Happy New Year 2011

Happy New Year 2011

Seats in technical education to be increased

Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal Thursday announced revised norms for All India Council for Technical Education to increase the seats in technical education.

The ministry also made it mandatory for technical institutions to reserve 5 percent seats for the weaker sections of society.

'The aim is to increase the seats in technical institutions so that it can be more inclusive,' Sibal said after announcing the new norms.

The minister announced easing of norms for establishing new engineering colleges, expansion of institutions and number of seats, with a series of steps that would result in increase of seats in engineering institutions.

'Introduction of Section 25 of Company's Act to allow good corporates to set up Technical Institutions. However, no joint ventures can apply for this,' an official statement from the HRD ministry said.

Models like public-private partnership and build-operate-transfer will be used to involve the private sector in setting up technical institutes in 241 districts where there are no engineering colleges.

Easing the land norms for starting institutes, the HRD minister announced that lesser space will now be needed for establishing technical institutes. While an engineering college in rural India will need 10 acres of land, in urban areas it will require just 2.5 acres of land.

Special evening classes will also be conducted in the areas of Engineering, Technology, Architecture, Town Planning, Hospitality and Pharmacy by AICTE-approved institutes.

'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 programmes,' the HRD minister said.
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Sources: Seats in technical education to be increased

Facebook offers Rs 38 lakh package for IIT Madras students !!

Social networking site Facebook has offered a package of Rs 38 lakh (USD 85,000) for IIT Madras students during the ongoing placement season, a top official of the institute said. Companies selecting prospective candidates from the country''s premier educational institute IIT Madras began on December 1.

However, Facebook leads the chart with a package of Rs 38 lakh, IIT Madras Advisor (Training and Placement) N Ramesh Babu said. "Every year, the selection process commences in December and this time too it began on December 1," he said.

Every year students eagerly await to participate in the campus selection and this year too more than 260 companies have registered so far, he said, adding, "But we expect it to cross 300 companies." Asked on the selection processes, he said the final round of interview would be done later.

"For example, Facebook after conducting all the rounds, will conduct another interview via Skype from the US and when a student gets selected he/she will be offered USD 85,000 package," Babu explained. He said around 1000 students from various streams including B Tech, MTech, MS, Doctoral programmes, MBA, have registered for placements this year and so far around 30 students have received offers from various multi-national companies including Goldman Sachs, IBM and Boston Consulting Group.

Last year the highest package was offered by Tower Research Capital at Rs 28 lakh per annum and about 225 companies had visited the institute for selecting 700 candidates.

IIM Common Admission Test to go global !!

The Indian Institutes of Management (IIM) are quietly working towards expanding their Common Admission Test into an international examination to draw students from abroad and to compete wIIM Ahemdabadith the globally-popular Graduate Management Aptitude Test.

According to an exclusive story published in Hindustan Times on July 2, credited to Charu Sudan Kasturi, the initiative is said to be a key component of a confidential contract signed between IIMs and Prometric, the American computer-based testing (CBT) service provider.

“Prometric will provide CBT services to IIMs in India ... and to IIMs for global expansion of the CAT program,“ states an agreement signed between the IIMs and the service provider, accessed through the Right to Information Act.

The “global expansion“ was also a reason why IIM rejected the bid of the Graduate Management Aptitude Council - a non profit body that conducts GMAT - for the computerisation of the CAT.

Read more: IIM Common Admission Test to go global

Electrical Engg beats computer science at IIT !!

For years, computer science was a rage among those who made it to the top of the selection list of the joint entrance exam (JEE), which is the passport to the Indian Institutes of Technology. Anumula Jithendar Reddy from Hyderabad who topped the competitive entrance test, didn't take that road much travelled. Instead, he decided to pursue electrical engineering at IIT-Bombay.

There were many like Reddy, whose preferences have shifted with the IT shimmer fading. Picture this: While electrical engineering opened at all- India rank (AIR) 1 and closed at rank 98, computer science, on the Powai campus, dragged on and closed at rank 116.

"One will notice the same trend picking up in other IITs next year. But telecommunication is on the top, at least neck-and-neck with computer science. And electrical engineering is as much a rage as computer science, at least in the IITs. After that we have most students opting for mechanical engineering," said an IIT faculty member.

While computer science still attracted a large chunk of the JEE toppers, this year, however, of the top 100 JEE-2010 rankers, about 25% opted for electrical engineering, while they could have got a seat in computer science. Interestingly, pure sciences too seem to have attracted some top rankers. AIR 33 signed up for physics in IIT-Kanpur and engineering physics, too, moved up the popularity charts and opened at rank 48 in Bombay; last year's opening rank for this stream was 303. The trend was noticed in IIT-Madras too where engineering physics opened admission at rank 494 (last year's opening rank was 832).

Statistics on the opening and closing ranks of candidates admitted into the IITs in August 2010 on the basis of their scores in the JEE also revealed that mechanical engineering has been steadily climbing the ratings. At IIT-B, the opening rank in the general category is 56 against last year's 72 and 2008's AIR 171. On the other hand, chemical engineering and civil engineering have descended in the preference list.

At IIT-B, chemical engineering opened at rank 561, as against last year, when rank 244 was the first one to opt for it. AIR 887 at IIT-B took up civil engineering, a stream which opened admission at AIR 665 a year ago.

Read more: Electrical Engg beats computer science at IIT

IGNOU to open study centres in six European countries !!

The Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU), the largest in the world, will open study centres in six European nations, including Germany and France, to offer personalised courses, its Vice Chancellor V.N. Rajasekharan Pillai has said.

"We will open our centre in Paris next month. Negotiation is going on with Germany. I hope we will start in Germany by the end of this year. Our target is to open five-six centres in Europe by July 2011," Pillai told media.

The Netherlands and Austria are other European countries where IGNOU, the world's largest by student enrollment, is considering to open study centres. It already has a centre in London, the vice chancellor added.

Pillai, who also heads the government's Distance Education Council, said IGNOU would also offer personalised courses in Gandhian studies and some Indian languages such as Sanskrit through its new study centres in Europe, besides the regular courses.

"We are in discussion with several institutes in the US, Australia and Europe to develop personalised courses. It will be done keeping in mind the needs of partner institutes," he said, adding IGNOU's low course fee was hindrance in forging accords overseas.

"Our fee is quite low when you compare it with what is charged by universities in the developed countries. We are planning to restructure the fees for courses offered outside India," Pillai said.

IGNOU has presence in 35 countries through 56 study centres. Over 42,000 students are enrolled at its overseas centres. More than 90 percent of them are the people of India origin.

The vice chancellor said student enrolments at the university have almost trebled in the last four years.

"Now we have 3.2 million active enrollments. It was 1.1 million in 2006. This indicates increasing popularity of distance education," said Pillai, adding the university targets to sustain over 25 percent annual growth in enrollments in the coming years.

IGNOU courses were also becoming increasingly popular in Africa and the Gulf region that has a large strength of India expatriates. "Many African universities have approached us for collaboration. We will help in designing course and study materials."

Read More: IGNOU to open study centres in six European countries

IITs say no to common engineering entrance test !!

Times of India has recently reported that the Indian Institutes of Technology have trashed the idea of selection through a single national admission test for all engineering colleges. Instead, in a throwback to the earlier system of a two-stage test (2000-2004) to enter an IIT, an HRD ministry-appointed committee has come up with a plan of holding an "add-on" test to select candidates.

TOI has a copy of the interim report of the committee, which is headed by IIT-Kharagpur director Damodar Acharya and comprising IIT-Madras director M S Ananth, IIT-Bombay director Devang Khakhar and IIT-Roorkee head S C Saxena. They wrote the report after extensive discussion with state officials, university heads, faculty and other stakeholders nationwide.

Scores in a well-designed National Aptitude Test should be used to capture parameters of interest such as raw intelligence, aptitude, general awareness, comprehension and written communication skills. NAT should not require extensive preparation and coaching. The questions should be so designed that it would not require inputs beyond plus-2 level," an HRD ministry-appointed committee said in its report. The NAT high-performers will then have to clear another test to get into IITs and other top institutes.

To soften stress, it has been proposed to make NAT an online test conducted throughout the year. Every students' composite weighted performance score will then be drawn up; it will be based on marks in NAT and marks each student tots up in science subjects in Class XII boards.

Read more: IITs say no to common engineering entrance test