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Restructuring Higher Education – Need of the Hour
Dr. P.
Chandramohan
Vice
Chancellor, Kannur University
The Father of our Nation Mahatma Gandhi once suggested that
framing of any policy should be on the basis of how the new
policy is going to improve the living conditions of the poorest
of the poor in India. In fact the knowledge revolution has
created a favourable environment for countries like India to
achieve economic growth at a rapid pace. Production,
distribution and consumption of all the three sectors namely
primary, secondary and tertiary are being determined by the
availability of knowledgeable human resources. Kerala with a
comparatively higher volume of knowledgeable human resources had
already become a model in this respect. At the national level
also considerable wealth has been generated utilizing the
favourable environment created by the knowledge revolution. But
the benefits of the knowledge revolution could not be
distributed in an equitable pattern. It is alleged that the
rich poor divide has been deepened. Facilities for acquisition
of knowledge, creation of new knowledge and dissemination of
knowledge are to be extended to the poor and marginalized masses
in a big way in the rapidly changing scenario of the 21st
century. The fate of an individual and the society is going to
be determined by the volume and quality of knowledge that each
individual possesses. So much so the new policy should
obviously aim at universalisation of education at all levels
especially at the level of higher education. Such a policy
would be quite justifiable in the wake of the new understanding
that the volume of genetic potential in every human being is
almost the same though the nature varies from individual to
individual and that any human being can be brought to the level
of excellence if he is given the appropriate environment in the
field of his interest and genetic potential. This conclusion is
on the basis of the study “ Human genome project” conducted in
the field of Biotechnology from 1996 –2002. In a pluralistic
society like ours universalisation can be brought about only by
providing access to quality higher education with maximum
inclusiveness bringing the marginalized and weaker sections of
the society to the classrooms.
Brought up
The main features of the new higher education policy should
be
·
To create knowledgeable and employable human resources to
the maximum extent possible
·
To create human resources with innovative and creative
thinking leading to quality research out put
·
To create human resources with a proper and realistic
sensitivity towards social justice
·
To create human resources with entrepreneurship
To achieve this objective an all-out effort is required in the
following areas.
Expansion
-
India and Kerala had achieved phenomenal growth during the
last 60 years of post independent period in providing access to
higher education. At the time of independence India had only 20
universities, 500 colleges and 0.1 million students. Today
India has 378 universities, 18000 colleges and 11.2 million
students and we are the 3rd largest higher education
system in the world. But when we take Gross Enrolment Ratio
(GER) at the national level we see that in spite of the
remarkable expansion that we made over the last 60 years only
10% of our population between the ages of 18 and 24 get access
to higher education. UGC has set a target of increasing the
access by 5% from the existing level during the 11th
Five Year Plan.
Present
status of Kerala is more encouraging. Kerala has already
reached a GER level of 15 – 20 per cent. This does not mean
that we can sit idle till the rest of India reaches this level.
Kerala has been always a model to the rest of India in the field
of education and health and we had often kept international
standards in these areas. When we look at the developed
countries we see US has more than 60% GER, while the European
countries have an average of Enrolment Rate of more than 40%.
Even the average Enrolment Rate in Asia is 23%. In a knowledge
based economy the minimum GER required for achieving sustainable
development is 20%. Under these circumstances it is most
appropriate for Kerala to target at 30% GER towards the end of
11th Plan. To achieve this target is not an easy
thing and the following issues are to be sorted out.
·
Development of infrastructure:- Required area of land,
constructed area, equipment, furniture, library, teaching aids
etc. are essential for quality education. Specific norms are to
be spelt out for specific number of admissions to each course.
·
Qualified faculty:- Already there is a serious dearth of
faculty in the existing system. For a further expansion all
vacant posts are to be filled up and more posts as per UGC norms
are to be created.
·
Increased workload on the University:- Expansion can be
brought about either by expanding the existing colleges or by
starting new colleges or by expanding the distance education or
by combining the aforesaid missions. In any case the workload
on the part of the university will become too heavy and measures
are to be worked out to reduce the workload on the affiliating
universities to optimum levels.
Operational aspects:- As was already mentioned expansion can
be brought about by
·
Expanding the available facilities in the existing colleges
· Starting
of new colleges:- Only after giving autonomy to clusters of colleges
on the basis of infrastructure, instructional facilities, academic
performance and research output, new colleges can be sanctioned
to the districts where the GER is below the state average. This
will cover the remote and hilly areas and places inhabited by
marginalized and backward classes.
· Formation
of autonomous clusters of colleges:- New colleges can be started only after
delinking some of the oldest colleges with good performance in
the past as autonomous clusters which can be ultimately
converted into independent universities. The affiliating
universities are under tremendous pressure and finding it
extremely difficult to keep their academic standards within the
acceptable limits. They have been converted into examination
conducting bodies with no time spared to play an effective role
in up keeping and updating the academic standards comparable to
the rest of the world. In the history of higher education in
India, colleges were started first. And then to define and
regulate the academic requirements and to conduct examinations,
the three mother universities namely Calcutta, Bombay and Madras
universities were started in 1857. Now the number of
affiliating colleges have increased to large numbers and some of
the universities have more than 400 affiliating colleges. This
has resulted in the deterioration of the quality of our
higher education system to such an extent that the
affiliating colleges are often described as the academic slumps
of India. But it is a sad reality that 80% of students in our
higher education system are in these affiliated colleges. The
situation warrants urgent attention and remedial measures. One
of the effective measures proposed is the separation of clusters
of colleges with a meritorious standing in the past. Each
cluster can have a headquarters in one of the oldest and best
performing college in the cluster preferably a Govt. college and
the various authorities can be constituted in the most
democratic way without dilution of academic quality.
· Strengthening
Distance Education:- Distance Education is an effective and practical
approach to provide access to higher education. But the massive
admissions to distance education causes a serious threat to the
affiliating universities which are already over burdened. So
as a policy evaluation of the students admitted to various
courses under distance education should be delinked from the
examination wing that deals with the evaluation of the regular
stream. The services of Edusat can be utilized to conduct
contact classes and for interactive sessions. Higher Education
Council can take the initiative to establish a telecasting
studio and receiving ends can be arranged by the various
universities at the different parts of the state. IGNOU can be
approached for the creation of course content.
· Quality:-
Quality, access and equity should go together in a pluralistic
society like ours. Access without quality can only augment the
problem of unemployment and unrest among the educated youth.
Quality at the level of higher education is to be rated on the
basis of the following criteria
ü
Employability
ü
Innovative research output
ü
Social sensitivity and emotional maturity
The present status is far from satisfactory.
ü
Employability:-
The overall employability of the graduates coming out of our
arts and science colleges is only around 15%. AICT study shows
that the employability of engineering graduates is only around
30%. But if special training programmes are offered the
employability of engineering graduates can be brought up to
around 60%. The remaining 40% have no possibility of
employability because they are landed up in the wrong field
where they have no interest.
ü
Research output
:- Even though India as the 3rd largest higher
education system in the world our research output by way of
publication in referred journals is less than 3% while the
contribution of our neighbouring nation China is 15%.
ü
Sensitivity towards social justice:- India is a pluralistic society where a large mass of
youth belong to social groups that had been deprived of power
and education for centuries together. India as a country to
survive as an independent nation these masses are to be brought
to the main stream of the society by sharing the facilities for
education and power with them. So much so inclusion of these
masses should be an integral part of expansion. To create a
sensitivity among the privileged classes education itself is to
be tuned in such a way that all stakeholders of education are
sensitized to understand the need and importance of inclusion.
The present situation is far from satisfactory.
Steps to be taken to ensure quality with inclusiveness
1. Right student for each course:- We know that
every student can be brought to the level of excellence if
he/she is put to the right slot according to the genetic
potential or inborn talents. The talent inventory should
actually start from the preprimary level so that when the
student reaches the level of higher education, the student and
the parents will be clear in their mind as to which subject the
student should accommodate. At the level of higher education an
aptitude test must be made mandatory before admitting a student
to a particular course. After admission adequate flexibility
should be allowed to get himself exposed to three or four
different disciplines according to his interest (cafeteria
pattern). Through a continuous observation and assessment for
a period of at least one year the core subject for each student
can be jointly decided by the students, teachers and parents.
Choice based credit system with a little more flexibility can
solve the problem in an effective way.
2. Right teacher for each course:- Dearth of
quality faculty is the major factor confronting expansion and
quality. Hence it is imperative that all vacant positions are
filled up on a war footing strictly adhering to the UGC norms
before thinking of further expansion. At present teachers are
selected on adhoc basis on meager salary. They have neither
quality nor accountability. So expansion ensuring quality
should mean creation of sufficient number of faculty positions
as prescribed by UGC. We have an existing system that insists
exposure to techniques of pedagogy to the teachers at the level
of primary and secondary education. Unfortunately we do not
have such a facility at the level of higher education. To make
up for this lacunae UGC introduced Academic Staff Colleges to
conduct refresher courses. But these colleges have never been
effective in imparting the required training to the faculty in
the advancing frontiers of pedagogical techniques. These
refresher courses are often regarded as a tool for professional
exercise rather than academic upliftment. One of the
suggestions to be forwarded is to expose the teachers
immediately after their selection to the modern techniques of
pedagogy consisting of teacher assisted and satellite assisted
pedagogy and research methodology. Publication and presentation
of papers should become mandatory criteria for promotion to
higher teaching posts.
3. Updated syllabus:- Struggle for existence and
survival of the fittest has become the rule of the day as far as
employability is concerned. The only way out is to prepare the
students with the updated syllabus and make them fittest in the
struggle to secure a job and come out with innovative output.
Update the syllabus should become a continuous process. Subject
wise cells are to be constituted by Higher Education Council to
continuously monitor the changes and innovations in each subject
and made available to the concerned Board of Studies in each
university.
4. Student Centred pedagogy:- Choice based credit
system envisages a rapid change in the teaching learning
process. The role of the student from a passive listener in the
conventional system is to be converted into that of an active
participant. For this teaching and learning should be extended
to the venue of interactive session like seminar, workshop etc,
to the libraries, laboratories, to the industry and the work
field for direct real-time exposure and hands on training.
5. Computer assisted teaching and learning:- In
the conventional system teacher is considered as a provider of
readymade knowledge. In the present context teacher can provide
only obsolete readymade knowledge. Because the knowledge is
changing at a rapid pace and can be mastered only through a
phased manner where informations are collected from the various
sources and then converted into knowledge. Information is
flowing in large volume at a rapid pace so as to keep abreast
with the changing scenario. The teacher and the student should
swim together into the ocean of knowledge towards perfection.
To achieve this objective of reciprocative learning and to reach
the highest pinnacles of knowledge both the teacher and the
student must be well versed in using the technology like
computer assisted learning and satellite assisted learning.
6. Governance:- Quality assurance at the level
of decision making:- To ensure quality higher education the
first thing to be done is to ensure quality at the level of
decision making. Qualifications are to be prescribed for the
posts of statutory officers especially Vice-Chancellor who is
the chief administrator to lead the University to greater
heights. They should be academics par excellence with adequate
experience in academic administration. The tenure of statutory
officers must be made uniform throughout the country and
immediately after selection facility must be provided for a
specific period of advanced training in academic administration
just like what is done in the case of IAS officers. In this era
of knowledge explosion, to keep pace with the rest of the world
governance needs to be more dynamic and transparent using the
modern management techniques and by strengthening the
workforce. The ultimate aim should be to have paperless offices
where decisions are taken and executed at the fastest pace.
7. Financing of higher education:- Public
funding :- All over the world public funding is the main
source of funding in higher education. Even in USA 80% of
financing to higher education come through public funding.
Unfortunately in a developing country like India only 20% of the
financing to higher education is through public funding. This
situation has to change to satisfy our dreams about expansion,
quality and inclusion. Accepting the recommendations of the
Kothari Commission, Government of India declared a policy on
higher education in 1986. This policy document swears to
elevate the share of higher education to 6% of the GDP. But
even today (2007-08) the share of higher education is less than
4% and the share for higher education is only 0.4%. This needs
to be elevated to 6% for education in general of which 1-2%
should be earmarked for higher education.
Private participation:- Private sector has made phenomenal contributions in
the field of higher education in the past. But these
institutions were started as philanthropist ventures by
missionaries and social organizations as part of their social
commitment. But recently there is a trend on the part of the
private players to ignore the social realities in this country.
There is no doubt that the management should have resources to
run the institutions without diluting quality. But at the
same time quality cannot be compromised for mobilizing resources
beyond a certain limit. In this context some sort of social
control to ensure merit and social justice has become
inevitable. Two possible methods are suggested below:
One of the good suggestions made by Knowledge Commission is
needs blind admission where admission could be insisted solely
on the basis of merit and inclusiveness. Per capita annual
expenditure is to be calculated on the basis of actuals by a fee
regulatory committee appointed by the government. This can be
fixed as the annual fee for all students. Liberal free ships
and scholarships should be sanctioned by the government to those
belonging to the BPL group. Others who need assistance must be
provided with loan scholarships by the government with a well
spelt out scheme of recouping immediately after the students get
placements. If this is not possible soft loans from
nationalized banks can be arranged by government. But then a
minimum period of two years should be allowed after the
completion of the course for starting the repayment. In the
case of those who cannot make repayment even after two years due
to unemployment should be supported for repayment by the
Government till the candidate gets employment somewhere. This
is likely to bring in considerable financial commitment on the
part of Govt. The second method of ensuring quality and equity
is to follow the legislations made by the Govt. of Kerala.
Differential
fee system:- This is one of the practical solution to the problem of resource
mobilization in private institutions. 50% of the seats are to
be filled up from the selection list prepared by the government
on the basis of merit and inclusion and their fees should be
fixed at par with the government fee. The remaining 50% also
should be selected from the merit list prepared by the
government on the basis of their capacity to pay the higher fee
fixed by the fee regulatory committee on the basis of actual
expenditure involved in running the college and for the
developmental activities envisaged. But this system amounts to
cross subsidy and requires constitutional protection which can
be achieved only through the Parliament of India.
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