Open access movement in higher education is the key for emergence of meta-university

Dr K K Dwivedi
Vice Chancellor,
Apeejay Stya University

During the last 15-20 years new developments on the technological front have brought about major changes in the way we approach education.

Campus infrastructure is not only about physical boundary. It consists of manpower, faculty, student and staff along with physical infrastructures like the buildings, labs, classrooms hostels, housings, and other technological tools embedded into the system. We have features like teaching learning platforms through video conferencing, virtual classrooms, and much else.

As far as the manpower is concerned, faculty shortage is the most challenging task that we are faced with. Faculty doesn’t
drop down to us from tree tops; it takes decades of training to create an effective teacher. A good teacher who can face the challenges of higher education must be imbued with the six Cs: Competence, Creativity, Confidence, Caring, Collaborations and Communication. Unfortunately, most of the PhDs and teachers that are available these days are not employable because of the poor quality.

Nowadays most university campuses are ICT enabled. They are equipped with, intranet and internet. With the emergence of the National Knowledge Network one GBPS connectivity is available. Online access to books, journals, periodicals, and the learning management system which make the campus  more efficient are coming up.

Meta-university will promote collaborative and multidisciplinary learning through the use of National Knowledge Network. The availability of open courseware and the emergence of open access movement in higher education is the key for emergence for meta-university.

With right use of ICT, education can become a much more enjoyable experience for the teachers as well as students

Prof Dilip K Bandyopadhyay
Vice Chancellor,
Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University

India faces a major deficiency of teachers, especially in the state universities, where 40 percent posts are lying vacant. The syllabus in these universities is not getting covered and the examinations are losing their value rapidly.

Today, we are on the brink of a revolution in the education technology. India has taken many bold steps in implementing the National Mission of Education through ICT by bringing technology to classroom teaching.

One important intervention has been in the area of creating digital content, providing the connectivity and the access devices. Such a system enables anyone from the university to access content through a range of net-connected devices. The major benefit of such learning methods is that students have an opportunity to learn 24 hours a day and all 365 days a week. The issues of place and time fade away.

Keeping content in the online space is one thing, and helping students understand it is something quite different. The teachers have to act as the mentors and facilitators. They must help the students understand the content thoroughly. With right use of ICT, education can become a much more enjoyable experience for the teachers as well as students.

Akshai Aggarwal,
Vice Chancellor, Gujarat Technological University

The number of universities is important, but even more important is the quality of education

In 1854, East India Company established three universities in Bombay, Calcutta and Madras and today India is home to 600  universities”
Today youth in India want to study at premier institutions; even these institutions face a major drawback in their research facilities.  There has been a steep fall in the ranking of India’s educational institutions year after year, while the ranking of universities in other  countries keeps rising.
The students in India are quite capable, they are making a mark everywhere in the world. But the problem of  engineering students in India is that they have no practical knowledge due to poor facilities for research in the institutions where they are being trained. Indian students tend to shy away from the practical problems.
India has a rich tradition in education, but no new innovations in education have happened after the burning of Nalanda University in  12th century. In 1854, East India Company established three universities in Bombay, Calcutta and Madras and today India is home to 600 universities.
The number of universities is important, but even more important is the quality of education that they provide. We need to look at the  structure of our universities and devise a system that is suitable for doing thorough research. We don’t have to blindly create more  replicas of the IITs, we can try to evolve some other models also.

Prof Sandeep Sancheti,
Director, NITK Surathkal

Children should be encouraged to develop skills

Vocational Education focuses on imparting some specific job related skills to the students. Vocational training is not part of higher education, it stands somewhere between schools and higher education depending upon the case and the need of the job.
In school education, we do not nurture and help the children, instead we kill the creativity of the child by setting rules for everything.  Right from Kindergarten, teachers take complete control of the child’s mind. Instead of allowing the child to develop his own brand of creativity, the teachers fill him up with their own ideas.
It should come as no surprise that after some amount of this kind of training, the child starts following a prescribed way of doing  things. Creativity is the fountainhead of any skill. Skills will not develop in children, if they are not allowed to showcase their talents  from childhood.
In India, our engineers do not get to open and rebuild things, so problem solving approach is never developed. The students are great  on paper, but hands on knowledge is missing and students don’t have the courage to join bits and pieces and learn in the process.
Another important change that needs to be implemented is that our system of education should focus more on enabling students to  develop right kind of skills, rather than on simply awarding degrees.
Diplomas should be given to students who have acquired a  specific  skill. Students who have higher skill set should be given degrees.  There should be a modular structure where entry is given to vocational education based skills. When a specific skill set is prescribed, then even 12th exams will not be necessary and people with skills will be given lateral entry.

Deepankar Bhattacharya,
Sr Manager, India Education Programmes, AutoDesk

There is a lot of job opportunities provided the graduate students have the requisite skills sets

The emerging trends in higher education should be aligned to the broader trends in the industry, because it is in the industry that the  students will look for jobs once they finish their graduation. Just as the industry faces several challenges, our universities also face challenges. These challenges are not aligned to each other, but in an ideal world, they should have been.
The way the students acquire knowledge, the way they learn, the way they communicate in the industry has become digital now. The  digital life is further fuelling the process of globalisation. Globalisation means access to global talents, access to newer products and  services and so on.
Then there is the issue of infrastructure management. Millions and trillions of dollars are being spent in the emerging economies for  creating new infrastructure.
The challenges of globalisation, infrastructure and much else cannot be addressed in a simplistic manner.  There is a need for new ideas and approaches in the education.
In the design sector, we are looking at emerging technologies like building information modelling, digital prototyping, sustainable  design and digitals entertainment creation. So, if we look at the architecture, engineering and construction industry, things like building information modelling is the need of our hour. If we look at the manufacturing industry, digital prototyping is the drift. There  is a vast potential for growth in the animation industry and therefore, massive requirement of talent.

Dr Francis C Peter,
Vice Chancellor, Dr K N Modi University

The hour is to have a technological solution for holistic engineering practice and system

Education institutions, particularly those in engineering sector, constantly face the challenge of upgrading their infrastructure to meet global standards. But many of the technical universities and institutions are unable to bring about the requisite improvements, and  they turn into sort of degree shops. The fall in quality of academic research is a direct result of the low calibre of our institutions.
The balance of economic and financial power is gradually but steadily shifting towards Asia. It is high time our educational institutions  made some concerted attempts to focus on higher education. They should attempt to enhance their skill levels by developing key  national and international partnership based on the synergistic power of industry, government and academia. Such partnerships will  be based on academic integrity, diversity of students and faculty, enhancements of the institution’s core mission, and also on factors related to national interest. The success, of course, will depend on the physical, intellectual, and academic infrastructure that the  institutions already have.
The measurable parameter is obviously the employability and productivity in terms of social relevance in meeting the national goals  and objectives. The academic process should bear the burden of the scrutiny of quality, integrity, adherence to rules, regulations and  time table and adhocracy of supporting infrastructure. In short, for achieving the above, we have to adopt a mandate to ensure coordinated development, through proper planning and administration.
The need of the hour is to have a technological solution for holistic engineering practice and system in place in all our institutions.

Dr Kripa Shankar,
Vice Chancellor, Gautam Buddh Technical University

Higher education cannot flower without there being a solid base of lower levels of education

First of all, we need to understand the meaning of higher education. Higher education normally refers to a degree that is above the  usual crop of Bachelor degrees. The focus has to be on Master’s degrees and PhD’s. Today we are having a rather vibrant display of  bachelor’s degree, the case can certainly be made that commercialization has crept into the under graduate programmes.
Our under graduate education has become a business like affair. We do have access to private universities, online education and ICT  applications, but this does not match the purpose and scope of higher education. In under graduate programmes, creative thinking is  in the form of online lectures and notes prepared by someone else. The higher education programmes have to be more innovative to  keep pace with the graduate programmes. The scenario for employability of students after higher education is quite lacklustre. Efforts  have to be made to bring about an improvement.
The higher education space needs lot of fresh thinking. We can’t have students spending another 5 or 10 years of their life in education,  when they have already been studying for years.
A good higher education programme will naturally demand the fundamental revision of the education from the elementary level  onwards. Higher education cannot flower without there being a solid base of lower levels of education.
Higher education must not be conducted only with the aim of getting better jobs. Higher education should not be left in private hands;  it has to be supported by the government, as building higher education institutions is a capital intensive activity. Perhaps we need to  have a national policy on higher education that is funded by the public money.

Prof Rameshwar Rao,
Vice Chancellor, Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University

A business can be assessed on basis of profits that it makes, but in higher education we don’t have such parameters

Demand for higher education is increasing not only in India, but in every other developing country. As developing countries are home  to a very large young population, there is lot of demand for adult education and professional courses. While demand keeps on growing,  the traditional institutions in these countries are failing to keep up with the demand.
The developing nations need to make lot of new investments in the education space in order to bring about an improvement in their  educational outcomes. Quality in higher education basically signifies a certain level of excellence. There is a difference in the way we assess quality in the education sector. A business can be assessed on basis of profits that it makes, but in higher education we don’t  have such parameters.
How would you prepare the students to take admission in M Tech or in any other professional course? How do you prepare the students to take GRE or to become IAS officers?
Even though globalisation is welcome phenomenon to a large extent, the developing countries need to be careful about the  motivations of foreign universities.

Nagendran S
Executive Vice President,
MeritTrac

By 2020, Indian will have 47 million people ready for the job market, provided they are trained properly. If we compare with other  countries, this estimate is lesser by around 15 million. It can be seen from two perspectives. India will have those people without jobs  or people with opportunities across the globe.
In India, the total enrolment has grown to 16 million in 2011 from 8 million in 2001. Simultaneously, the investment has also gone up  and the number of institutions has also gone up. It means that we are getting more educated people in the system. If we give right  input, we will get enough people taking up those opportunities across the globe. Now, we have e-Commerce coming in education. The examinations are also moving online. Initially, there were some question marks as some of the online exam systems did not perform  well. People were skeptical. But today many prestigious exams are conducted online.
There is a myth that online examinations are not secure, but online exams are safer than paper and pencil test. In the traditional mode  of examination question papers are vulnerable due to various touch points. It is always better to make use of technology for making  examination secure and robust. We need to pick the right service provider who has been a specialist in testing and assessment and look  for examination delivery rather than software delivery.