UGC

Pursue Education In The Right Path With Recognized Universities

Education blogger

Education always have played an important role in placing once career on the right path. It is a most powerful tool in tackling the present cut-throat competition that people face in their daily life. Today, India is emerging as the great source of education on the global face with thousands of good educational center offering professionals courses. But as there are so many of them claiming to offer the best form of education its really hard for students to students to select a recognized university approved from UGC and ministry of HRD (Human Resource Development).

Every individuals aims to pursue higher education from a well recognized and good university. A well affiliated institution can help you to get a good job as well. In the country like India where students seeking for higher learning , there is no dearth of institutions which are fake and have no recognition. Many a times, students do not make ample research and get admission in unrecognized institutions offering fake degrees. These education centers not only charge huge fee but also do not assists in any form of job. Moreover, there are always chances that these organization can close anytime by government or run-away. Thus, it is always important for individuals to determine between the fake universities and the recognized ones before taking admission.

Education plays a vital role in constructing a strong and successful career in each and everyone’s life. Hence it is crucial to research well about the course and the important subjects that are most integral for your eminent progress. Once, you acquire the knowledge regarding your course, you should find out the top institutions and universities offering the same.

Now-days internet is the best place where one can easily find the details about the intuition, accreditation and courses. Most of the prominent universities have their web presence and provide extend information on the subjects and their certification details. You can easily view the course details, the eligibility criteria, admission process, fee structure, time duration etc. Moreover, you can even find the recognition details about the college and universities. In India, UGC (University Grants Commission) approves various government and private educational institutions like deemed universities, central universities etc.

In the country there are many fake universities, held by individuals or entrepreneurs and running engineering and medical courses without getting approved. Thus, you need to make a healthy search regarding their identity like keep a track at their affiliation, faculty, administration and fee structure. Make sure it answers your questions such as:
Is the University/College UGC recognized?
Is the fee structure worthy?
Is there a placement facility in major corporations?
Is the institution offering internships or training?
How is the faculty?
Is the curriculum justified?The country has strict legal management against these fake educational institutions. Lot of people regularly complain regarding this and there are professionals who help in sorting out with such problems. So, if you are looking for a recognized university then go online and search steadily for the UGC approved list of universities and colleges.

Madhav University Freedom Education (state Private Ugc Recognized University) – Allowing You To Lear

Education blogger

Learning at their own convenience is often the dream of working professionals. Many a working professional aspire to study further to enhance his or her career prospects, but is not able to do so because of a dearth of suitable education opportunities. Now their wait has ended, thanks to the Madhav University Freedom Education Industrial Integrated Learning Program(IILP).
The IILP offered by the Madhav University, Mount Abu, Rajasthan has come as a boon to working professionals, who can now work full time, while also getting a regular, full time, UGC recognized degree. One of the biggest advantages of this program is that working professionals need to attend only limited hours of classes for workshops and exams and need to attend the Industry/Corporate for practical knowledge.

Enabling this flexible learning opportunity is the use of cutting edge technology. For the first time in the country, the university has set up a virtual academy on cloud. Now students can use the versatility of cloud computing to learn a variety of topics on Management and IT – higher education, round the clock, throughout the year, across the globe. They can log on to the end-to-end education portal and can access any desired information, just a click. This perfect mix of classroom sessions and virtual learning platform leads to a full time, regular degree.

For the first time in the country, a state private university is offering such flexible for working professionals from the industry. The course curriculum has been designed keeping in mind the requirements of the industry. The courses, whether it is the Bachelor in Business Administration or the Masters in Business Administration, have been structured in such a way, to offer the perfect mix of theoretical inputs and practical exposure to what is happening currently in the industry. What this means is that the student passes out as an industry-ready professional, who is in tune with the latest happenings and need not be trained again, which in turn saves both money and time , for the company which he or she gets placed in, after completing the course and also adds value in his existing company.

Another first for the MUFreedom education academy is the presence of an expert corporate advisory board panel. This panel addresses the queries of students, while also handling mentoring sessions of students undergoing various courses. The advisory board consists of experts from the industry, who perfectly understand the requirements of the industry and can mentor the students accordingly.

As part of the courses, students get to choose different specializations or honors degree in a specific field in which he has practical experience unlike general degrees available with traditional universities.

Quality education in India is the hour of the need

Education blogger

Education is a new concept in India as it has always remained as an integral part of the Indian society. With the development of the modern India, education has taken a giant leap and it has caught the global attention not because of its illiteracy but the quality of education it promotes.

In the recent past the Indian economy has witnessed an immense growth due to the prospering literacy rates in the country. Since the times of ancient India when the concept of Gurukul was promoted to the present age where online education is gaining momentum; India has travelled far and across.

Let’s analyze the present and the future educational scenario of India-

Education in India

As per the present statistics, the primary education has crossed the mark of two-third of the total population. Out of which the 40% of the population still remains illiterate and it is only the remaining 20% of the lot that is attending the schools.

Since time immemorial the discrimination that happens on the basis of caste and gender has remained a major deterrent when it comes to healthy development of the society. To avoid such practices to take precedence, the Indian constitution has made the primary education as a compulsory form of education. It is compulsory for the children who fall in the bracket of 6 to 14 years to have education.

The university grants commission established by the Indian government focuses on increasing the level of higher education in the country. The role of UGC lies in controlling and coordinating the required standards of the country.

Present Scenario

To promote education in India, government has abolished child labor and stopped the children from working in unhealthy conditions. The enforcement is difficult to be applied completely due to poor economic conditions and social disparity. Some of the other reasons are lack of sufficient resources and lack of political support.

The government has initiated several programs to instigate the education system and make it reach to a wider section of people. There are programs that focus specially on girls and children who are handicapped or form poor financial backgrounds. However, in spite of the constant efforts to develop a qualitative education system, still there are some loopholes. Even after the bill passed by the right to education act India 2009, there are some loopholes and prejudices.

Education must be given importance as it is the one thing that no one can take away from you. You can always share your education with others and spreads the light of knowledge.

Visit us for more information on Right to Education

Approval For Ptus Distance Education Program By Ugc-aicte-dec Joint Committee

Education blogger

Punjab Technical University (PTU) has been a leading university in the country that is imparting quality education to the students. The university was granted the formal approval by the UGC-AICTE-DEC Joint Committee for all programs that are being offered through Distance Education program Mode. This approval came in the 35th meeting of the Committee that was held on 10th March, 2010 in New Delhi. It was stated that Distance Education courses and Online Education can be availed from everywhere and they would have no boundaries or state jurisdiction.

The Ministry of Human Resources, through its notification no 44, on date March 1, 1995, has clearly stated that all these courses are valid and all the qualifications awarded through Distance Education program by different universities automatically stand recognized for the purpose of employment in all state and state government establishments and also for higher courses.

To establish a better coordination among UGC, AICTE, and DEC, a Joint Committee of UGC-DEC-AICTE was formed by the MHRD. The MHRD also announced that it is mandatory for all universities to take formal approval from this Joint Committee of UGC-AICTE-SEC. All the universities offering Distance learning mode have been asked to submit fresh approval from this Committee.

Punjab Technical University, a state university recognized by the UGC, is also a member of the Association of Indian Universities (AIU). The university enjoys strength of over 3 lakh students and is busily offers Post Graduate and diploma courses in 10 disciplines. The various disciplines include IT, Management, Mass Communication, Biotechnology, Apparel and Fashion design, Hospitality and Journalism. Today, more than 288 colleges from all over the country are affiliated to PTU. The university imparts the Distance Education Courses through 1600 learning centers all over India.

According to the Vice Chancellor of Punjab Technical University Dr. Rajneesh Arora, the mission of PTU is to provide quality and standard technical education to the students through distance education programs. He said that the main challenge in accessing equality and quality in higher education in India can only be achieved through distance learning programs. These distance education courses enable the students to make easy access to quality self-learning material, and computer based tutorials. Learning Management System (LMS), personal learning programs at the learning centers and all this put together provides each and every student collaborative, placement-ready, and affordable learning. He added that the PTU is trying to achieve more heights in the field of education by preparing for accreditation of our DEP programs.

Dr. N. P. Singh, Dean EDP, PTU said that PTU has added various innovative inputs in the programs. According to him, the most important challenge is to conduct examination for the large number of students from all over the country. According to him, the PTU will be establishing technology centers at all the examination centers from where the questions would be delivered through the web without any human intervention. He added that the PTU is preparing to provide different question papers to the students sitting in the same examination hall. He said that we have ensured that adequate recourses are out to enhance the quality of the learning material and special emphasis will be laid to deliver non IT programs more effectively.

Shaping Higher Education in India

Education blogger

Dr Akhilesh Gupta

Secretary,

University Grants Commission

Dr Akhilesh Gupta obtained his MSc degree in Physics from Lucknow University and PhD in Atmospheric Sciences from IIT, Delhi. He joined India Meteorological Department in 1985 and worked there as Meteorologist until 1994. He then joined National Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting where he worked in the field of location specific weather forecasting and numerical weather modelling and coordinated All India Agro-advisory Service until 2006. Dr Gupta worked in the Disaster Management Cell of the Department of Science & Technology during 2006- 07. He worked as Advisor to the Union Minister for Science and Technology and Earth Sciences during 2007-09

What steps is the UGC taking to bring about improvement in overall quality of education?

The University Grants Commission (UGC) is an apex regulatory body on higher education in the country. It came into existence on 28th December, 1953 and became a statutory body of Government of India by an Act of Parliament in 1956. The main objective of the UGC is to work for the coordination, determination, and maintenance of standards of university education in the country. There are three broad goals of the higher education system in the country. These are: to ensure access or expansion (that aims to increase student enrolment), to impart quality or excellence in education and to provide equity to under-privileged sections of the society.

What steps is the UGC taking to monitor the educational institutions?

UGC constantly monitors the educational institutions to ensure that there is no compromise in terms of quality of education. UGC is committed to maintain the standard of education in the country. In a renewed effort to accelerate the pace of several reforms in higher education, the UGC has taken a number of significant initiatives in the recent past with a view of bringing about improvements in higher education. These include-UGC (Prevention of Caste-based Discrimination/ Harassment/Victimisation and Promotion of Equality in Higher Educational Institutions) Regulations, 2012; UGC (Establishment of Mechanism for Grievances Redressal) Regulations, 2012; UGC (Mandatory Assessment and Accreditation of Higher Educational Institutions) Regulations, 2012; UGC (Promotion and Maintenance of Standards on Academic Collaboration between Indian and Foreign Educational Institutions) Regulations, 2012; UGC Guidelines on Students’ Entitlements and Obligations, 2012; Introduction of Bachelor Degree in Vocational Course under the National Vocational Education Qualification Framework (NVEQF); Development of econtent in 77 Postgraduate Programmes under National Mission on Education through Information and Communication Technology (NME-ICT); Restoration of the autonomy of universities for seeking timely allocation of grants during the 12th Five-Year Plan; Innovation Universities; Joint Appointments; Anti Ragging Helpline and Web portal; Innovations and Reforms in the National Eligibility Test (NET); Introduction of Alternative Modes of Experimentation on Animals in Life-Sciences; Introduction of Electronic Repository of Research Thesis and Synopses; Inputs for the National Mission on Teachers and Teacher Education.

This decade was marked by an exponential increase in the number of student enrolMENTS in higher education Tell us about the interventions that UGC has made for the 12th Five Year Plan.

Some of the major interventions for the 12th Five Year Plan include, enhancing autonomy of universities through a mechanism of block grants for academic, research and innovations activities, differential funding provisions for under-graduate, post-graduate and Ph D students in an attempt to improve GER for higher education; performance linked funding based on designing appropriable ranking system for the universities; enhanced emphasis for support to state universities; on the excellence front, constituting empowered committees to create new schemes for knowledge generation through research; creation of expert subject panels to clear major and minor projects and for Quality Control Mechanism; overcoming near absence of good text books in Indian Languages and strengthening internationalisation of higher education including mobility of faculty and students. In discharge of its cardinal function of coordinating and maintaining standards of higher education, over the years, UGC has evolved a wide variety of programmes for realisation of the goals of higher education. Some of these have assumed -Flagship’ status as they focus on individual students, teachers, researchers, socially vulnerable groups, thematic priorities in teaching and research and institutions of higher learning, ranging from Departments and Colleges to Universities. Several compensatory interventions for marginalised sections of the society for enhancing their participation in higher education have been a special concern of these initiatives with a view to promote social equity. Establishment of Inter-University Centres has provided a fillip to make high-end research facilities and support to the Indian higher education system. Recently, the UGC has decided to launch an inspirational intervention through the establishment of Chairs in Honour of Nobel Laureates who have done our country proud. The UGC would endeavour to harness the indentified strength, channelise its resources and direct its efforts towards overcoming the perceived inadequacies. The Government of India has been taking a number of steps to bring improvement in the Gross Enrolment Ratio. Please provide us your views on this. Higher education in India has reported an impressive growth since independence. However, the last decade has witnessed an unprecedented expansion of higher education sector. This decade was marked by an exponential increase in the number of students enrolling into higher education; a quantum jump in the number of institutions including universities; and a substantive increase in public funding. The UGC has been contributing immensely to this growth in the higher education through various policies, programmes, academic reforms and administrative and financial support to the institutions. UGC has been working ceaselessly with the challenge of providing equal opportunity for quality higher education to ever-growing number of students while maintaining equity with the societal and sectoral diversity of the country. The other challenges include; reinvigorating institutions, achieving excellence of international benchmarks and extending frontiers of knowledge. Keeping these challenges in mind, the UGC aims at achieving rapid expansion for deepening excellence and providing equal access to quality higher education during the 12th Five Year Plan. There has been an unprecedented growth in the number of institutions in recent years. From nearly 250 universities in 2000-01, today we have as many as 700 degree awarding institutions in the country. Similarly there has been a three-fold increase in the number of colleges in the country from about 12,000 in 2000-01 to over 36,000 now. The number of students enrolling in higher education has also witnessed exponential growth during the last decade. This increase was also nearly three-fold from nearly eight million in 2000-01 to over 20 million now. There has been substantial progress in terms of overall Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER) in the country during the past five to six years. GER has increased from about 11 percent in 2005-06 to about 19 percent in 2012-13. Considering the present trend, both in terms of increase in number of institutions and students, the country is likely to touch a GER of 30 percent by 2020. There have been some concerns about lower student enrolment in certain fields of higher education as compared to others. These fields include Veterinary Science (0.14 percent), Agriculture (0.48 percent) and Law (1.84 percent). The UGC is endeavouring to promote students opting for such areas to achieve higher enrolment in such fields. There has also been considerable increase in the number of teachers in higher education in the country. There has been over two-fold increase in the number of teachers from nearly four lakh in 2000- 01 to over nine lakh now.

UGC at a glance In 1952, the Union Government decided that all cases pertaining to the allocation of grants-inaid from public funds to the Central Universities and other Universities and Institutions of higher learning might be referred to the University Grants Commission

UGC was formally inaugurated by late Shri Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, the then Minister of Education, Natural Resources and Scientific Research on 28th December 1953

The UGC, however, was formally established only in November 1956 as a statutory body of the Government of India through an Act of Parliament for the coordination, determination and maintenance of standards of university education in India

In order to ensure effective region-wise coverage throughout the country, the UGC has decentralised its operations by setting up six regional centres at Pune, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Bhopal, Guwahati and Bangalore

The head office of the UGC is located at Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg in New Delhi, with two additional bureaus operating from 35, Feroz Shah Road and the South Campus of University of Delhi as well eGovernance at UGC

Academic Jobs for NET/ SET/PhD Candidates e-SARTS Scholarship- Fellowship UGC NET Online and UGC NET Result UGC Faculty Recharge Programme e-Payment e-PG Pathshala

In your opinion what are the specific steps that can be taken to ensure that quality of education being offered in private institutions is up to the mark?

We have UGC (Establishment and Maintenance of Standards in Private Universities) Regulations, 2003, which helps in regulating educational standards in private universities. Private universities are generally established by a separate State Act. A private university is a unitary university having adequate facilities for teaching, research, examination and extension services. A private university established under a State Act is expected to operate ordinarily within the boundary of the State concerned. However, after the development of main campus, in exceptional circumstances, the university may be permitted to open off-campus centres, off-shore campuses and study centres after five years of its coming into existence. All the private universities are expected to conform to the relevant provisions of the UGC Act, 1956, as amended from time to time. However since these private universities are established through state act, it is the state governments concerned that also need to ensure that the quality of education being offered in their universities is up to the mark. UGC is in the process of bringing a new Regulation on Private Universities. What initiatives is UGC taking to ensure equity in higher education in the country? India is a young country, as 50 percent of the population is less than 25 years old; nearly 65 percent population is below 35. The true potential of the youth who dominate Indian population can be harnessed only through access to higher education. However, this effort will remain futile unless the social equity is nurtured adequately. Despite considerable efforts that are put in, the real potential of our youth belonging to the vulnerable sections of the society remains untapped. The UGC has always been giving considerable emphasis to greater participation of Scheduled Castes (SCs), Scheduled Tribes (STs), Minorities, Other Backward Classes (OBCs), Persons with Disabilities and Women in higher education. Some of the notable schemes of the UGC for nurturing societal equity for various beneficiary categories include Indira Gandhi PG Scholarship for Single Girl Child, Residential Coaching Academics for Minorities, Rajiv Gandhi National Fellowships for SCs and STs, and Maulana Azad National Fellowship for Minorities, Postdoctoral fellowships for SCs, STs, and Women, etc. Through these schemes, the UGC has supported nearly 19 lakh students from as many as over 6,500 institutions involving an expenditure of `4,684 crores in the recent past.

We are currently having a lot of discussion on allowing foreign universities. What is your view on allowing foreign universities to function in the country?

Since there is a bill pending with parliament on this issue, no decision has been taken by the government on allowing foreign universities to open their campuses in India. However, we have UGC (Promotion and Maintenance of Standards on Academic Collaboration between Indian and Foreign Educational Institutions) Regulations, 2012. Under this regulation, foreign institutions can have collaboration, partnership or twinning arrangement with any Indian educational institutions. For this only those foreign institutions which are accredited with the highest grade in their homeland will be allowed to have twinning arrangement with those Indian Institutions which are accredited by the nationally recognised accrediting agencies with a grade not less than B or its equivalent in respect of institutional accreditation or a threshold level of accreditation in respect of programme accreditation, as the case may be.

How is UGC planning to facilitate use of National Knowledge Network which connected the Institutes supported by UGC?

UGC has set up an Inter University Centre called the Consortium for Educational Communication, popularly known as CEC. The CEC has been established with the goal of addressing the needs of higher education through the use of powerful medium of television along with the appropriate use of emerging Information Communication Technology (ICT). Realising the potential and power of television to act as means of educational knowledge dissemination, UGC started the Countrywide Classroom Programme in the year 1984. Media centres were set up at various universities for production of educational programmes. In fact, the CEC has been set up to serve as a nodal agency to coordinate, guide and facilitate such educational programme production through its Media Centres.

What role can universities play in environment conservation?

Environmental conservation is not just a subject of education alone. It is linked to India’s civilisation ethos. India is one of the few countries in the world which has been traditionally following the path of environmental conservation and preservation. There is need to build the subject of environmental conservation in the curriculum so that students are made sensitive to these concerns. There are already a number of universities in India which have departments or centres focusing on earth and environmental sciences. It is expected that more and more universities and institutions may start setting up such centres in the future when the climate change may become more relevant in the time to come, especially when its impact would be felt in terms of increase in frequency and severity of extreme weather events and on socio-economic sectors like agriculture, water and human health.