The Indian Naval Academy (INA), Ezhimala has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Indian Institute of Technology Madras (IIT Madras) with the aim of collaborating together for academics and research in the areas of mutual interest, exchange of academic information, scholarly information, materials and publications.

The MoU signed earlier this week in Chennai will also facilitate the cadets and students of both the institutions to participate in project competitions, faculty exchange programmes, sponsorship of cooperative seminars, workshops, etc and facilitate faculty development programmes.

Professor Bhaskar Ramamurthy, director of IIT Madras, said that the IIT Madras engages in interactions with society, organizations and industry through a variety of outreach programmes.

Vice admiral Ajit Kumar P, commandant, INA while thanking the director, said the Indian Naval Academy, which is already the largest Naval Academy in Asia, and aims to become the best Academy of its kind in the region, would benefit immensely from the IIT Madras which has a rich experience and legacy of more than five decades.

The INA had earlier signed a MoU with the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore and also Govt Engineering College Kannur (GECK) at Mangattuparamba, to collaborate together at the academic level.

The University Grants Commission has selected four Jesuit colleges — Loyola – Chennai, St Joseph’s-Bangalore, St Xavier’s-Kolkata and St Xavier’s-Mumbai — for the college of excellence award. The award comes with a grant of Rs two crore to be spent over five years for specific purposes.

The University Grants Commission began conferring on colleges the Potential for Excellence award about a decade ago. Two hundred of the 30,000 colleges in India were selected for this award, which included generous funding for infrastructure and educational upgradation.

St Xavier’s College – Mumbai was granted this award in 2006 and has received about Rs 2.5 crore in funding over 8 years. Some months ago, the UGC announced a sequel, “The College of Excellence (CE)” award.

Students have given a mixed response to the changes proposed by the Delhi University admission. While some say that students should have the right to apply to as many colleges/ courses they prefer, others say they welcome the changes.

Those who are questioning the cap on the number of colleges are also asking the university to reverse its earlier decision and allow students to opt for as many courses in as many colleges. In 2013-14 academic session, students were asked to opt for only courses and not colleges in the OMR sheets.

Students are questioning the proposed cap on the number of colleges and the courses one can apply to. Cut-offs, they claim, are unpredictable and it is difficult to make accurate choices. Cutoffs, based on aggregate of best of three, has however been welcomed by many while suggesting that language should not be in the best of three subjects for commerce and science stream. Students also agreed that this will further increase the cut-offs significantly.

IIT Kharagpur is now offering students of other colleges a chance to study at the elite institute under the tutelage of an international faculty.

The International Summer and Winter Term (ISWT) will run each year during May-July and December, IIT Kharagpur officials said.

By bringing together participants and faculty from India and abroad, the programme will not only be academically stimulating, but also offer an opportunity to make new friends and interact with about 30 international experts, they said.

These subjects are designed around current and multi-disciplinary themes of science, engineering, management and law, the officials said, adding, the duration of each course is of two weeks or ten working days with a judicious blend of lectures and tutorials per day.

They said participants can be even from the industry and research organizations.

Students registered for these courses will have the opportunity to obtain additional academic credits based on evaluation and grading process, they added.

To develop technical skills of students, CREDAI is seeking to sign a memorandum of understanding with institutions like Anna University, SRM and VIT universities for third and fourth year students.

Just 20 percent of the 2.5 lakh engineering graduates passing out of colleges in Tamil Nadu every year are employable, said Sandeep Mehta, president, Confederation of Real Estate Developers’ Association of India (CREDAI).

He said that the subject knowledge during four years alone is not sufficient, but other skills are also required to make them efficient employers.

He added that nearly 60 fourth year students would be trained as site supervisors by the member developers of CREDAI to improve their skills. We have also recommended Anna University to make onsite training part of the curriculum for the third year students. They would also be trained as site supervisors and site engineers during their fourth year.