New online education venture launched

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January 14, 2015

First generation entrepreneur Ronnie Screwvala is launching U Education, an online company focused on higher education. The new venture involves an outlay of Rs 100 crore in the first phase mainly into content, interactivity, platform, technology, assessments, adaptive learning, marketing and building a national footprint.

“India has the largest college going age cohort in the world, yet only one out five of them enroll into higher education, resulting in one of the lowest higher education enrollment ratios, even among most developing nations. If we have to meet our GDP growth targets, we need to at least double the participation rate immediately, otherwise we will miss out on our demographic dividend,” Screwvala said in a statement.

The Indian education sector is a little over $ 70 billion, with higher Education – undergrad / post grad and doctorate accounting for nearly $ 11 billion. The bulk – $ 40 billion comes from pre – school and K-12, $ 4 billion from vocational education and the rest from the ancillary and support services (tutoring, uniforms, books and others).

The sector, the statement says, needs over $ 200 billion in investment between 2015 – 2020 to bridge some of the gap and get to a strong level of quality. Mayank Kumar comes on board as Co-Founder and Managing Director of U Education with a decade of experience in the education sector across India, China, Latin America, S E Asia, Middle East and Africa. “Our goal will be to foster the next level of degree education / learning and train the next generation Indian workforce to take on the industries of the future,” says Mayank.

‘90% Indian MBAs unemployable’

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January 14, 2015

India produces about three lakh management graduates every year, but hardly 35,000 of them are employable, said the experts.

According to All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), 3,54,421 students enrolled for MBA in 3,364 institutions across the country last year. Speaking at the southern regional round table conclave of business school directors and deans, J Philip, former director of IIM-Bengaluru, said, “Today, the requirement of managerial candidates in the Indian market is between 35,000 and 40,000 every year. There are two reasons for unemployment: Lack of global skills and excess supply.”

Philip said India is probably the only country that could help supply managers to European countries and Japan. “Most countries in Europe are facing a crunch,” said Philip, now the director of Xavier Institute of Management and Entrepreneurship, Bangalore. An expert, who did not wish to be named, said, “Around year 2000, there were about 10 world class business schools in India. Now we have 25, but we have a long way to go. We need an industry-oriented syllabus and interaction with industry to improve employability.”

Parag Kalkar, director of Singhad Institute of Business Administration and Computer Application, Pune, said in the past 10 years the number of management institutes in the country had doubled. “While the previous central governments aimed at reaching the global enrolment ratio for higher education (27%), AICTE randomly allowed institutes of engineering,” Kalkar said.

According to AICTE, the number of management institutions has risen from 2,614 in 2006-07 to 3,364 in 2013-14. While the numbers continuously rose till 2011-12, at least 71 institutes shut shop in 2012-13 and 107 in 2013-14.

Kalkar said, “While quantity has improved, the government and AICTE have been compromising on quality. Institutes have been given approval without examining or inspecting documents, infrastructure, faculty and other basic requirements.”

Lack of industrial exposure of faculty and students is another issue. “Many institutes do not have faculty with industrial experience. Some wish to join a management institute immediately after completing their postgraduate study,” said R Nandagopal, director, PSG Institute of Management. The same applies to students, too. “Many engineering graduates do not want to waste time. Hence they apply for MBA immediately after graduation,” said Nandagopal. “While in the US and Europe, institutes consider work experience as a criterion for admission to MBA. It is a mid-career education for them,” he said.

Tamil Nadu growth bucks ASER trend

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January 14, 2015

Every year, for 10 years now, ASER has been telling a dismal story, one that begins with how most Indian children go to school and ends with how little they learn. This year, there is one happy twist to that narrative: Tamil Nadu. While both reading levels and elementary mathematics continue to be a problem for children in the 6-14 age group across states, Tamil Nadu has bucked the trend.

Though Tamil Nadu’s figures are still below the national average — only 46.9% Class V students can read a Class II textbook against the all-India figure of 48.1% — what is heartening is the strides the state has made since last year and the steady progress over the last few years. While there are other states that show gains (Himachal Pradesh, Haryana, Bihar, Orissa and Karnataka) in reading levels over last year, Tamil Nadu has shown the highest jump, of 15 percentage points from 32 to 47.

And though maths levels have declined in almost every state over the last 5 to 8 years — in 2014, only 25.3% of Class III children could do two-digit subtraction, down from 26.3% in 2012 — Tamil Nadu has improved significantly in this subject. The proportion of Class V children who can divide a three-digit number by a one-digit number, for instance, has gone up from 14 per cent in 2013 to 25.8. Manipur too has done well in this aspect, rising from 42 to 54.7 per cent. Tamil Nadu’s remarkable rise comes after its count had fallen from 15 per cent in 2010, the year the RTE Act came into effect.

G Gautama, director-secretary of The Chennai Education Centre (Pathashaala & Outreach) of the Krishnamurti Foundation, says Tamil Nadu has for some years now pushed for “multi-age” classes, where children are grouped not by their age or grade but their learning levels, “active learning methodologies”, which encouraged group learning and peer interaction, and “activity-based learning”. “I am delighted to hear that the steadfast work done in Tamil Nadu’s government schools is yielding measurable results. The transformation of the classrooms from same-age environments to multi-age proactive spaces has been most rewarding to watch,” he says.

By 2007, 37,000 primary schools in the state, and by 2008, 16,500 government schools had adopted activity-based learning under Sarva Siksha Abhiyan and in partnership with School of the Krishnamurti Foundation.

Canada’s Seneca college explores partnerships in India

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January 14, 2015

With more than 290 programmes and 500 career options, one of Canada’s largest colleges provides boundless opportunities for students in India. Currently, more than 1,000 Indian students from 20 states add to the diversity of Seneca College, which has students from 130 countries. A truly global institution of higher learning offering cutting-edge programmes and opportunities for students, the college seeks to expand its international reach through strategic partnerships in India. Seneca College President David Agnew has been in India for a week to explore and develop partnerships with institutions sharing similar aspirations.

While in Delhi, Agnew met with several stakeholders, including Entrepreneurship and Management Processes International (EMPI) with which Seneca College has signed a Memorandum of Understanding.

Agnew noted that, “The MoU with Entrepreneurship and Management Processes International in Delhi focuses on a joint post-graduate programme in Social Media and Business aimed at providing mobility for qualified MBA/PGD students to specialize in Seneca’s Social Media post-graduate programme in their second year.”

After completion of Seneca College’s Social Media programme, career opportunities for students could be as diverse as they are exciting and rewarding. Students will gain skills that will be valuable across industries, market sectors and around the world.

The partnership with EMPI may expand in future to include other disciplines of interest to both parties and create a joint centre of learning that could focus on finding solutions for local businesses in India and Canada.

The MoU with EMPI builds on existing partnerships that Seneca has in India, including with the Mangalam Group of Educational Institutions in Kerala, Pandit Deendayal Petroleum University in Gujarat, and the College of Engineering Pune (CoEP).

The College has a letter of cooperation with the Govt. of Gujarat to internationalize the Higher Education in Gujarat through inter-alia, student exchange, faculty exchange, joint research projects and curriculum development. As well, Seneca and the IIT Alumni Canada entered into a letter of intent to collaborate on entrepreneurship development activities.

David Agnew said, “We are expanding applied research activities, broadening international and corporate partnerships, investing in capital improvements and increasing experiential, cross-disciplinary and flexible learning opportunities.”

After his visit in Delhi, Agnew went to Pune to expand the relationship Seneca College has with CoEP. Seneca and CoEP have an existing Letter of Intent that allows for the exchange of faculty, students, joint collaboration for projects, virtual labs, open source software and hardware.

Indian students who attend Seneca College predominantly come from Gujarat, Punjab and New Delhi. In 2013, students from India comprised 54.6 per cent of all international students in Seneca College’s Faculty of Applied Science, Engineering and Technology programmes.

Primary education in India a secondary responsibility: Report

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January 14, 2015

India would appear to have partially arrested the downward spiral in the quality of learning of school children in rural areas but there is little to cheer about the country’s performance, according to the Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) published on January 13. The enrolment level is near universal with 96.7% of children registered in schools during 2014, the same as 2013, according to ASER 2014, published by education non-profit organization Pratham Education Foundation.

The proportion of all children in Class 5 who can read a Class 2 text has improved by 1 percentage point from 2013—48.1% children of Class 5 could read a class 2 text in 2014 against 47% in the previous year. This means every second Class 5 student in rural India can’t read the text of a class three levels below.

In 2005, when the first ASER report was published, three out of five children in Class 5 were able to read a Class 2 text. This is the 10th ASER report. This year, the foundation surveyed 577 rural districts across India for the report. “Stagnation has happened but at a low level. That is the reality,” said Madhav Chavan, chief executive and president of Pratham. He said things have not changed much despite government levying a tax to fund education and enacting a law to ensure access to education for all children in the 6-14 age group. And arithmetic, the last of the three Rs, still remains a challenge. For example, only 44.1% of Class 8 students in rural India managed to do a division in 2014, as against 46% in 2013. “The all India (rural) figures for basic arithmetic have remained virtually unchanged over the last few years. In 2012, 26.3% of Class 3 children could do a two-digit subtraction. This number is at 25.3% in 2014. For Class 5 children, the ability to do division has increased slightly from 24.8% in 2012 to 26.1% in 2014,” said the report. The situation in the ability of school children to comprehend English too seems to be stagnating. “Children’s ability to read English is relatively unchanged in primary school. In 2014, about 25% of children enrolled in Class 5 could read simple English sentences. This number is virtually unchanged since 2009,” the report said.
The situation is worse in middle school. In 2009, 60.2% of children in Class 8 could read simple sentences in English but in 2014, this figure was 46.8%, the survey said. Experts said the numbers indicate that India’s school education is in deep crisis and needs urgent attention. If India wants to reap the so-called demographic dividend, then the school is where it must focus, experts said. “How will you reap the demographic dividend when your school children are not learning the basics?” asked Yamini Aiyar, director of Accountability Initiative, part of think-tank Centre for Policy Research. Administrators have talked about IITs, IIMs and skill development but less about what is happening inside classrooms in schools, she added. “In the pursuit of excellence, we cannot leave the basics behind.” She said the ASER report should influence the centre and states to set specific goals and work towards it. Chavan said the report is, in a way, a summary of what “we have observed over the tenures of UPA I and II. It is also a baseline for the new government and what it has to deal with.” Rukmini Banerjee, director of ASER centre, said that she would like to see the report as a “glass half full than half-empty”. “Stagnation has happened and we hope the upward mobility will start soon,” she added. Banerjee pointed out that some states had done better. In 2014, a higher proportion of Class 5 students in Himachal Pradesh, Tamil Nadu Haryana, Bihar, Odisha and Karnataka could read a Class 2 level text than in 2013. The survey also said that the Right to Education Act and the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan have resulted in an improvement in infrastructure in government schools, if not the learning outcome. It also said that more students are now enrolled in private schools than even before. In 2014, 30.8% of all children between the ages of 6 and 14 were enrolled in private schools. This number was 29% in 2013 and 16.3% in 2005 when the first ASER report was published.

RIET signs MoU with TSSC

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January 14, 2015

Rajasthan Institute of Engineering & Technology (RIET) Jaipur has become the first technical institute to provide soft skill training in association with Telecom Sector Skill Council (TSSC). RIET has signed an exclusive MoU with TSSC, a society registered under the Societies Registrations Act, based in New Delhi.

These technical courses will create ample job opportunities for all potential aspirants from Rajasthan and other parts of the country. The courses will provide theoretical as well as practical knowledge about every aspect of the telecom industry and make them eligible through their certification, to face all challenges in future.

Kr. Bhim Singh, Chairman, RIET, Jaipur said, “We are proud to sign this historic MoU with TSSC to provide skilled professionals in the telecom industry of the country. The Indian telecom sector is one of the fastest growing sectors in the world and is projected to become the second largest telecom market globally. With newer technologies such as 3G and WIMAX entering the market, the sector has opened up enormous opportunities to all potential candidates, who can complete a technical course and for getting a respectable employment in future. I wish everyone best of luck and congratulations for their future endeavours.”

TSSC will also provide the necessary support through guest lectures and arranging mid-term and extended internship projects for the students to gain experience on real-time data, projects and research papers at TSSC.

Lt Gen (Dr) S P Kochhar, CEO, Telecom Sector Skill Council (TSSC) said, “This MoU marks an important step for RIET and the aspirants of Rajasthan as these programmes aspire to bring together academia and industry in the larger interest of telecom and IT sectors and is also an example of private-public partnership. Though the telecom sector is on the path of exponential growth, there is an acute shortage of skilled professionals equipped with both managerial acumen and technical know-how. Further the collaboration with RIET will also provide the aspirants to access the state-of-the-art research capabilities offered by the RIET members”

There is a huge demand for qualified and skilled professionals with knowledge and technical know-how in these fields. The telecom revolution in India has been quite exceptional, with so many new players entering the market and existent players expanding operations. While the sector has been one of the largest employers in the last decade, it would still need around 2,75,000 people by 2015. The challenge here would be to get the right talent

TSSC has a long history of developing similar programs with universities and colleges across India to create talent in-tune with the needs of a constantly evolving market. Prime Minister Narendra Modi promises to transform India into a connected knowledge economy offering world class services at the click of a mouse. This will be implemented in the phased manner by 2019, including ongoing enabling projects run both by telecom and electronics departments. So, there will be a huge demand for the skilled professionals for jobs both RIET and TSSC will mutually find out the skills in order to match industry requirements to provide greater level of on-the ground training experience.

Both RIET and TSSC will jointly identify the job role that is necessary for training and placement for the students. They also agreed to set up Center of Excellence in order to identify job roles, validate occupational standards, training and assessment framework and pilots conducted both by RIET and TSSC.

RIET will also use TSSC MOOCs platform for delivery of courses offered in TSSC’s LMS. On the other hand, RIET will also provide infrastructure which will be used by either TSSC trainers from the college affiliated training provider to conduct TSSC approved courses. This facility is not only open to the students of RIET but also to the neighboring residents of RIET.

Panel set up to improve quality of education

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January 9, 2015

With the aim to bring about quality improvement in the tertiary education, the Himachal Pradesh Private Educational Institutions Regulatory Commissions has set up an eight member advisory committee comprising prominent academicians which will be headed by Sarojini Ganju Thakur, the commission’s chairperson. The other members include Dr Furquan Qamar, former vice chancellor of the Central University at Kangra, who is also secretary general of the Association of Indian Universities; Prof Chetan Singh, director of the Indian Institute of Advanced Study, Simla; RL Sharma, vice chancellor of the HP Technical University at Hamirpur; Rajnish Srivastva, director of the National Institute of Technology, Hamirpur; and PK Ahluwalia, dean of planning at Himachal Pradesh University at Shimla. The panel will also include a nominee of the secretary of the Human Resources Development ministry and additional chief secretary of the Himachal Government’s higher education department. The committee, constituted under rule 11 of the HP Private Education Institutional (Regulatory Commission) Rules, 2011, has been tasked with suggesting measures to improve the quality of the tertiary education and creating a good benchmark for private higher education in the state. There are 252 private education institutions across the state including 17 private universities. Besides, there are 20 polytechnic colleges, 83 education colleges and 25 pharmacy, nursing and dental colleges.

In 2010, the BJP-led state government had set up a commission to regulate private education institutions. Its mandate was to work as an interface between private, state and central regulatory bodies to ensure appropriate standards of admission, teaching examination, research and protection of interest of students in private educational institutions.

Private education institutions have been routinely receiving complaints about the private universities not keeping up the education standards. Initially there were lots of the complaints related to introduction of the various courses that were started without approval of the government. The state government had given approval to the private education institutions to make the state as education hub of north India. The private education institutions ran into controversies during the BJP regime.

Nadda vows autonomy for higher education

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January 8, 2015

Union health and family welfare minister J.P. Nadda stressed that the country’s institutions of higher education would get full autonomy and there would be no political interference in the education sector.

He was speaking at the inauguration of the south zone vice-chancellors’ conference at VIT University last week. “Academicians can work freely under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s leadership,” he said, adding that the government will also cooperate with states in fostering education, irrespective of the party in power.

Speaking about global university rankings, the Union minister said that the Centre would come up with an India-specific ranking system.

Former Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, director P Balaram raised the issue of the appointment of politicians on the search committee for the selection of vice-chancellors. “The vice-chancellors are controlled by syndicate members, whose appointments are political sometimes. There is no autonomy for higher education institutions,” he said.

India’s higher education needs re-evaluation

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January 8, 2015

Former Press Council of India Chairman Justice (Retd) Markandey Katju bemoaned about the abysmally low quality of research work carried out by most Indian universities and about rampant “plagiarism”, which, he said, is raising disturbing questions regarding the present status of higher education in the country.

Delivering the keynote address at the inaugural session of the North Zone Vice Chancellors’ conclave in Aligarh, Katju said a huge amount of money was being spent on higher education, but this investment was making no contribution in raising the standard of living of Indian masses. “The time has arrived to re-evaluate the functioning of our institutions of higher education so that they can benefit all sections of Indian people,” he said.

“Most of the money spent in India is going to institutions of higher education like IITs and as a result there is hardly any money available for primary and basic education, particularly in rural areas. The level of facilities in primary schools is reflected in the pathetic level of classrooms, and working conditions of teachers,” he said. Katju felt that the theme of the conclave – ‘Research for the betterment of the human society’ – was very pertinent as most of the present research in Indian universities was being conducted on subjects which have “no relevance whatsoever to the myriad social, economic, scientific and technological issues faced by the country”.

AMU Vice Chancellor, Lt Gen (retd) Zameer Uddin Shah urged Indian universities to take up the challenge of research work in important fields of “water conservation technology, waste water treatment and solar farming”. He said that the AMU had recently written to the Prime Minister offering its expertise in the vital field of “conservation and preservation of Indian rivers, especially the rivers Ganga and Yamuna”.

Addressing the conclave, Lt Gen SS Mehta, former Director General, Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), said that six major threats to India’s security were “water scarcity, energy related problems, health, education and rising levels of unemployment”. Vice chancellors from more than 40 universities of north India are participating in the two-day conclave.

Free JEE test, a click away

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January 8, 2015

EntrancePrime has announced a breakthrough free preparation and assessment tool for JEE 2015 Aspirants -JEE Calibrate. All JEE aspirants who are appearing for JEE Main 2015 Online or Offline can participate in JEE Calibrate, totally free of cost. JEE Calibrate is a simulation of JEE Main which is aimed at providing a feel of the exam before the exam. JEE Calibrate is a close simulation of JEE Main exam where students will get an All India Rank, detailed analysis report and expert suggestions and improvement tips. This will help the aspirants get a near to JEE experience right before the exam and the detailed result analysis will highlight the weak spots well within time so that corrective actions can be taken to improve rank. JEE Calibrate test will be available for a 72 hours window from 11 AM of 15th January to 11 AM of 18th January 2015 and result would be declared on 19th January. Students can register online at: www.EntrancePrime.com/JEECalibrate (Between December 19 Midnight & January 14 Midnight)

Apart from attempting JEE Exam like test, students also get detailed result analysis, suggestions and tips to improve their time management, accuracy and question selection strategy to help them achieve their maximum score. Also based on the Test’s performance, JEE aspirants will stand a chance to win exclusive rewards and prizes from EntrancePrime.

Ashutosh Modi, Executive Director, EntrancePrime said –“JEE Calibrate is our attempt to break the technology hurdle and bring precision to JEE preparation to each and every aspirant of the nation.” JEE Calibrate is first of its kind test to be conducted online & is available on any internet enabled device & Android App of EntrancePrime. JEE aspirants can register for free on www.EntrancePrime.com/JEECalibrateFees. Through JEE Calibrate, EntrancePrime is planning to help around 1 lakh aspirants pan India to master the art of test taking and improve their ranks in JEE 2015.

EntrancePrime is India’s leading website for test series preparations. EntrancePrime is a part of diversified Education Company ‘JIVEM Education’ headquartered at Jhunjhunu near Delhi. JIVEM Education focuses on various segments of education such as Playschool, K-12, Test Prep, Sports coaching and e-learning. The company entered into the e-learning space in 2013 with its online test practice portal EntrancePrime.com for various entrance exams i.e. JEE, AIPMT, BITSAT, CA-CPT and NTSE. EntrancePrime has over 70,000 registered students and is receiving an average of 500 new registrations every day. It also provides detailed multi-angle result analysis of each test, based on multiple dimensions such as speed, accuracy, consistency, topic-level preparedness and concept-level understanding.

TSSC will also provide the necessary support through guest lectures and arranging mid-term and extended internship projects for the students to gain experience on real-time data, projects and research papers at TSSC.

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