21st Century Schools

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December 14, 2013

Being father of two it was a big challenge for me to pick up the school where I can send my children. It is not an easy task to select a school for one’s children these days. There are lot of issues that you need to keep in mind while selecting a school. Is the school good in academics? Does it have a comprehensive system and infrastructure for inculcating interest in extra-curricular activities? Will it take care of the overall development of the child? You also need to take account of whether the school is adopting new techniques of education or is believes in following the traditional systems?
The point I am trying to make is that today most Indian parents have to go through lot of stress in finding a school for their children. One major issue is that the good schools have a very limited number of seats, so even if a parent is able to find a school that is most suitable, it is not necessary that he will be able to get his children placed there.
School education in India has been drastically transformed during the last few decades. Today parents expect the schools to take care of not only the academic performance of their children, but also their overall development. With the entry of new private schools providing plethora of services to students and multiple curriculums, choosing right school has become really complex and brain storming tasks.
This is one issue of digitalLEARNING that I think most parents would appreciate. This issue is all about rating the schools on basis of the most important factors. As you turn the pages, you will find the ranking of some of the key schools located in the country. Mainly we have tried to select and rate the top schools located in six zones – North India, Central India, West India, South India, East India and North-East India.
India is witnessing a big leap in school education sector, which is fuelling the demand for strong leadership abilities among school leaders to take this growth forward. Taking this aim forward, we are organising school leadership summit 2014 on 31st January 2014 at New Delhi. We will be delighted to felicitate schools featured in this issue at the event for their excellence in performance in school education.
We look forward to see you at the event!

Rishikesha Krishnan to be the new director of IIM-I

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digitalLEARNING Network

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December 13, 2013

Rishikesha T Krishnan is all set to take up the post of director of Indian Institute of Management, Indore (IIM-I). A man full of innovation, an IIT-Kanpur and Stanford University post graduate will take up the lead to achieve the future goal of the institute.
Krishnan is currently posted at IIM-Bangalore as professor of corporate strategy and policy. He has accepted the offer to join as director of IIM-I but the institute is yet to receive the official confirmation from the ministry of human resource and development. The tenure of the existing director N. Ravichadran has expired but he got an extension of three months due to controversy over the director search panel. The five-member director search panel had held an interaction session with the short listed candidates in New Delhi in October after which the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) has given clearance to Krishnan name for the new director of IIM-I.
Krishnan has co-authored the book titled ‘8 Steps to Innovation: Going from Jugaad to Excellence’ earlier this year. Prior to that he wrote a book ‘From Jugaad to Systematic Innovation: The Challenge for India’ which was published in 2010. Prof Krishnan has also worked in the corporate sector.

IIM-A, IIM-C ranked 18th and 19th in FT Masters in Management Ranking

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digitalLEARNING Network

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December 13, 2013

The post graduate programme of IIM-Ahmedabad and IIM-Calcutta are ranked in the world’s top 20 management programme in the 2013 FT masters in management (MiM) survey. The IIM-A comes in at the 18th position followed by IIM-C at 19th position. The 2013 FT masters in management (MiM) ranking features the top 70 programmes for students with little or no previous work experience. The University of St Gallen, Switzerland is at top for the third consecutive year, followed by ESCP Europe and WHU Beisheim, Germany. IIM-A and IIM-C are the only institutes from India to feature in this ranking. Both have been ranked higher than such world-renowned institutions as the London School of Economics, Manchester Business School among others. Earlier in the FT Global MBA ranking 2013, IIM- Ahmedabad was ranked at 26th position while ISB-Hyderabad stood at 34th.

MSU to grant recognition to open and distance learning programmes

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digitalLEARNING Network

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December 12, 2013

Maharaja Savakorap University (MSU) has decided to grant recognition to open and distance learning education programmes for admission to all courses, including the undergraduate, postgraduate as well as PhD programmes. The move came after a notification from University Grants Commission (UGC).
The decision has come as a respite for the students who had passed out from open universities but were not considered eligible for admission at MSU. This will help in increasing mobility between open and traditional universities and increase intake at various faculties and colleges. In order to improve the gross enrollment ratio of the country and increase employability of the youths, the Government of India has visualized a greater role for open and distance learning institutions and entrusted the responsibility to UGC for regulating them. It will also open doors for credit transfer between the two streams in future and promote choice-based credit system (CBCS).

Two BITS Pilani students offered highest pay package till date

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digitalLEARNING Network

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December 12, 2013

Google, the network and services giant, hired two BITS Pilani students for a whopping annual package of Rs. 1.44 crore, the highest Google has ever offered in the country. The package has also become the highest offer made to any Indian student in 2013.
The two students are Thoppilan Romal Devassy and Kannan Sunder, both natives of Mumbai and seventh semester students of the computer science branch in BITS, Pilani. More than 100 students participated in the interview and appeared for seven technical rounds and one written examination which were conducted in the campus. The other five rounds of technical interview related to subject knowledge were conducted in Bangalore. Networking giant Facebook also visited BITS for the third consecutive year and shortlisted three students.
It seems to raining placements in other technical and management institutes as well. Engineering colleges affiliated to RTU are also receiving a good response from the market post recession. IT giants like Infosys, Wipro and Forbes 500 in financial, real estate and consultancy are visiting campuses and hiring students in bulk.

IIIT-Allahabad signs MoU with 6 foreign universities

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digitalLEARNING Network

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December 12, 2013

The Indian Institute of Information Technology, Allahabad (IIIT-A) has added another jewel to its crown by entering into an agreement with six foreign universities from Canada, Switzerland, Italy, Denmark and US to participate in the science conclave from next year.

The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed by IIIT-A director Dr MD Tiwari with representatives from six premiere universities of the world including Indiana University of Pennsylavania, USA, Centre for Tele-Infrastruktur, Aalborg University, Denmark, University of Rome for Vergata, Rome, Italy, State University of New York, Buffalo, New York, Biomedical Technology and Cell Therapy Research Technology, McGill University, Montreal, Canada and Ecde Polytechnique Federal De LauSanne, The Swiss Federal Institute Of Technology, Lausanne, Switzerland.

The universities have also agreed to nominate 5-10 students at graduate, under-graduate and research level to participate in the conclave. The MoU will be effective from January 2014 for the next five years, or until its termination by one or two parties. The next science conclave is scheduled from December 8-14, 2014.

CFA institute to open India Centre

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digitalLEARNING Network

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December 12, 2013

US-based Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) Institute plans to open an India centre in Mumbai by the second quarter of the next year. With almost 25,000 candidates every year from India, it is the third biggest market for the institute with US being at the top followed by China. The institute operates in India through its member societies such as the Indian Association of Investment Professionals.

The India centre aims to make the Institute a better known name in the country as a professional designation for investment managers and security analysts. This involves working closely towards industry, employers, universities and regulators to build the brand of CFA within the financial services world. The Mumbai office is expected to be a fully functional office where the CFA Institute will have people engaged with regulators, industry and educational activities. Institute works with partner institutes in each country to extend its professional qualifications. In India, too, the institute is looking to partner with local institutions.

The institute would also focus on its ‘Future of Finance’ project. Initiatives under the project are divided into six areas- financial knowledge, putting investors first, regulation and enforcement, retirement security, safeguarding the system, transparency and fairness.

IIT professors to take virtual classes in 100 colleges

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digitalLEARNING Network

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December 12, 2013

Students of 100 engineering colleges will now be virtually taught by IIT professors. From January, as many as nine subjects, from mechanical engineering to Mathematics will be taught to these students by one of the best faculties in the country. In a variation of the Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), lectures by senior IIT faculty will be combined with inputs from regular college staff to improve educational outcomes. The initiative is taken as part of the Quality Enhancement in Engineering Education programme guided by the Ministry of Human Resource Development. E-tutorials and e-labs are also part of the first phase of the programme. The ministry reportedly hopes to extend this experiment to other disciplines.
India has previously experimented with online classes but their impact has been marginal probably due to their lack of interactivity. When the teacher-student ratio in most classrooms is 1:40, there is dearth of properly trained faculty; the availability of online content can usher in the much required experimentation in the higher education model.

Amity to provide vocational training in collaboration with international counterparts

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digitalLEARNING Network

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December 12, 2013

Amity University sealed a deal with Australia based training providers Heraud Education and TAFE to provide vocational education in India.
Technical And Further Education South Australia (TAFE SA) will work with the two institutes and develop its first series of course on automotive training which will start next February in Amity’s Manesar Campus. TAFE SA will also develop courses on retail, building and construction, banking, accounting and healthcare. The initial course implementation and delivery, quality assurance and audits for delivery of the courses will be managed by Heraud.
Vocational courses offered will focus on providing value-based employment oriented future ready skills. Amity has also decided to open two new institutes, Amity Vocational Training Institute and Amity Skills Institute.