Update: From a report in DNA.
Sources from the ministry of human resource development said that under the 12th plan, the Centre would announce 10 more IITs.
Following is an excerpt from a report in Deccan Herald.
The Bangalore University will submit a memorandum to the Union Law Minister on January 2 urging him to upgrade University Visvesvaraya College of Engineering (UVCE) to an Indian Institute of Technology.
"The HRD ministry has announced that it would set up ten more IITs soon. UVCE has the necessary infrastructure, expertise, faculty and students. This can be converted into an IIT with a campus at Muddenahalli," Vice-chancellor N Prabhu Dev told reporters on Friday. The memorandum will be submitted at the mega reunion event of UVCE alumni, which will be held from January 1 to 3 on the occasion of Sir Visvesvaraya’s 150th anniversary. "UVCE might remain a constituent college of BU. Even if we have to let go of the administration of UVCE, we will not mind," he added.
VSSUT Burla must be watchful and take appropriate steps at the right time.
January 1st, 2011
Update: Following is the PIB release on it.
Shri Kapil Sibal, Union Minister for Human Resource Development, announced revised norms for the approval process, for 2011-2012, of institutes that are regulated by the All Indian Council for Technical Education (AICTE), here today.
The AICTE has been making an effort to facilitate stake holders in establishing good technical institutions in the Country. In order that a planned and coordinated development is ensured in technical education, AICTE for the coming year 2011 -12 has taken the following facilitative measures for Institutions, Faculty and students and others.
1. Introduction of Section 25 of Company’s Act to allow good corporates to setup Technical Institutions. However no Joint ventures can apply for this.
PPP and BOT model
2. Extended to 241 Districts where currently no AICTE Institution exists. This will facilitate spread of Technical education to all under represented areas.
3. Benefits of MEGA Cities extended to Metros and MRDA regions. Now there shall be two classifications of Rural and Other areas where the land requirement is: Rural area 10 acres, Other areas 2.5 acres.
4. FSI / FAR shall be considered for vertical Expansion where Management Programs will be allowed on FSI / FAR basis
5. Social Responsibility
5pm to 8 pm Courses for skill development that are based on the expertise areas possessed by the respective Institutions in the areas of Engineering / Technology / Architecture / Town Planning / Hospitality / Pharmacy etc are being allowed to be conducted by AICTE approved Institutions. This will facilitate the community around the Institutions to benefit by acquiring the skills provided by these Institutes. These Institutions are expected to form clusters with other institutions in the neighbourhood and collaborate with the Industries in the area in running these skill based programs.
6. Upto year 2010, Architecture had 40 students / division. This has been raised to 60 Seats / division. to provide for larger no. of seats and optimisation of resources without having to set up new institutions in the area.
7. Upto year 2010, different Programs like Engineering / Architecture / Pharmacy / Management / Hotel management and catering Technology, one each were allowed to be integrated into a single campus so that resources can be shared and optimised. Now this facility has been extended to more than one program to be integrated. Ie, 2 or more Engineering colleges, 2 or more management colleges and so on can be integrated as Technical / integrated campus to optimise resources
8. Upto year 2010, Tuition fee waiver scheme operated by AICTE allows for providing 10% supernumerary seats that are given to students of economically backward category. These seats were provided for Instituitions who may apply for such a scheme. Now these seats are made manadatory for every Institute upto 5%.
9. Security Money Deposit that takes care of contingencies in case of Institutions defaulting on their obligations, shall be replaced as money deposit in AICTE account. All existing FDR’s shall be converted to money deposit. This is necessitated because of
• Earlier FDR’s being encashed without AICTE knowledge or permission
• Custody and logistics of maintaining FDR’s being a source of problems.
10. The interest accrued shall be used to facilitate more stake holders like faculty, students, funding Institutions through schemes, and enhanced scholarships. AICTE has recently taken a decision to include all Government and Government aided Institutions as QIP centres in order to promote more research amongst faculty and produce more Ph. D’s. Hence a lot more faculty would be needed to be provided with QIP scholarships. This is also expected to be met from the money so generated.
11. All institutions completing more than one batch shall be eligible to get 2 Courses / program / level / shift on self disclosure if facilities and infrastructure are available. One Course would mean an addition of 60 students or one division. The ceiling which was there earlier like no increase after an intake of 540 students has been removed.
12. Institutions not completing one batch of passed out students shall get 1 Courses / program / level / shift on self disclosure if facilities are available.
13. If institutions have accreditation a further 1 Courses / program / level / shift shall be given additional in the course accredited.
14. 2nd Shift Courses and Women to Co-Ed Institutions shall be processed only after expert visits confirm that the infrastructure required exists with the Institutions.
15. Stand alone PG Institutes can be started which was not the case earlier.
16. Indian Degrees can be given in Campuses of Indian Institutions abroad subject to local laws.
17. Overseas campus can be setup subject to local laws and Indian Government clearance.
18. PGDM courses to be regulated as per several representations made.
• Date of admissions and Model curriculum to be given by AICTE
• Admissions to be effected by States and Fee to be regulated by State fee committee.
19. All approvals for Polytechnics shall be processed by AICTE.
20. Students of XII Vocational / Technical of the State Boards or any other to be admitted to 2nd Year lateral entry of a Diploma Program
21. Students of B. Sc to be admitted to 2nd Year lateral entry onto a Degree Program provided they have passed Mathematics at XII or B Sc level and would be required to pass Engineering Graphics and Engineering Mechanics along with the second year subjects.
22. 10% lateral entry setas increased to 20% in all states except Andaman Nicobar, Lakshadweep and Diu Daman where it is 30%
23. A separate division of 60 students / course can be started from 2nd year onwards in all AICTE approved Institutions subject to availability of infrastructure, exclusively for Polytechnic students for lateral entry.
24. All approval process to be completed by May 31st 2011 to enable coordinated planning.
MV/Hb
Following are excerpts from a report in India Today.
The new norms, allowing for an increase in the number of institutes and seats in various courses, will come into effect immediately.
(1) … all institutions completing more than one batch will be eligible to get two courses and programmes.
One course would mean the addition of 60 students.
(2) The earlier ceiling, which did not permit any increase after an intake of 540 students, has now been removed.
(3) All these steps envisage an increase in the number of total available seats by 50 per cent and a sharp increase in the workload of the faculty members. …
(4) The reforms also include relaxing land requirement for setting up institutions from 3.5 acres to 2.5 acres in urban areas and introducing section 25 of the Companies Act to allow ‘ good corporates’ to set up technical institutions. No joint ventures can apply for this.
(5) Until recently, postgraduate programmes could be started only where an undergraduate programme existed. But now, the AICTE will permit standalone postgraduate institutions to be started.
In regards to point (4) above one may note that one of the controversy regarding Vedanta University is regarding its status as a Section 25 company.
Following are excerpts from a report in expressbuzz.com.
Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal on Thursday announced the revised norms for the approval process for 2011-2012 of institutes that are regulated by All Indian Council for Technical Education (AICTE). …
… From now onwards, technical institutes approved by the AICTE, have to reserve up to 5 percent of their seats for students from economically backward sections of society.
“Till now, tuition fee waiver scheme, operated by the AICTE, allowed providing up to 10 percent supernumerary seats that are given to students of economically backward category. It was the discretion on the part of the institution to apply for such a scheme. Now, these seats are made mandatory for every institute up to 5 percent,” Sibal said. The minister said, “These measures are aimed at easing pressure on the education sector and providing relief to the students in matters of admission.”
January 1st, 2011
Thanks to reader Jitu for the pointer. Following are excerpts from an interview in pagalguy.com.
Bhubhaneswar-based Xavier’s Institute of Management (XIMB) is in the process of turning into a university soon, its Director Fr PT Joseph, SJ tells PaGaLGuY. In this interview, he also speaks about the curriculum changes the institute is planning for its Post Graduate Diploma in Management (PGDM) and the PGDM Rural Management courses.
What changes can the incoming batch of 2013 look forward to benefitting from at XIMB?
From the point of view of the fulltime programme students, we will be revising the curriculum a little bit next year. Apart from that, although it doesn’t directly affect PGDM or PGDM(RM) students, but we have started a 1-year advanced management programme on Resettlement and Rehabilitation and Corporate Social Responsibility for 15 executives of Uttarakhand’s Tehri Hydro Development Corporation. This along with our other initiatives in the rural management and social sector will continue to be under focus in the coming year.
Are you looking at an increase in intake for any of the the two-year programmes?
We were looking at expansion in the number of seats but the proposal hasn’t gone past AICTE’s regulations. But we may become a university soon and therefore increase intake from a university perspective. That process might take one or two months to finalize, but we are in the process of becoming a university.
Would that mean that the PGDM degrees would be offered as full-fledged MBA degrees under the XIMB University?
The PGDM will still remain as an AICTE-approved course, it may not become a university degree for now. But after we get university status we may start some other type of programmes under the university. Right now we have gotten the government sanction of Rs 10 crores and are involved with acquiring the necessary land for the University in Sambalpur. Until land is acquired, which is priority for now, we aren’t in a position to share more details.
What is XIMB’s faculty strength now and how are you thinking about expanding it?
As of now we are 55 in total. One more is joining in December and another two may join in January 2011. We hire faculty whenever we come across somebody good. For example, one of the faculty joining next is a Cornell University PhD with lots of experience. Another person in the recruitment process has worked in Netherlands and has a PhD from Korea.
What kind of curriculum changes are you going to make in the PGDM and PGDM(RM) courses before the next batch joins?
We have already started a new course on Environment and Sustainability which is mandatory for all the 180 PGDM students. There’s another mandatory course on Emotional quotient and Leadership. Next, we are planning a meeting of all the faculty on the January 12, 2011. Before that meeting, a committee is preparing the background papers by looking at changes in the global and Indian economy. Only after the January 12 meeting will a clear picture emerge about the exact changes.
But speaking in general, we’ve been teaching management that is too bifurcated by specialization in our view. As you know, students choose to go for either marketing or finance or other specializations during the course. We are having a feeling that there should be some integration between these specializations by changing their content and give each course a holistic approach. For example, we know that there is a good market for inkjet printer cartridges. But inkjet cartridge production also generates a large amount of waste and affects the environment. So when we teach either of marketing or production management, we need to also bring awareness of sustainability in and show how both marketing and production are linked. If we can do this, we will not only make better managers but also better human beings. Apart from that, we would like to increase our connection with the bottom of the pyramid. We have a very strong programme in which all 180 PGDM students went and stayed in villages for 3 days. We want to increase their exposure to bottom of the pyramid and to leadership. We would also like to focus on ways to increase mentoring from faculty and senior students.
January 1st, 2011