Two universities of UAE have made it onto a list of the top 20 most international universities. In a new ranking by Times Higher Education, the federal UAE University in Al Ain and private American University of Sharjah achieved 15th and 12th places, respectively.
The rankings are examined on the basis of the proportion of international students, international faculty and research published, with at least one international co-author, each given equal weighting.
Phil Baty, Editor, Times Higher Education, said, “With naturally small indigenous populations, it could be argued that Qatar, which took first place, and the UAE, would have what he calls a ‘natural advantage’ towards internationalisation.”
Maryam Khan, Advisor on the UAE University rankings team, said, “The placement reflected the university’s goal to be research intensive. We want to bring the big brains of the world to come here so being on the international rankings is important for this.”
Though the federal university was set up for Emiratis, it does have increasing numbers of foreign students.
On the rankings, Kevin Mitchell, Acting Provost, AUS, said, “Even if there were no rankings that considered internationalisation as a criterion, institutions would likely still seek to attract an international student body and faculty as there is an increasing need to establish connections across the world to enhance knowledge and facilitate research.
In a landmark verdict, the Delhi high court put an end to what it called “profiteering and commercialisation of education” and empowered the state government to regulate fee hike by private schools.
The court ruled that fee hike by private unaided schools, who got DDA land at concessional rates, requires prior sanction from the Delhi Government’s education department. The order is expected to curb arbitrary fee hike
A bench of Chief Justice G Rohini and Justice Jayant Nath held, “It is clear that schools cannot indulge in profiteering and commercialisation of school education…Quantum of fees to be charged by unaided schools is subject to regulation by DoE under Delhi Schools Education Act and it is competent to interfere if hike in fee by a particular school is found to be excessive and perceived as indulging in profiteering.”
The court further ordered DoE to ensure compliance. It also directed DDA to take action against those private schools which violate the embargo on fee hike in the letter of allotment of land.
“Access to learning opportunities and the pursuit of excellence must both receive equal attention,” says the President Pranab Mukherjee, while inaugurating the Shiv Nadar University on January 18, 2016 at Dadri, Gautam Buddha Nagar (Uttar Pradesh). He also laid the foundation stone for its faculty residential campus.
The President said that private institutions account for about 60 per cent of the students enrolled in higher education. “Though proliferation has led to greater access, its negative fallout on standards is alarming. If the declining quality of education particularly in the area of higher learning is not reversed quickly, we will land ourselves in a scenario of having a large number of people with degrees but not enough manpower with proficiency. We cannot afford to produce workers and professionals who fail to meet the skill levels required by a growing economic system,” he adds.
He expressed happiness that in 2015, two Indian institutions for the first time have been ranked within the top two hundred Universities in international rankings. He was confident that many more will join in the coming years.
James Cook University (JCU), Singapore is conducting the assessment tests in Mumbai, New Delhi and Chennai in the month of January/February 2016. The scholarships will be covering up to 50 per cent of the course fee for the Master’s Degree and Bachelor’s Degree programmes. The University has been organising scholarship tests across India since the past six years, to support the educational journey of promising students.
The JCU scholarships are given to meritorious students based on the two-hour long test conducted by the university and assess the students on their English Language Skills and Aptitude. The assessment test will be essentially based on four topics, namely, Antonyms, Sentence completion, Mathematics based questions and General Knowledge Questions.
Candidates, who are planning to pursue their studies (either Bachelors or Masters) and wish to apply for the scholarships must do it before appearing for the test. Meanwhile, they must have a score of 60 per cent or above marks in their higher secondary examinations or Bachelor’s degree.
Established in 2003, the university offers a slew of scholarships. For the Indian students, the scholarships are worth S$16050 (approx INR 8 lakhs) for Masters’ Degree in the field of business, IT and tourism and S$23832 (approx INR 11 lakhs) for Bachelor’s’ Degree in subjects like business, IT and psychology.
Kalpana Nath, Principal, The Chintels School shares with Elets News Network (ENN) about the challenges in school education, qualities of a best school, parents involvement in child education, role of technology in education, Chintels’qunique proposition and more
Challenges in School Education Today, the main challenges regarding education are the various competitions students have to face to be successful in life, in order:
To keep at par with national and international level of education and technology;
To get admission in the colleges of their choice.
Qualities of a Best School The qualities that make a best school are:
Excellent infrastructure such as spacious, wellventilated classrooms; cleanhygienic washrooms; activity rooms with latest gadgets; science and computer labs with latest technology, etc. Big sports field, swimming pool, gymnasium,
library, audio-visual rooms and auditorium are also essential for a good school;
Highly qualified faculty, who are dedicated and always eager to update their knowledge; knowing the latest technology to help in teaching. And above all imparting values of life to the students;
Should be headed by a well-experienced principal, who should be openminded to bring in the required changes in the school;
Management should hire well-trained and hardworking office-staff and Grade IV employees for official work, maintenance and cleanliness of the school;
Ambience should be environmental friendly;
Students should be guided and encouraged to participate in competitions and extracurricular activities so that later in life they can face any challenges that can come in their way.
The Chintels: Imparting High Moral Values The Chintels School is different from others, due to the following qualities:
A team of dedicated, sincere, hard-working teachers guides, motivates, educates the students to do their best;
The students excel in their academics performing excellently in the ICSE/ISC Board results and proving themselves in the city and state level;
In various interschool competitions, students of junior and senior classes have won top positions at the city and state level, bringing glory to the school;
The Chintelians have high moral values and are well-disciplined.
Parents Involvement in Education I agree that positive parent involvement has a significant impact on student education. When parents take keen and positive interest in their child’s education, the students are motivated to do well in academics and competitions.
Role of Technology in Education In this rapidly changing world, education too cannot escape the impact of technology. The presence of Internet itself has revolutionised the process through which we access and disseminate information. It has created a global platform for the students. The process of assessment has become efficient. Students can now take online tests. The interaction between students and teachers has improved. The most important factor is that there is an instant access to information and e-books.
Keeping with the Changing Demands The teachers at The Chintels Schools use both traditional and modern methods of imparting knowledge to the students. Through seminars and workshops, the teachers update their teaching methods and keep abreast with the changing demands.
Professional Achievements I feel proud that my students have performed brilliantly in academics and co-curricular activities and competitions, bringing laurels to the school.
This, I feel, is my achievement too which could not have been possible without the hard work of the teachers. One can never stop learning because life never stops teaching.
Smart Education is an integral part of the entire precept of Smart Habitations. As a part of digitalLEARNING School Perception Survey, the chosen eduDESTINATIONS were subjected to a social poll. Some of the eduDESTINATIONS performed overwhelmingly well in this social poll, while others kept guessing about the intent of the same and couldn’t open up their tally. The extent of participation in the aforesaid social poll has somewhat a co-relation to the overall progressiveness of the concerned eduDESTINATION.
Based on the Social Perception Survey, following is the Progressiveness Index of eduDESTINATIONs of the country.
Gaurav Mundra, Co-Founder & CEO and Madhup Bansal, Co-founder & COO, myly share with Elets News Network (ENN) about the need of mobile apps in educational institutions, myly’s unique proposition, benefits for educators, students & parents and more
What is the need for mobile apps in educational institutions?
Although education leads to technology improvement, but the implementation of technology for improvement of education delivery has been in a sorry state till now. Most of the educational institutes are still using age-old methods, even in this digital age.
Educational institutions need to adopt mobile app solutions not just to look smart but to actually act smart. Mobile apps lead to better, cheaper and faster communication and transaction enablement. Mobile apps enable customised and personalised learning, content delivery, assessment and feedback, improving quality of learning, etc.
Which type of educational institutes can use a mobile app?
Any and all types of institutes can and must use mobile apps – schools, colleges, universities, tuition classes, coaching centres and hobby classes. There is no restriction of minimum number of students to adopt an app.
What are the key features that educational institutions must look for in a mobile app?
There is no limit to features you can have in a mobile app. To begin with, any app must have:
Bi-directional messaging between educators and students/parents;
Ability to share homework, circulars and exam schedules;
Attendance notification of student’s absence;
Ability to create events’ and holidays’ calendar;
Gallery for sharing images and videos;
Fees payment via multiple online channels.
Madhup Bansal Co-founder & COO, myly
With several players in institute-home communication space, what is unique about myly?
First, myly is completely FREE for educational institutions, students and parents. We guarantee our customers that the current offering will remain free for life. We will introduce various optional value-added services that customers may use at a small fee.
Second, myly is useful for all types of educational institutions: schools, colleges, universities, tuition classes, coaching centres and hobby classes.
Third, myly is transaction-enabled. It is designed to allow payments via net banking, credit/debit card and mobile wallets.
Fourth, myly is extremely easy to setup and use. Our typical turn-around from sign-up to go live, including training, is only two days.
Please share the vision and mission behind myly?
myly was born out of the common frustration of co-founders Gaurav Mundra and Madhup Bansal, about not getting timely information from their kids’ schools. The conventional means of communication like diary and circulars are grossly inefficient in this digital age. Even SMS and email leave too much to be desired. This is why Gaurav and Madhup left their fulltime engagements and started myly.
Their vision is to have myly in hands of every educator, student and parent across schools, colleges, universities, tuition classes, coaching centres and hobby classes.
myly’s mission is to connect, engage and facilitate learning over a seamless mobile platform.
How is myly benefiting educators, students and parents?
For educators and institutions:
Saves communication cost and staff time by up to 90 per cent;
Improved brand image and higher brand visibility;
Share messages, documents, images and videos;
Complete audit trail on what was communicated, and when;
Comprehensive data repository is created on a secure cloud;
Accessible anytime, from anywhere;
Saves paper, helps the environment.
For students and parents, myly app allows to:
Get all communication even when they are absent;
Access all information in one single repository;
Access images and videos shared by institute;
Apply for leave from the app;
Make fees payments via net banking, credit/debit card and mobile wallets;
Get advance information about events and register for them.
Overall, it increases the participation of all stakeholders in the student’s learning improving outcomes.
Dr Satyabrata Minaketan, Chairman, ODM Educational Group shares with Elets News Network (ENN) about the challenges in school education, qualities of a best school, parents involvement in child education, role of technology in education, ODM’s unique proposition and more
What do you see as the main challenges for school education today?
Today, the biggest challenge in the domain of school education is the dearth of quality teaching methodologies and curriculum. The school education in our country has actually gone through very few changes to catch up with the dynamics of the changing economy. I believe that school education should lay the foundation among the students to nurture future leaders. For this, schools today have to go through radical changes in terms of their teaching pedagogy and curriculum planning.
According to you, what are the qualities that defines a best school?
A best school is the one that truly prepares all its students for the future. An ideal school brings out the best out of every child. A child might be good at academics, sports, dance or music. A school will be best in real sense if it helps students recognise their latent talents and helps them excel in the same. This approach needs a dynamic curriculum planning, active parental involvement and an excellent growth environment provided by the school along with provisions for excellent training and exposure.
What makes your school sets apart from others?
Since the foundation of school, my team and I have relentlessly been focussing on providing a unique pattern of education – on enriching students with aesthetic values and overall grooming through modern global teaching pedagogy. We believe in nurturing students by imparting rich spiritual values (not specific to any religion) as well as ensuring a techbased education system with modern and advanced teaching aids used by leading schools across globe.
Positive parents involvement has a significant impact on student education. Do you agree? If yes, how?
It has been noticed that parents’ culture and lifestyle impacts the grooming of a child to a great extent. The way we behave at home, lead a lifestyle – our child learns from us and starts to act accordingly. We, at ODM, have clearly understood this aspect. Whatever we teach a child in school not only in academics but also in other aspects, if that training is supplemented at home, then that doesn’t lead to a complete development in a child. Hence, we think positive parents’ involvement has a significant impact on students. We have seen that parents who are concerned about their child’s development and cooperate with school by supplementing on the coaching provided to the students have witnessed their child acing domains with flying colours.
Use of technology has become an integral component of education. In your opinion, how technology is transforming the school education landscape?
It is undoubtedly true that school education is transforming with the aid of technology. The advent of smart classes, tab-based learning and other teaching aids have not only taken the education to next level among students but also have improved teachers’ efficiency exponentially. The smart classes have made learning fun and the visual and audio aids made understanding and memorising of facts easier for students.
We are one of the few schools in eastern zone to introduce tab-based learning for senior secondary students this academic session. Through tabs, they can go through recorded e-classes of some of the best teachers in the state which help them understand the concepts at any time of the day or year. The new ERP software for schools have made the process of maintaining records, student profiling and examination conduction a lot easier and the efficiency of the staffs in school increases exponentially.
Rita Kaul, Director, The Millennium School, is a special educator and psychologist with 23 years of experience. She shares with Elets News Network (ENN) about the challenges in education, qualities of a best school, role of parents in school, unique proposition of The Millennium School and more
What do you see as the main challenges for school education today?
Today, the greatest challenge is to balance the information and knowledge we provide in school, with the harmony in life. Gone are the days when teachers would force the children to mug up and vomit out during examination. Thus, the first and foremost challenge is to train the teachers in a way that they can think of various strategies to engage the students in class. There is need to change the methodology of assessment and let the students enquire and discover the facts.
According to you, what are the qualities that defines a best school?
Being the head of a school, I interact with young parents of a nursery child as well as with a parent who is seeking admission of a child in grade XI. Their expectations vary from one stage to another. To sum up, basically a parent looks at the quality of academics i.e., the kind of curriculum adopted, physical school environment that is quality infrastructure and the psychological environment that is the attitude of all the stakeholders inside the school. A best school will certainly practice cultural values, have democratic approach, and engage qualified and passionate teachers who are well-versed in integrating technology to the curriculum. The environment in a quality school is student-centric. Parents as partners and freedom to students for research will also add on to the quality of school.
What makes your school sets apart from others?
The Millennium Schools across the country are based on developmental milestones and not on the chronological age of the students. Our curriculum, called The Millennium Learning System, is based on Piaget’s longitudinal and cross-sectional study of children across the world. The Millennium Learning System (MLS) is an age appropriate learning system that caters to the psychological, emotional and cognitive needs of the learner. It has different levels, based on developmental milestones and age appropriate pedagogy.
Integrating technology into the classroom is definitely a great way to reach diversity in learning styles
Every tangible for MLS has been developed at the R&D Division, with a focused outcome in mind. This outcome is clearly understood through our vision for every child who enters the system. Age appropriate, psychologically mapped and pedagogically apt tangibles are used at every level of the MLS. Some of these are the books, the assessment system and the lesson plans.
Positive parents involvement has a significant impact on student education. Do you agree? If yes, how?
To have positive and educated parents as partners is like having a mirror in front of us. Parents are our ambassadors. If they speak respectfully of our schools and are involved in certain decisionmaking stages, they have an ownership like a family member has in a family. The student feels confident when school and parents work together. When these parents believe in the system, they talk about it and give the schools an honest feedback and thus create opportunities for the schools to correct the course when they are perceived in a negative manner.
How technology is transforming the school education landscape?
Technology has become an intrinsic part of education and an important tool for teachers. Integrating technology into the classroom is definitely a great way to reach diversity in learning styles. It gives students the chance to interact with classmates more, by encouraging collaboration.
With technology, the teacher becomes the encourager, adviser and coach. Students can have access to digital textbooks that are constantly updated and often more vivid, helpful, and creative. Technological tools, like Fliplearn, help to communicate and enhance knowledge, and play a vital role in bringing the stakeholders closer and sharing of information. Technology also facilitated learning for the differently abled.
Bharat Lal Meena, Additional Chief Secretary, Dept. of Education (Higher Education), Govt of Karnataka
Bharat Lal Meena, Additional Chief Secretary, Dept. of Education (Higher Education), Govt of Karnataka
Bharat Lal Meena has initiated ICT projects in Karnataka Power Transmission Corporation Ltd (KPTCL) – a Government of Karnataka undertaking, during his previous assignment as Managing Director, and set a trend for other States to emulate in power sector. Now as the Additional Chief Secretary, Department of Education (Higher Education), Government of Karnataka, he is on a new mission, making ICT an efficient tool for learning, governance and academic activities. He shares with T Radhakrishna of Elets News Network (ENN) about the Department’s mandate, initiatives, action plans, challenges in implementing ICT and more
Describe the Department’s mandate and its objectives. Who are your key stakeholders?
The mandate is to make quality education affordable and accessible to all sections of students. The department deals with higher education i.e., college, universities and technical education. Its objectives are: Development of undergraduate and postgraduate education; Increasing access to higher education; Development of infrastructure in Government colleges; and, Maintaining high standards of education in colleges. The key stakeholders are students, faculty, administration, parents and people in general.
What systems and processes have you used to ensure the effective running of the Department’s functions? In which functions, do you use ICT and how?
The history of implementation of ICT in universities/colleges was poor till mid-2015. Basic computing was available in each office or institution, but office automation did not exist. The day-to-day functions of higher education were not connected in realtime IT environment. However, the potential for using ICT in the higher education is enormous. ICT is very useful tool for learning, governance and academic activities.
Could you tell us about how you have maximised the use of current facilities at Department? What were the challenges you faced in managing them?
In the absence of systems and processes, monitoring is a challenge. Data sharing is another. There was low priority for collating and updating data. Cyber security and information overload are some other concerns. Going forward, the Department is seeing a massive ICT implementation to bring in digitisation in higher education. While office automation is one aspect of it, there are a host of student centric initiatives. After I had joined the department about 10 months ago (in February 2015), I studied the situation and focused on how and where to use ICT in higher education to bring in productivity, accountability and transparency in the day-to-day functions. As part of this, I travelled to all the universities and held meetings with officers concerned and later called for presentations on best practices in higher education from all. Data sharing must be linked with critical areas like approval, renewal, grants, etc. Finally, we came out with a roadmap for ICT initiatives after elaborate discussions with internal stakeholders.
Explain your 100-point ICT plan for Department improvement.
The department has prepared a roadmap for ICT initiatives to facilitate ease of administration and academic reach for students in universities and colleges. The programme aims to provide end-to-end digital solution from admission to completion of education, covering all functions of the department and its stakeholders. The 100-point table is nothing but an action plan for each requirement of the department’s functions. Of them, 15 ICT initiatives and solutions are related to administration; 22 exclusively for universities; six exclusively for colleges; 15 for colleges and polytechnics; 12 for universities and colleges; and 30 for universities, colleges and polytechnics. The action plan has mapped the entire functions of key stakeholders – students, faculty and administration, and feedback mechanism to parents (of students).
Under administration, we are deploying modules such as Online Admission for Students; Education Management Information System with Dashboard; HRM System; e-Administration System; e-Library Networking and Synergy, Accreditation Monitoring, etc. For Smart Student Support System, we shall implement modules such as Online Scholarship Management System; e-Attendance; Online Class Monitoring and Matrix; e-feedback system by students about teacher, etc. Under academic initiatives, conversion of classrooms into Smart Classes, Tele-education, Campus Wifi, Online Affiliation System, Teachers Biometric Attendance, Setting up of well-equipped studios in each University, Question Banks (10 years old) are taken up.
What is the status on ICT initiatives? Give details about its timelines.
We have tested ICT initiatives on a pilot basis with the support of National Informatics Centre (NIC) and adopted most of the initiatives in a holistic manner. All the initiatives are interconnected. Software is freely available to all institutions. The Department has set March 15, 2016 as deadline for achieving 50 per cent implementation of ICT initiatives and June 1, 2016 for completing 100 per cent implementation.
On November 6, 2015, the department launched ‘Jnana Sangama’ (convergence of knowledge), an ICTenabled programme in the presence of TB Jayachandra, Minister of Law, Parliamentary Affairs and Higher Education and Vice Chancellors of Universities. It is aimed at digitisation of higher education institutions in the State. This ICT initiative is the ‘Smart Karnataka Education Yardstick’ (Smart-KEY), designed for digitising most of the teaching materials in public and private domain throughout the State.
The Department has set March 15, 2016 as deadline for achieving 50 per cent implementation of ICT initiatives and June 1, 2016 for completing 100 per cent implementation
Through Jnana Sangama, the higher education system in Karnataka – 50 Universities, 2992 undergraduate and postgraduate colleges, 305 polytechnic colleges, and 207 engineering colleges – will get a major boost.
Highlight student-centric initiatives.
Major thrust will be given to make the processes of entire pre and post-exam and admission, online. The department will introduce online application and admission process for undergraduate and postgraduate courses. Digital attendance registration, interuniversity information highway and online affiliation process are on the anvil. While some of these are partially implemented this year, the department is looking at full-scale implementation from the next academic year. The department will make the entire admission process online, including the application process. The students do not have to go from college to college to buy application forms. They can apply once online and seats will be allotted based on merit, like Common Entrance Test (CET) admissions. The Department has tried this out in 2015 for polytechnic courses and in some government degree colleges. This will be implemented across all government-aided and unaided institutions for undergraduate and postgraduate courses.
Not every student can secure admission in top colleges. However, on this account alone, students should not miss out on quality education. This is the principle with which e-content sharing is being implemented. To begin with, 22 top colleges have been selected to record their lectures and share teaching aids with other institutions. The content shared by colleges is available on a central server that can be accessed by other colleges and students. The department has signed MoUs with private universities for sharing e-content, including video classes. Today, we have 2 TB size of videos of e-content.
Do you have any suggestions to Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD)?
There is a need for synergy of data exchange of different portals such as AISHE, UGC, AICTE, NAAC, NBA, DISE, MCA, etc. ICT initiatives in higher education need to be encouraged. Scalable and robust ERPtype ICT solutions could be developed and made available to all states by MHRD, based on Karnataka model. Quarterly national level workshops in different regions be held for sharing best practices and case studies be undertaken and sponsored. Financial support be extended for reforms-linked activities and annual awards and incentives to innovative initiatives in states should be taken up.
Two universities of UAE have made it onto a list of the top 20 most international universities. In a new ranking by Times Higher Education, the federal UAE University in Al Ain and private American University of Sharjah achieved 15th and 12th places, respectively.
