Adding Value to the Engineering Educational Institutions

Establishing and running an engineering educational institution is a capital intensive project. In India, the main source of income for the private engineering institutions is from the tuition fees collected from the students. The revenue outflow is mainly for salaries, establishing laboratories and the development of college infrastructure.

All promoters wish that their institution should be preferred by the prospective students, to seek admissions. They also desire good faculty should join the institution.   

Over the years, large number of engineering colleges have been established, as the number of students seeking engineering courses was equally large and kept growing, in the past. Since last few years, however, the demand for other faculties like commerce, law has increased. As a result, number of students seeking engineering admissions have not increased in the same proportion vis-a-vis the number of engineering colleges established. Large number of admission seats remain vacant in most engineering colleges, as per the current trend. 

The viability of many engineering institutions has come under threat. These institutions find it extremely difficult to gather resources to pay staff salaries and develop laboratories and infrastructure. The students and parents do not give preference to these institutions due to perceived bad quality. This is despite the fact that some of them have secured very good grades in accreditation by NAAC and NBA.  

Even in this difficult period, it is seen, some engineering colleges and universities are successful filling almost cent percent seats. Why do students and parents prefer these colleges?

Dr J D Bapat helps the institutions solve this juggernaut. As a development professional and the adviser, he helps the engineering institutions build up strength in the following areas: 

• Resource Generation (other than tuition fess)
• Marketing and
• Image Building

Dr Bapat, advises the institutions how to build on own strengths. He helps faculty propose research projects to funding agencies and also set up research laboratories. He also identifies areas in which collaboration with the industry could be initiated. Marketing is always with respect to the product. Pass out degree holders are the products of engineering institution. The industry employing the fresh engineers on the one hand and the students seeking admission to the institution, on the other, are the customers. Dr Bapat gives systematic plan to market the achievements of the institution and also to build the image in the society. All these efforts are focused towards adding value to the engineering educational institutions. 

Visit Dr J D Bapat's website 

View Dr J D Bapat's Brief Bio-data

Send your message to Dr J D Bapat: consult@drjdbapat.com


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Washington accord is not a panacea for the ills in higher education

In recent meeting on the permanent membership of Washington Accord, the academicians expressed positive thoughts.  It is felt that permanent membership of AICTE recognised institutions in the Washington Accord shall open greater job opportunities abroad for engineering graduates from India. The optimism is understandable but to look towards the accord as panacea for ills in the engineering education smacks of our penchant to look towards the west to solve our domestic problems. 

Our politicains do not miss opportunity to criticise US for its so called capitalist policy but prefer to take treatment in the US hospitals, even for the smallest illness, at the State's expense. The same attitude is seen while shopping for the advanced equipment for the country's defense preparedness. If the same trend continues, one wonders whether the indigenous industry and the institutions shall ever achieve parity over the advanced countries. Now it is the turn of higher education.

Most Principals, Directors and Promoters of the Higher Educational Institutions were of the opinion that being a part of Washington Accord shall lead to better quality of infrastructure and education in our institutions. How?

Who stops us from improving our standard right away? The problem is not the lack of opportunities but the lack of will to improve. The educational institutions are viewed as private business by most Promoters. What kind of a business is that, where the customers (viz. students and parents) are left with practically no choice of the product. Just look at the way the promoters are trying to bring moratorium on establishing new institutions. In the captive market, no one is ready to face competition. 

In fact it will not be proper to consider educational institution as private venture, because the institution is built and survives on the money received from the stakeholders (students and parents) but denies any right to them to decide about the management policy. Besides, the normal laws and economic criteria applied to any private venture are not applicable to the educational institutions. This issue needs serious consideration. 

 The great educational institutions of the world are not built by the criteria of accreditation. In fact accreditation only ensures the minimum standards, sky is the limit for quality.

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Accreditation! is it a quality standard?

In India, all higher educational institutions are required to get there teaching courses (programmes) accreditated by a national organisation, namely National Board of Accreditation (NBA). Similarly the universities are mandated to obtain accreditation by another national organisation, namely National Assessment and Acreditation Council (NAAC).  

The accreditation is only to ensure whether the educational institution or the university meets the minimum prescribed standard. However it is misunderstood as a quality standard and hampering the further growth of the educational institutions.

The educational institutions are required to submit an elaborate report on a prescribed format prepared by the accreditating organisations. The institutions spend months and sometimes even years, fulfilling these requirements. However in many cases, these requirements are fulfilled only on paper and does not lead to the improvement in quality of the educational institutions. The following are the visible indicators of the fact: 

(a) The course content lies far behind the practical requirement of the industry.

(b) Despite the accreditation, many institutions are found actually lacking in fulfilling the basic requirements of land, instructional area, qualified faculty, laboratory facilities and library.

(c) Some Deemed Universities are accreditated and authorised to award PG and Ph D Degrees. However many such institutions have a few qualified regular faculty on the rolls and seriously lack in the laboratory infrastructure.

(d) None of the so called top ranking institutions and universities in India come even near to the world standards and ranking

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Reforming higher education

“There is no need for any government regulation. Let private institutions come up and students can make their choice based on the information on which institutes provide quality education.”

This is what Lord Meghnad Desai, Professor Emeritus, London School of Economics said at the fifth Oxford India Business Forum 2010, at New Delhi, on 25 March 2010.

As a manifestation of the Central Government’s  resolve to reform and restructure the higher education sector, the draft Bill on formulation of the National Commission for Higher Education and Research (NCHER) has been placed before the Indian Parliament. The Commission seeks to replace institutions such as the University Grants Commission (UGC) and the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE). Noted educationists all over the country have expressed concerns over the efficacy of the Bill bringing in the desired changes in the higher education system. As higher education is an area that concerns a large number of people, the Central Government should be more pro-active in seeking feedback from stakeholders and that should be the norm all the time. The major concerns expressed are as follows:

(a) NCHER Bill undermines the autonomy. It tends towards centralisation of powers and control over academic initiatives. The Preamble lays down two basic objectives, firstly, ‘to provide for the determination, co-ordination, maintenance of standards in and promotion of higher education and research' and secondly to ‘promote the autonomy of higher educational institutions, for the free pursuit of knowledge and innovation and for facilitating access, inclusion and opportunities to all'. There is a mismatch between what is proposed in the preamble and incorporated in the body of the Bill. The terms of the proposed Bill are such that they may not improve the quality of education or make much needed autonomy a reality.

The statement in the preamble is in favour of autonomy. Both academic and administrative autonomy are necessary if the universities are to become real centres of learning. But autonomy without democratisation is likely to lead to an authoritarian system. The Bill is silent about democratisation. Even the colleges should become autonomous, as the affiliating system is under severe strain. But the character of the Bill, despite the claims to the contrary, undermines autonomy rather than advancing it. The commission's powers to make regulations are likely to impinge upon autonomy rather than promote it. It has assumed powers far greater than what was exercised by the UGC. Moreover, UGC was essentially an advisory body in academic matters.

(b) NCHER is not sufficiently rooted in academic imperatives. NCHER is mainly a management remedy. The problems that higher education is facing are not essentially because of inefficient management but because of the inability of the system to ensure quality. Whether a new apex body which would exercise ‘national' control is the ideal solution for the problem deserves very serious consideration.

(c) NCHER is not an umbrella organisation. The resolution on the National Policy on Education (NPE) passed by the parliament few years back envisages creation of a single regulating organisation replacing as many as 13 different regulating organisations approved by the Parliament. For example, the education in agriculture and medicine still lie outside the purview of NCHER. 

(d) NCHER may remain organizationally inadequate. The commission is a highly centralised body manned by a chairman and six members, supported by a collegium, consisting of core and co-opted fellows to ‘aid, advice and make recommendation to the commission'. The commission is a pretty isolated organisation without any window to the society. The collegium is at best a deliberating body and would not exercise any control over the commission. Eminent personalities like Nobel award winners, Jnanapeeth Award winners shall be appointed members of the collegium. Notwithstanding the eminence of these personalities, they may not be fully aware about the ground realities and problems faced by the higher education in the country. The management of higher education in the country would thus be left in the hands of a committee of seven who have no prescribed channels of feedback. Therefore, even if well intentioned, the commission would be starved of necessary democratic connection.

(e) Compulsory accreditation as envisaged in the Bill may not be effective. There are considerable reservations about the manner in which the accreditation system is working now. Whether a national system can function effectively is doubtful. After many years of the system being in operation, only a small percent of colleges have so far been graded. The National Knowledge Commission (NKC) has proposed the idea of licensing accrediting agencies, probably involving private agencies. It is not clear as to if the provision in the bill which refers to accrediting agencies registered under the commission would involve the implementation of NKC proposal. In principle, the authority to regulate and accredit should rest with public authorities. The process of accreditation should be participative and the purpose ameliorative rather than punitive. It is perhaps time to review the system. One possibility is an internal assessment with external participation at the State level. The accreditation today primarily looks into the ‘process’of imparting education. Rather it would be better to evaluate the ‘product’ of education. The product based evaluation shall call for total review of the methodology. That is what perhaps Meghnad Desai means (see quote at the top)

To sum, the NCHER should be a single umbrella organisation at the national level with necessary monitoring and regulatory functions. ‘Autonomy at all levels’ should be the watchword while drafting the Bill. The collegium, with advisory role, should consist of eminent personalities from the field of education with a feel of local conditions obtaining in different parts of the country. An effective system should be established to seek sustained feedback from the stakeholders as well as to maintain adequate checks and balances over the functioning of the Commission. The accreditation today is ‘process’ oriented. It may be worthwhile making it ‘product’ oriented.  

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Higher education reforms: autonomous colleges

The Indian government is thinking of freeing colleges from universities and letting them run their own show. This was announced by human resource development (HRD) minister Kapil Sibal during his meeting with principal secretaries and secretaries of higher education from the states.

In order to become independent, colleges will first have to excel in many areas. Should they improve further, they could be allowed to become universities.

The Centre plans to create a three-tier system of affiliated colleges, autonomous colleges and universities. Their standards will be judged through an accreditation system formulated by the States so that students know the quality and resources of institute they attend. That would introduce competition among the educational institutions.

The government wants to regulate the fees and the admission process in private and unaided colleges and create a regulatory mechanism to prevent the business of capitation fees. States have also been asked for ideas on how to insulate the selection of vice-chancellors from politics.

A three-month deadline has been set for the education secretaries to prepare a vision document on the targets to be achieved in higher education by 2020. That must contain the state's targets for higher education till 2020, details of the current conditions, the number of universities and colleges, what the state thinks of their quality and a plan to increase Gross Enrollment Ratio (GER) in higher education. The document will help the government plug loopholes, boost the sector and set benchmarks for 2020.

The government has ambitious plans for enrollment. It plans to bring a 5% increase in GER by the end of the 11th Plan and raise it to the global average of 30% by 2020. The states were also pulled up for pinching pennies on the education. According to the Ministry, the Centre's education spend, as a percentage of GDP, has increased to 0.91% in 2009 from 0.53% in 2000-01, while the states' spend has declined from 3.76% to 2.73%.

National Knowledge Commission on Higher Education

USA-India Educational Exchange

Full interest subsidy on educational loans for poor students

Higher education: welcome reforms

As a part of the HRD ministry's current move to overhaul the education system in India, the existing regulatory bodies like UGC, AICTE, Medical Council of India, NCTE and Distance Education Council shall be replaced by one single body. This is in line with the recommendations made by National Knowledge Commission and the Yashpal committee. Welcome move indeed !

It will go long way reducing the prevailig malpractices and also contribute towards improving the quality of higher education

The Yashpal committee laments the ill-growth of private educational institutions and deemed universities.The committee recommends granting of deemed universites be put on hold till unambiguous, rational guidelines are evolved. The Committe observes that the behaviour of some private universities has become a matter of serious concern to students and parents. A detailed probe into the basic reasons for the concerns revealed that many of them were professional colleges that got approval from the regulatory bodies for university status. Immediately after, they began admitting five to six times their capacity, without a corresponding increase in faculty strength or infrastructure. The classes were conducted at strange hours like factory operations. The students who paid huge capitation fees felt cheated. The students from the underprivileged sections could not get admission in many of them, due to heavy capitation fees”.

Another big part of the plan is a legislation to prevent, prohibit and punish educational malpractices. The draft Bill has been sent to the Law Ministry. It proposes to give teeth to the government to deal with institutions that do not meet promises made in their prospectus, be it fees, quality of teachers or infrastructure. The recognition to deemed universities, 127 new ones in the past five years, is being reviewed.

Accreditation shall be mandatory for higher education institutions.The entry barriers would be very tough.Once passed, an institute can become a deemed university and even a full-fledged university.

A law to regulate foreign education providers is on the anvil. The Bill proposes to regulate fees and ensure Indian laws are followed. Whether these institutions would have to abide by the quota rule,would be decided on a case-by-case basis. Big foreign universities might be exempted from quotas.

The economically weaker sections will be offered interest subsidy on the educational loans. The scheme might be a part of the budget 2009.

On the planning board is also a scholarship scheme under which money will be directly credited to bank accounts of 41,000 boys and an equal number of girls in colleges.

The Government proposal on educational reforms is a result of continuing discussion and debate that go back to the previous UPA regime and are being monitored by the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who has accorded priority to the sector.