Following is an excerpt from an IANS report.:
Sambalpur University of Orissa has signed an MOU with Aarhus University of Denmark to foster higher education and research in different fields.
“It will help us in enhancing our knowledge base. We will certainly benefit from the exchange programmes. We will particularly be interested in sharing the knowledge where-in other universities are strong and we would also like to share the knowledge where we are strong,” said Vice Chancellor of Sambalpur University, Prof Arun K. Pujari, after the MoU was signed Saturday.
The university would get to choose a semester course from Denmark University and students from Aarhus University would also get to choose an elective course from the university.
The MoU would also facilitate faculty and student exchange programmes, restructuring educational programmes, improving language teaching through study tours.
Although news about MOU between an Orissa University and foreign universities are frequent, this one is special because Aarhaus University is the number 2 univ in Denmark and is ranked in the top 100 in both the Times ranking and the Shanghai Jiao Tong ranking. (Most other MOUs involve 3rd rate foreign universities.) This MOU is one among many new things happening at Sambalpur University since the dynamic Prof. Arun Pujari joined as its VC. I am told that it now has the best tandem of Science faculty (in terms of top notch publications) among all the Orissa universities. It has plans to set up a IIIT in its campus and I would recommend the Orissa government to strongly support it.
January 10th, 2010
Following is an excerpt from a PTI report on this.
Sibal said the government wants to set up 14 innovation universities on various themes and these institutions will earn revenue from various areas, including research.
Brown, however, differed from Sibal on the proposed economic model for the Innovation Universities and said that major funding will have to come from tuition fee.
"This is not going to work. In our university, 50 percent of revenue comes from tuition fee despite the university having a billion dollar of Endowment fund. The universities here will have to depend on tuition fee," he said.
Sibal retorted back, saying that the investment involved in setting a university in India will be less than the cost in the US.
He said institutes should not be charge exorbitantly on students. They can generate revenue from other sources.
The government will set up a Higher Education Finance Corporation to provide funding to poor students for study. The students can pay back the money over a period of time, he said. The HRD Ministry has prepared a bill to set up the corporation.
The loans will be made available for students pursuing professional courses, he said.
I am a bit confused about the innovation universities being on various themes. I thought they were supposed to be multi-dsiciplinary universities aiming to become like Oxford, Cambridge and Berkely.
January 10th, 2010