quality of college teachers

The quality of college teachers- A critical factor  in the higher education reform process 

 

According to a report by ASSOCHAM, Indian students going abroad for higher studies cost a foreign exchange outflow of $10 billion annually, an amount sufficient to open 20 engineering and management colleges   in India. Over US$ 13 billion is spent every year by about 450,000 Indian students enrolled in higher education abroad. Why do they go? It is not only for jobs abroad, but also mainly for international environment, better research amenities, flexibility in choice of subjects and wider choice of courses, practical oriented learning methods, high quality of faculty and the state of the art facilities. These are missing in many colleges in India.’ Almost two-third of our universities and 90% of our colleges are rated as below average on quality parameters,” Prime Minister Singh once revealed.

A vital indicator to ascertain the global standard of the universities in any country is the number of foreign students enrolled in them and their position in the international ranking. China has emerged as the number-one choice for students who want to study in Asia.. Beijing University has emerged as one of the top 20 universities in the world. It is a sad commentary on our higher education sector that  the  recent evaluation of universities and research institutes all over the world, conducted by a Shanghai university, has not a single Indian University is  in the world's top 300 . However,   China has six.

The HRD ministry is worried about the dissatisfactory quality of our colleges and hence has introduced   series of reforms with the guidance of the Knowledge Commission in recent times. The   introduction of all the sophisticated western tools of     higher   education,    the establishment of additional regulatory bodies and   higher the flow of fund to this sector have not yielded the expected results. The employers say 65% of the graduates are unemployable, because, there is huge gap between what is expected from the employees   and what they are capable of contributing

A critical factor  in the reform process is the quality of the faculty. The government is not blind to the  need to improve the quality of the college teachers and taken many measures, such as increasing the salary of the teachers through the  6th pay commission , so that teaching  becomes  attractive to brilliant minds . Strict provisions for recruitment,   orientation and refresher courses, academic freedom in restructuring of the syllabi, academic auditing, Performance Based Assessment System (PBAS) and the pass in the eligibility tests etc.,   have been introduced to improve faculty quality. . UGC has sent the  PBAS proforma to all varsities which will also be free to devise their own PBAS based on it. Teachers will be able to offer themselves for assessment for promotion once they fulfill minimum API scores. They will also be able to get increments to the tune of 3 per cent of the Academic Grade Pay (AGP) -- as outlined under the Sixth Pay Commission. State governments have also been asked to amend their relevant Acts within six months to enable implementation of these regulations. Lot of changes has come into the recruitment process too. Yet the result is not as per the expectations .

The expectations of the students and the administrators regarding teacher’s performance are very high. The teachers are expected to be the  reservoir of knowledge in there respective subjects by constantly upgrading their knowledge through various sources,   use latest pedagogic method than relying on uninspiring rhetoric, show interest in molding the personality of the students  through encouragement for  co curricular and extra curricular activities, create a vibrant class room atmosphere through participative learning method than teacher centric method, encourage original contribution by students and thereby kindle logical reasoning, analytical skills, and enquiring mind  and  inculcate reading habit among them .. The students feel such teachers only will make their college education productive and prepare them for the competitive job market.  

 However, the ground realty is very different. Higher percentage of the college teachers does not possess these skills or the interest to engage themselves with these roles. . The orientation and refresher courses, the eligibility test like NET and SLET, PhD degree, and participation in seminars do not guarantee high quality of teaching . How many of the teachers have chosen teaching due to aptitude for it  and relish the idea of accountability? Is not window dressing adopted on a large scale for better grade in self-appraisal and accreditation procedures? How many of the teachers are using   the treasure of knowledge available in the internet to provide latest information to the students, do extra reference for  lectures, present original and high quality   papers to the journals and seminars? Do thay give   practical orientation to their theoretical presentation? What care is given to test the communication skill, aptitude for innovative teaching methods while recruiting teachers? It would be disastrous if we appointed anyone who just came along and if corruption plays a role in the recruitment of teachers.

“A bad teacher is like a time bomb, because they would only continue to generate sub-standard students for decades”. No responsible administration should tolerate this situation. Teachers are the main link in the educational reform process. They are the field workers and have direct contact with students. Nobility is still attached to their profession and they are in charge of molding the character and knowledge level of the youthful population. There is no use of having major share of youthful population if they are not of high quality.

The teachers should remember that the born teacher concept is outdated. An ordinary teacher can become an excellent teacher and then turn into an out standing teacher with dedication towards their profession. Teachers forever should be learners and impart that knowledge gained to the students with clarity and thought provoking manner. Original contribution by students should be recognized and encouraged. More concentration is needed on participative learning process. . The teachers should talk to the students about the changing world scenario in economic, political, and social matters.

 The following measures might help in improving the quality of the teachers.

·        The introduction of some mechanism through which teachers performance appraisal done efficiently and accountability established.

·        The syllabus, which is not industry-friendly currently, should be modified. The teachers and industry associations like CII, FICCI should interact and find out what is missing in the syllabus. Nomination of industry representatives in the board of studies  should not  be a window dressing exercise.

·        Many supervisory bodies like AICTE unwisely assume that once a teacher completes Ph D, he / she automatically becomes an expert teacher. In reality, there is no direct correlation between research and teaching ability.  This point should be noted while further reforms are introduced.  

·        Even the refreshers courses and orientation courses cannot achieve their purpose unless the concentration is on the latest pedagogic methods than on monotonous guest lectures.

·        The government should rethink on the utility of the eligibility tests in assessing efficiency of the teachers. The best thing to do is to assess the teacher’s quality at periodic intervals. If the assessment reveals poor quality, performance counseling should be given, grace period for betterment allotted and suitable action taken after the next assessment if the same position continues.

·        The teacher student ratio also should be regularised .

The teachers would say that with autonomy, their work burden has multiplied due to the need to create and   maintain innumerable records to please the regulatory and inspecting bodies, which have multiplied, and their energy is spent more on non-academic matters. Even the recent performance assessment system is going to result in creation and maintenance of innumerable records and that will further cut down their concentration on classroom activities, where the students are waiting with altogether different type of expectations. The   teachers form the final link in the hierarchy of the higher education and they are the field workers. They feel that  sweeping reforms are introduced after consulting only the  education ministers and vice chancellors and without listening to the ground realities faced by the teachers.They are not involved  in the decision making process of the  higher education sector .Unless the grievances of the teachers and the students are  rectified , the goal of attaining global competency cannot be achieved .

Basic qualification for journalists

Basic qualification for journalists

Justice Markanda Kadju’s suggestion for formal qualification for journalist has sparked a healthy discussion as his other observations on different matters have done. This suggestion is in a way good, because the journalist can come into the profession with basic knowledge and confidence in reporting and can improve their skill in reporting though their experience, wisdom and their own capacities instead of wasting their time in learning through trail and error methods. The time thus saved can be used for developing professionalism and expertise in their chosen field of activity. Formal training in any field will not go a waste. But it should not be made compulsory for entering into journalism field .

economics of aging

 It is an article written by Rameeza Rasheed and  Published in silver talkies which is an online magazine  exclusively for young and spirited elders.

 The economics of ageing

The elderly population is increasing around the world and is bringing with it economic, social and health related changes. Dr. Prof. Rameeza Rasheed analyses the economics of an ageing population around the world and how it could be used productively.
By 2020, the number of 65 plus people in Asia Pacific is set to rise to 396 million. China will account for 45.8 % of the world’s aged and India for 28.8%. Indonesia and Vietnam will have a share of 7%. Carl Haub, senior demographer with Population Reference Bureau in US says, “By 2050, population growth in Africa alone will boost up the world’s number of the aged by one billion. Eastern Europe too is facing this problem.”
USA fears that ageing will make social security and medical care unsustainable in the long run, because its 65 plus population is now 40 million and is likely to reach 68 million by 2050. As a solution, it has raised the retirement age to 67 years with the aim to raise it to 70 years in the future since most of their seniors live up to the age of 90 years.
For the first time in British history, the aged population in UK has outnumbered the under 16 population. By 2050 the ratio between workers and non-workers will be 2:5. UK is thinking on the lines of increasing the retirement age to 68 years, encouraging bridge carriers and asking the younger workers to pay for personal pension schemes.
Singapore has the fastest ageing population in the world with those over 65 plus estimated to reach 23% of its population by 2030.The government has long enforced individual savings through the mandatory Central Provident Fund (CPF), which mandates that the population save for old age. More recently, the government announced plans to pass a Re-employment Act to extend the standard retirement age from 62 to 65.
Japan’s working population is projected to shrink by 9.8% by 2020 while the aged population will increase by 21.5% by 2020. Japan’s pensioners would form half the population in 2055. By 2025, 27% of its national income would be spent on social sector. Longer life span of the elderly in Japan has put additional stress on the families as a third of the 85 plus elders are affected by Alzheimer’s and such patients have longer hospital stays, straining the health budget.
China started becoming an ageing society from 1999 and it didn’t have any Asian model to follow to cope with the new situation. China’s has 145 million people over 60 and about 67% of them live in the rural areas. But Chinese seniors are mostly engaged in business and not completely dependent on the government.
India at present has 81 million elders, i.e., 7.7% of the total population and it is projected that by 2050, quarter of the population will be elders. The overall life expectancy of Indians would be 69.89 years as per CIA World Face Book estimates of 2009. It is going to be a huge financial burden to the government and as well as to individual families. Moreover, 58% of the female and 45% of the male aged are fully dependent on their poor children and hence subjected to starvation, abuse and neglect (the 2011 final census data report may give a staggering number about the 60 plus population) The Rs 400 pension per month paid by many state governments to poor seniors is too low to meet their basic needs and hence they are forced to work and live in semi starvation. The 2011 census report reveals the real burden of supporting the elderly population, because in several states the retirement age is 58 years.
Do all the facts and figures presented above indicate that the growing number of the aged is bad for every country?
The answer is ‘no’ because the new global thinking is that every country can formulate a suitable strategy to convert the ageing population into human capital so that it does not cause strain to the economies struggling for recovery. It seems Singapore, Malaysia and China has already tested these strategies through an integrated approach. Many suggestions have emerged to convert the aged persons into human capital. Here are some of them:

• Elders these days are healthy and have expertise in different fields. If they are willing to be economically active, opportunities should be created for them to utilize their knowledge and experience in different fields. It can be done either through second career chances or as entrepreneurs through suitable incentives. Increasing the age of retirement before they become beneficiaries of social security is the urgent step needed. This measure would result in narrowing down the ratio of the years spent in retirement to the years spent in working and convert a majority of elders into a tax-paying rather than a benefit receiving community. It is highly suitable to developed countries because 40 % of their aged people live unto 90 years, have better health status and are capable of working efficiently up to at least 75 years of age. This measure would reduce the financial burden related to ageing at least by 20%. In USA, most of the professionals have taken up second careers as consultants with high salaries and contribute heavily to the tax revenue.

• India on one hand has an excellent pool of retired professionals and on the other hand has shortage of experts to head many projects. For example, India plans to have 850 universities by the end of the 11th plan. There would be a huge demand for teachers and educational administrators. If the future situation is going to create a mismatch between supply and demand, why ask people to retire at 58 or 60 years of age? Experienced teachers form a reservoir of knowledge and they should be utilized for enhancing the quality of higher education. The argument that it is an injustice to job seekers in the teaching profession is an outdated one, since higher growth rate will take care of the employment generation aspect.
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• The housing sector too has huge potential to cater to the needs of the elders and can even help to lift the economies struggling for recovery. Malaysia has already executed this concept. Malaysia’s Pacific Corporation has a project called ‘Platinum Residence’ in Johor,’ which will cater to all specific requirements of the seniors. This project is meant to be in an urban setting so that the relatives and friends of the seniors can easily and frequently visit them. Singapore is already trying this concept by creating public housing that includes inter generational homes with senior friendly studio apartments. China is constructing integrated retirement housing. These projects can provide lucrative business prospects for the private real estate sector, which can pull up the economy from recession. In UK, 43% of the aged plan to move away from their hometowns as they prefer quite seaside places and hence, these areas have newly developed, creating job opportunities for all categories of service providers. India too is witnessing the launch of studio apartments in sprawling campuses to cater to the comforts of the elders.  These steps will boost up the housing sector, which has been limping for sometime.
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• Another gain is the scope that would arise from the huge seniors-based consumer goods market, waiting to be developed. The list of needs for the aged is endless such as medical equipment  medicines, supporting devices like wheel chairs, walking sticks, hearing aids, special beds, spectacles, dentures, safety devices, specialized furniture, footwear, special processed food, fruits, etc. In the case of services, the aged need home nurses, house call doctors, catering and door delivery of their requirements like specialty medicines. In China, a company has launched a campaign to start factories to cater to the senior market. Singaporean lifestyle companies cater exclusively to goods and services to the senior market. Asian countries can explore further into the travel and tourism needs of the elders. Considerable percentages of today’s seniors have more spending power and want a comfortable lifestyle and this market can be best utilized by the business community. The Singapore model of targeting the seniors market has inspired many countries. The Age and Employment network (TAEN), UK, says, “The change in the demographic profile provides great opportunity for business, tapping into wider pool of talent, experience and skills which will enable businesses to enhance productivity.”

• Concentration is also needed on timely curative care and rehabilitative care. This would enormously reduce the health expenditure of the government and assure sound health to the aged.

• Many elders retire with a lump sum amount and want to invest it safely and wisely. The government can attract this source of fund towards productive investments through attractive incentives. This way money spent on seniors’ care can be rolled back into government channels.

• Many seniors are into community service. They offer valuable consultancy and guidance to the young volunteers. This will promote social and civic sense among the young and motivate them to do more for the society.

• Finally, even within the family, the bond that exists between grand children and grandparents is beautiful and this helps in family togetherness and in the preservation of culture and tradition of every society.

The UNO has declared an action program for the member countries, who have framed policies and programs for the welfare of the aged. It should also to be understood that human ageing is the result of changes in lifestyle and advancement in medical science and it will pose challenges to all the countries of the world. The emerging market economies are nearly 25 key economies. These economies should not wait for the crisis to happen. Advanced strategies are the need of the time. No political party in a democracy can afford to ignore the demands of the seniors because of their ability to transform policies by their sheer number.
The new global concept about ageing.
According to scientists from Stony Brood University in USA, Institute of Applied Systems Analysis in Austria and the Vienna Institute of Demography, a new study suggests a different dependency measure which they call as Adult Disability Dependency Ratio (ADDR). It is based on the relationship between those who need care due to disability and those who are capable of providing it. This measure is sensible because it is putting only those who are disabled into the category of dependents and does not treat those elders who are physically, mentally and financially sound as dependents. Measured in this way, speed of ageing would be reduced compared to the figures arrived at through the existing method of measuring ageing on the basis of chronological age. The scientists strongly feel that treating, healthy, intelligent, productive elders as burden is not fair because they form a good source of human capital. If this argument is accepted by the UNO, the burden of the aged would be measured in a different way and ageing societies will have comfortable data on ‘ dependent elders’ and less worry.

Dr Prof. Rameeza Rasheed is a retired professor of economics from Chennai. Her doctoral degree is in Health Economics and her teaching specialization is in gender economics, public finance and Indian economy. She is also connected with  organizations for women and senior citizens,  gives talks and writes on gender and senior citizen related issues.

 

Real empowermenf of women

This article was published in "Beyond headlines" on 25t.3.2013

BeyondHeadlines (BH) is a leading alternative news portal providing information and analysis that the mainstream media have chosen to ignore.

BeyondHeadlines is associated with INSAAN International Foundation.

Empowerment of Indian Women – A Myth or Reality ?

inShare

Feminists of the world, talk about “empowerment of women” vehemently and advocate it as the magic solution for all the problems facing women. Yes, it is true that, social economic, political and legal empowerment are important for women to reach gender equity. It is because they would assure ,education , skill acquisition , health awareness,   employment,   laws to protect  women against crimes ,  political  rights and positions etc., These are the tools of empowerment  . But the big question is whether these tools can guarantee empowerment? ,

To answer this question we a should have a clear   understanding about the concept of “empowerment of women”

Indian women have very low   social. Economic, legal and political status and because of this reason  India is simply not doing enough for its women. The country has fallen from 112 out of 134 countries in 2010 to 113 out of 135 countries in 2011 according to the Gender Gap Index 2011 released by the World Economic forum (WEF).  What is the historic reason for such a position? The history of Indian women is “history of silence”. They were silent when basic human rights were denied to them, when they were treated as beasts of burden by the family and the society and when violence against them continued uncontrollably. Suppression of their rights and tolerance of crimes continued since they   belonged to inferior sex. Women also were taught that   “patience” is women’s virtue. They were taught to adjust to any situation for the sake of family welfare and society’s opinion. Women too accepted the patriarchal society’s dictates   because of their economic dependency on men i.e., on fathers, husbands and sons in various stages of their life. In other words lack of income earning capacity crippled them and made them suffer in silence if they were not blessed with good life. This situation led to endless crimes against women and suppression of their basic rights.  In many other countries too women were suffering in innumerable ways.

Hence, feminist all over the world raised their voice against  inhuman treatment of women in the beginning of 19^th century and started demanding basic rights and dignified treatment  through women liberation movement  .The UNO recognised the justice in their demand and declared, that “women rights are  human rights” and through international conferences,  workshops and committees drew a draft plan for women empowerment process and offered the guidelines and instructions to be followed to improve the status women. The member countries initiated women oriented development and welfare programmes and enacted suitable laws to protect their rights.  The empowerment process was initiated through education, training, health, employment, legal and political facilities but these are only tools of empowerment. Can they alone guarantee “real” empowerment? The answer then is “no’. Because unless women understand the goals of empowerment they can not elevate their status within the family, society and the nation

The goals of empowerment are—-

The goals of empowerment are—-

•  An economically empowered woman or an employed women should  have the ability to plan and take independent decision about her own life( in matters of education carrier, marriage, child birth etc.,)
• She should be able to face challenges of her life, with courage and confidence and with the support of laws or supporting groups.
•   She should be able to use the resources(such as education job, money, time and energy ) at her disposal to her best advantage, i.e.,  to achieve goals of her life
• She should be able to take part in decision making process at the family level in matters concerning, marriage, higher education or job of children, property acquisition and disposal, saving and investment matters etc and at national level through representation in the law making and administrative bodies.
• She should be able to put an end to violence against her through legal awareness.
• She should be able to live with dignity without depending on others, even during crises.

If a woman’s income does not permit her to have these advantages, there is no use of her economic power. There are thousand of employed women who totally surrender their salary to the family and depend on them even for their very personal expenses such as buying gifts for their near and dear ones or for self indulgence,   have no say regarding the spending, saving or investment of their income or have no say regarding their personal matters (such as health care, pregnancy related matters), carrier matters, children’s education, job or marriage.. Even the so called politically empowered women act as the agents of their politically powerful fathers and husbands, without taking independent political decisions. Most of the employed women have no economic, legal and political awareness and are not even aware of the fact that there are 24 women oriented laws in India to protect them from crimes. If women prefer to live with such indifference towards their empowerment process there will be zero benefit to the government’s and parent’s efforts towards empowering them and they will continue to exist with 18^th century tag of “inferior sex”

‘Empowerment”, is   not a product of a revolution but of evolution  . It is process which has to be initiated and nurtured carefully.  To think that all the educated and employed women are empowered is a fallacy. We witness incidents of  highly educated and economically powerful women like film stars, lawyers, scientists etc, attempt and commit suicide, when ,  the rural,  uneducated , illiterate and poor  women face the challenges of life  courageously  even after the suicide of their  husbands (farmers)  due to indebt ness.

What is the moral of this narration?  Tools alone can not empower a woman. If the parents are under the impression that ,the modern girls  are highly educated , have high profile jobs ,  economically independent  and hence they would be safe from dangers of life , they are mistaken . They should also mould them with certain other qualities of life such as , positive attitude towards life, strength of character, courage and confidence in facing crisis, definite goal in life and the aspirations and efforts  to reach that goals.. Money alone can not assure dignified life. Women should realise that they should strive for gender equity and that would become a reality only if they understand their self worth. Others can not fight their battle and self help is the best help.

(The author is a Chennai based academic and a retired Professor of Economics with specialization in gender and Indian economy.

lack of basic facilty for the tourists

The tourism department advertise about Incredible India. But wherever we go on tour in India we get irritated by the lack of the a very basic facility  ie., the toilet facility. We don't even find paid restrooms . After traveling for hours together if  we succeed in finding anything either the restroom will not have water or kept very dirty ,. I really don't understand why the tourism department is so callous about this basic need and what do they expect the tourist to do when they have  answer to the nature's call? I do not understand, how we expect  more and more foreign tourists to visit our country when we are not prepared to provide even this basic facility and what  image they carry in their mind about India which is described as an emerging economy .  It is a highly disgusting matter. 

I really do not understand why  do even smaller countries like Italy, Srilanka, Bangaldesh, Pakistan   and Nepal rub India on the wrong side all the time.  What has encouraged Italy to betray Indian faith on their promise to send back their sailors? Will any other country exercise so much of patience like in India while dealing with such an atrocious act? First of all, will any other highest court of any other nation allow the murder charged persons of another country to go to  their country to celebrate their festival ? Why India is not taken seriously in any  international  matter? Are we considered as a nation of empty words, incapable of concrete and effective actions?