, he says that culturally he had learned a lot.

“Ever since I took admission at IIT-Guwahati, the Covid-19 pandemic led to switch the teaching and learning process to online mode. During my short stay in India, I started to learn how people from cultural and ethnic diversities work together here. I aim to embrace these qualities of Indian citizens and work in building my own country after the completion of my study here. I would also like to collaborate with the friends and the professors of IIT-G to build a strong scientific temper among the youth of Bhutan.”

Are there concerns over women’s safety?

Masoda Khairzada, a 33-year-old Afghan national and a PhD fellow at the chemical engineering department of IIT-Madras, headed back home due to the lockdown but cannot wait to come back and “walk freely on Tamil Nadu’s lush green roads”.

Like many other female foreign students, Khairzada too had apprehensions about studying in India but was surprised by the sense of security she was offered here.

“I really miss working in the lab. I want to go back to labs and perform my experiments but I also miss walking on roads with its green and fresh environment. Chennai really impressed me with its security. When I was in Afghanistan, I was a little worried about staying in Chennai because I was the only Afghan student in IIT-M. However when I lived in Chennai it has started to feel like my second home,” said Khairzada who has worked as a lecturer at Jawzjan University in Afghanistan.

Bangladesh’s Swarna Roy too was skeptical of studying in India. “There was a myth about India that it is not very safe for girls and the system is not women-friendly, but I have found myself completely safe and comfortable during my whole journey in India.” said the 25-year-old student.

Hemlita Mondal, another MTech student at IIT-M recalls, “I heard about alarmingly growing rape cases in India. So, I was worried about women’s safety there.” However, it was the country’s ever-increasing technological education that had made her select it as her study destination.

Source: Indian Express, 25/01/21

Getting top foreign universities to open campuses requires more institutional autonomy

 The National Education Policy-2020 (NEP-2020), the fourth since Independence, was rolled out in July 2020 and has led to intense discussion on school and higher education. The most challenging aspect of the policy is the implementation of even those aspects on which there is some sort of consensus. The earlier education policies (1968, 1986 and the 1986 revised in 1992) were lauded as documents with clear vision. However, these policies could not yield much due to faulty implementation.

There are many provisions in the policy for improving the quality of higher education. For the first time, internationalisation of higher education has been highlighted as an objective. One such provision is to invite the top 100 World Class Universities to open international branch campuses (IBCs) in India. The underlying assumption is to raise the standard of research and teaching to international levels and slow down the out-bound mobility of Indian students. The biggest challenge would be the inclination of top universities to establish a campus in India. Not many such universities have such policies in place. At the same time, many universities are yearning to turn truly global and hold institutional mobility as a prerequisite.

Internationalisation of higher education in India has a pre-history. Many top foreign universities collaborate with Indian higher education institutions such as IITs and central universities for research and knowledge transfer. The collaboration has been strengthened by government’s schemes such as GIAN and SPARC. Conventional wisdom dictates that the existing research and academic collaborations between foreign and Indian institutions would facilitate the entry of IBCs in India.

To explore the potential of the policy of branch campuses and gauge the mood of top universities’ interest in India, a series of conversations have been held with experts, academic administrators and global heads of foreign universities. The discussions throw up interesting points. Top foreign universities are willing to respond positively provided there is sufficient clarity in areas essential for operationalisation of branch campuses in India. Interestingly, such universities are not looking forward to state sponsored infrastructure of the kind that the Dubai Knowledge Hub has offered — ready to move in campus, office space, and other facilities. A closer look at the IBCs suggests that these campuses are driven by the desire to accumulate profit in the manner of business enterprises. This implies that India will have to allow IBCs to repatriate income. The outflow of the money may not necessarily be 100 per cent of what these universities earn in India, but it will have to be a significant amount. As of now, there does not seem to be a viable model to balance the ploughing back of the resources earned in India and cash remittances to the parent university.

A key issue in the internationalisation of higher education is the preference for subjects and the areas of research considered rewarding. Social sciences and humanities do not generally figure in the imagination of decision makers — they are not seen as profitable ventures. There does seem to be a heartening change in this respect. However, here, and in a much greater measure compared to the science and business-oriented courses, foreign institutions demand more autonomy in framing and changing curriculum, daily functioning of the institution, the freedom to say no to industries, and even in the manner the institution is branded. The favourably inclined foreign universities also expect to be treated on par with Indian institutions in matters of government funding and scholarships. In return, they are willing to implement the Indian policy of social inclusion in higher education in their IBCs.

A related aspect of internationalisation of higher education is India’s keen interest on increasing the inflow of foreign students. The Study in India programme was launched in April 2018 with generous scholarships. Top universities encourage their students to go abroad for a semester or a year. Exposure to multiple cultures, subjects and pedagogies is deemed to be an asset and part of cultural capital. India is no doubt a potential destination for such study abroad experiences although it must be admitted that it is not happening on a large scale. The establishment of IBCs in India would gel well with the Indian quest for the in-bound mobility of students and scholars. The international standards maintained by the IBCs would be attractive enough for international students to explore and experience Indian education and culture.

Written by Anamika

Source: Indian Express, 22/01/21

Delhi University’s Vidya Vistar Scheme aims academic cooperation with other varsities

 An academic cooperative system between colleges and departments of the Delhi University and those of other Indian universities is on the cards, acting vice-chancellor P C Joshi said while releasing the DU’s six-month report card on Tuesday.

Through the initiative, “Vidya Vistar Scheme” (V2 Scheme), the DU has proposed to make available its faculties, library, and other academic facilities to the partnering institutions for academic cooperation and collaboration.

“The V2 Scheme has already started. Letters have been sent to all colleges and departments. Now we are giving them the freedom to chose. We are not imposing anything.

“For now, we are talking about all our online resources. DU has state-of-the-art resources, our lectures, textbooks, projects, everything. In the coming time, we will see if we can invite researchers here and share our laboratories and other facilities with them,” Joshi said.

The scheme will involve organising online and offline lectures, workshops, faculty training, conducting joint researches, and publishing in collaboration.

The DU administration is yet to hear from the participating colleges, he added.

Charting the course for future, the acting VC said the university will focus on improving its QS Ranking, which is an annual global university ranking, and bring to fore the its rich 100-year history.

“My mission right now is Mission 500, which is to be ranked between QS Ranking 400-500. Currently, we are at 510. It means we will have to improve ourselves at several fronts to get to that number. This involves recruitments, promotions, teaching methods, our researches, and connections with our alumni,” Joshi said.

The university will mark its 100th anniversary in 2022, for which the administration is planning to create a “DU Encyclopedia”.

“I am forming a new committee that will be involved with the 100-year history of DU and creating a DU encyclopedia. There are so many people who have been a part of DU, but we don’t know much about them since we weren’t working in that direction,” he said.

Talking to media, the acting vice-chancellor detailed the university’s activities in the last six months.

The university has constituted a 42-member committee, chaired by Professor Vivek Suneja, for the implementation of National Education Policy 2020

Joshi informed reporters that the university conducted online open-book Examination (OBE) for the first time involving 2.5 lakh students in August and 1.7 lakh students in December last year.

This was also the first time that admission process was conducted entirely online. The DU issued digital degrees to 19,821 students and provisional certificates to 3,885 students.

“There will be a mixed (online and offline) convocation ceremony on February 27,” Joshi said.

In the last six months, the DU signed an MoU with the Indian Council for Cultural Relations as well as with 18 universities across the world for the purpose of academic cooperation and collaborations with Indian and foreign scholars and students.

Joshi took charge as acting VC when Yogesh Tyagi went on medical leave. Later Tyagi was suspended over allegations of administrative lapses and a probe committee was set up in late October last year.

Source: Indian Express, 20/01/21

India's 'Institutions of Eminence' can now set up campuses in foreign countries

 Indian universities and colleges with the Institutions of Eminence (IOEs) tag, which include several IITs, will now be able to set up campuses in foreign countries with the University Grants Commission (UGC) issuing fresh guidelines on the same

The Education Ministry had launched the IoE scheme in 2018 as per which 20 institutions were to be selected -- 10 public and 10 private ones -- that would enjoy complete academic and administrative autonomy.

The new guidelines have been issued in line with the new National Education Policy (NEP) as per which foreign universities will be allowed to set up campuses in India and top Indian institutes in foreign countries.

According to the norms, IoEs shall be permitted to start a maximum of three off-campus centres in five years, but not more than one in an academic year.

They will, however, require approval from as many as three ministries -- education, home and external affairs -- before they can venture out.

“Institutions of Eminence...shall be permitted to set up new off-campus centres-maximum of three in five years and not more than one in one academic year by following the procedures,” according to the new guidelines.

“An institution willing to establish an off-campus centre shall have to submit an application to the Ministry of Education containing its 10-year ‘strategic vision plan’ and a five-year ‘rolling implementation plan’ which would include the plans for academics, faculty recruitment, student admissions, research, infrastructure development, finance and administration, etc,” it added.

The IoEs shall be permitted to start an off-campus centre in an interim campus, subject to the condition that the permanent campus shall be ready “within a reasonable time period not exceeding five years”.

“The institutes shall be allowed to start new off campuses with the prior approval of the education ministry after receiving no objection certificate from the ministry of external affairs and ministry of home affairs.“IoEs shall ensure that the norms and standards of offshore campus shall be the same as that maintained in the main campus for similar courses, and shall follow similar admission criteria, curriculum, exam and evaluation system," the guidelines said.

In the first lot, Indian Institutes of Delhi, IIT Bombay and the Bengaluru-based Indian Institute of Science (IISc) were awarded the IoE status in the public sector, and Manipal Academy of Higher Education and BITS Pilani in the private sector, while the Jio Institute by Reliance Foundation was given the tag in Greenfield category.

In 2019, five public institutions including Delhi University, Banaras Hindu University, University of Hyderabad, IIT-Madras and IIT-Kharagpur were granted the status.

A Letter of Intent for granting the IoE status was also issued to five private universities -- Amrita Vidyapeetham and Vellore Institute of Technology in Tamil Nadu, Odisha’s Kalinga Institute of Industrial Technology, Jamia Hamdard University in Delhi and Satya Bharti Foundation's Bharti Instiute in Mohali.

While the government will provide funding upto ₹1,000 crore to public institutions with IoE tag, in case of the private institutions proposed as Institutions of Eminence, there will be no financial support. But they will be entitled to more autonomy as a special category Deemed University.

A proposed off-campus centre is expected to achieve a teacher-student ratio of 1:20 initially, and 1:10 by the end of five years.

“The faculty for this purpose shall include the regular faculty, adjunct faculty, overseas faculty, visiting faculty, contractual faculty, industry faculty and tenure track faculty or faculty as otherwise permitted by the Statutory Council concerned,” the guidelines said.

It adds that at least 60 per cent of the appointed faculty members should be on permanent basis. The institute should also have enrolled a minimum of 500 students on its rolls under regular classroom mode with one third PG/research students. PTI GJS TIR TIR.

Source: Hindustan Times, 9/01/21

Academia and the free will

 

India’s dismal score on the Academic Freedom Index reflects the issues plaguing the country’s education system

India announced its National Education Policy (NEP) on July 29 this year. The policy aims at overhauling the educational system in the country and making “India a global knowledge superpower”, with a new system that is aligned with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal-4 (SDG 4). It also emphasises universal access to schools for all children, raising the Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER), and ending the spiralling dropout rate in India.The academic community is still debating and weighing the pros and cons of the NEP. However, one of the key disappointments is that the real problem plaguing the educational system in the country and the higher education system, the erosion of academic freedom, is being discussed by nobody.India has scored considerably low in the international Academic Freedom Index (AFI) with a score of 0.352, which is closely followed by Saudi Arabia (0.278) and Libya (0.238). In the last five years, the AFI of India has dipped by 0.1 points. Surprisingly, countries like Malaysia (0.582), Pakistan (0.554), Brazil (0.466), Somalia (0.436) and Ukraine (0.422) have scored better than India. Uruguay and Portugal top the AFI, with scores of 0.971 each, followed closely by Latvia (0.964) and Germany (0.960).

The AFI and the accompanying report quantify the freedom of scholars to discuss politically and culturally controversial topics, without fearing for their life, studies or profession — an aspect where India is failing terribly. In such a scenario, it is important to look into what the NEP 2020 has to offer. The NEP 2020 claims that it is based on principles of creativity and critical thinking and envisions an education system that is free from political or external interference. For instance, the policy states that faculty will be given the “freedom to design their own curricular and pedagogical approaches within the approved framework, including textbook and reading material selections, assignments and assessments”. It also suggests constituting a National Research Foundation (NRF), a merit-based and peer-reviewed research funding, which “will be governed, independently of the government, by a rotating Board of Governors consisting of the very best researchers and innovators across fields”. However, the question is whether these promises and offers will be put into practice or remain just a rhetoric.

The AFI has cited the ‘Free to Think: Report of the Scholars at Risk Academic Freedom Monitoring Project’, to suggest that the political tensions in India may have something to do with declining ‘academic freedom’. The police brutality against students at Jamia Millia Islamia University and Jawaharlal Nehru University in Delhi, and their being labelled as anti-nationals, has raised concerns about the state of academic freedom.

The AFI used eight components to evaluate the scores: freedom to research and teach, freedom of academic exchange and dissemination, institutional autonomy, campus integrity, freedom of academic and cultural expression, constitutional protection of academic freedom, international legal commitment to academic freedom under the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, and existence of universities. India has not fared well in components like institutional autonomy, campus integrity, freedom of academic and cultural expression and constitutional protection of academic freedom. Most universities in the country are subjected to unsolicited interference from governments in both academic and non-academic issues. It is common knowledge by now that a majority of appointments, especially to top-ranking posts like that of vice-chancellors, pro vice-chancellors and registrars, have been highly politicised. Such political appointments not only choke academic and creative freedom, but also lead to corrupt practices, including those in licensing and accreditation, thus promoting unhealthy favouritism and nepotism in staff appointments and student admissions. This reflects a ‘rent-seeking culture’ within the academic community.

At present, many educational institutions and regulatory bodies, both at the Central and State levels, are headed by bureaucrats. However, the NEP 2020 aims to de-bureaucratise the education system by giving governance powers to academicians. It also talks about giving autonomy to higher education institutions by handing over their administration to a board comprising academicians. This may help de-bureaucratise the education system and reduce political interference to an extent.

Jos Chathukulam is the director of Centre for Rural Management (CRM), Kottayam.

Source: The Hindu, 4/11/20

A financial model for higher education

 

Tuition fees, research grants, and endowment funds should contribute a third each to income

India’s gross enrollment ratio (GER) in higher education is 28%. It lags behind the global average of 38% and behind China’s 51%. If India wants to become a knowledge economy, our higher education institutions (HEIs) will have to play a leading role in boosting the innovation ecosystem while, at the same time, increasing GER to 50%. This calls for the scaling up of existing institutions as well as the creation of new premier ones. To put things in perspective, 23 Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) will admit as many as 15,000 undergraduates this year, while just one state university in the United States (US), Arizona State University, admits 13,500 undergraduates each year.

While the scaling-up of existing institutions and the creation of new institutions require additional budgetary allocations, running them well calls for money on a recurring basis. As a percentage of Gross Domestic Product (GDP), the nation’s expenditure on higher education remains low. This lower investment per student also has a strong correlation with global rankings.

The new National Education Policy (NEP) is trying to address this issue by allocating a fixed percentage of GDP for higher education.

It also talks about granting administrative autonomy to higher education institutions. Currently, these institutions receive upwards of 80% of funds from the government. They must explore 21st-century financial models to secure financial and administrative autonomy.

What is needed is a structural overhaul and creation of a diversified financial model for our institutions. Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) have been able to achieve autonomy by charging a higher tuition fee, contributing up to 85% of their funds. Is charging high fees the only viable financial model? It need not be if we follow the best practices of various countries and use a combination of these models.

Tuition fees contribute up to a quarter of the income for the most universities in the US, Australia and Asia. In the IITs, it contributes to only 6-7%, since only a fraction (approximately one-third) of students pay the upper limit of tuition fees. Others pay a much lower amount, based on their social category and economic status. This contribution can be increased not only by charging market competitive tuition fees, but also by bringing all students into the fee-paying category. This can be achieved by decoupling students and their families from the upfront financial barriers by offering them collateral-free and interest-free Income Contingency Loans (ICLs) through a centralised financial structure. Australia’s Higher Education Loan Program (HELP) is a widely-praised ICL model that is managed by the Australian taxation office. The repayments are linked to the debtor’s income level and are collected directly by the Australian tax authorities. ICLs are different from the education loans offered in the US that have caused massive student debt problems. A scheme can be piloted in India with IITs, which could also offer professional, executive and online programmes that do not require the infrastructure conventional degree programmes do.A third of the income could come from the research activities. Though research is primarily government-sponsored, universities such as UC Berkeley, Harvard and Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne raise up to a third of their research funds from non-government sources. Research at IITs is predominantly government-sponsored. A critical challenge has been managing and operating research facilities with insufficient overheads (ranging 5-10%) from these government grants. Alongside the expected increase in overheads, IITs could tap funds from the private sector, invest in and incubate research start-ups, and strengthen technology transfer and intellectual property licensing mechanisms. Mechanisms such as Foundation of Innovative Technology Transfer (FITT) at IIT Delhi and Society for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (SINE) at IIT Bombay may facilitate institutional equity investment in deep-tech start-ups. The recent launch of the world’s most affordable Covid-19 testing kit by IIT Delhi and the supply of over 4.5 million export-quality personal protective equipment by IIT Delhi start-ups are small demonstrations of the potential such investments by HEIs can generate. For boosting industry participation in research, IIT Madras has shown a way through the creation of technology parks. IIT Delhi is currently developing three technology parks for various industry sectors.

Harvard, Stanford and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have pioneered the concept of endowments, now adopted by public universities across the world. Endowment investment returns can easily contribute up to a third of the university’s income. Endowments are raised not only from the alumni but also from industry, philanthropists and governments. Last year, IIT Delhi launched an endowment fund with a target of raising $1 billion, that will provide a conservative investment income of ₹700 crore every year. A successful endowment model will require the creation of fund-raising teams and investment policy changes to overcome bureaucratic hurdles.

The new financial model for HEIs will be fuelled by the income from, one, deferred tuition payments; two, research grants/equity investments in startups/technology transfer fees; and, three, endowment donations. The transition is imminent, and it is up to us whether to lead or follow.

 Ramgopal Rao is director, IIT-Delhi, and Anurag Sachan is executive, IIT-Delhi

Source: Hindustan Times, 3/11/20