“We are humbled that EW survey respondents have consistently ranked Institute of Chemical Technology (ICT) among India’s Top 5 public engineering and technology universities. Since establishment in 1933, the institute has evolved into a deemed university with three campuses in Mumbai, Marathwada and Bhubaneswar, providing education, training, research and industrial collaboration in chemical engineering, chemical technology, applied chemistry, pharmacy, biotechnology and bio-processing. Our alumni include industry stalwarts such as Prof. M.M. Sharma, Dr. R.A. Mashelkar, Mukesh Ambani, and the late Dr. Anji Reddy, and over 600 first generation entrepreneurs. As indicated by our high parameter scores, ICT provides industry-relevant curriculums with high priority given to industry interface and research. Therefore our graduates are not merely industry ready but also equipped to become entrepreneurs” — Prof. Aniruddha B. Pandit (centre right, second row) Vice Chancellor, Institute of Chemical Technology, Mumbai (2,981 students and 155 faculty)
Revolutionaries: the other story of how India won its freedom Sanjeev Sanyal Harper Collins Rs.599 Pages 351 To counter public amnesia the author uses the methodology of micro-history to intervene into the mainstream narrative of India’s freedom struggle as it has been ‘received’ since 1947 Reading this alternative history of how India won its freedom from British colonial rule, I was reminded of eminent British historian Prof. E.H. Carr’s pertinent monograph which posed the question What is History? And proceeded to opine that it “reflects one’s own position in time” and “what view we take of the society in which we live.” For economist Sanjeev Sanyal, “correcting” the mainstream narrative of India’s freedom movement is an important imperative. Several revolutionaries whose lives and activities are showcased are personalities that the generation described as midnight’s children, born in the independent Republic of India, are unfamiliar with. Some acquired national and international fame as iconic individuals who offered resistance to British imperial domination. A few were admired for their leadership and acts of exceptional courage in regional spaces. Unfortunately many others who suffered and sacrificed their lives for the country’s freedom, were marginalised or sidelined. Remarkably, Sanyal, to pen this alt history, visited sites of rebellion and underground activities countrywide and abroad, family homes, the Andaman Cellular Jail, prisons and sites of incarceration and torture. The author’s grievance is that “generations of Indians were sold a narrative where the contribution of these revolutionaries were shown to have been no more than random acts without coherent objectives, and, consequently, as having no impact on the course of events.” Post-independence school textbooks and national days he believes, exclusively highlight the role of Mahatma Gandhi’s ideology of non-violence and activities of Indian National Congress leaders. Other revolutionaries have been systematically marginalised, if not summarily dismissed by mainstream historians. Sanyal’s effort is to resurrect the heroic deeds of nationalists such as Lala Lajpat Rai, Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Bipin Chandra Pal. But why it should be at the cost of undermining the achievements of other leaders and freedom fighters is a moot question. To counter public amnesia, Sanyal uses the methodology of micro-history to intervene into the mainstream narrative of India’s freedom struggle as it has been ‘received’ since 1947. According to Sanyal, revolutionary resistance to British colonial administration, draconian repressive laws, physical torture, criminalisation and penalisation, was spread over at least three generations in the aftermath of the Sepoy Mutiny aka First War of Independence in 1857. But such often violent revolutionary resistance was by and large read as confined to regional areas and projected as individual acts of bravery linked to organised networks in Europe, America, Canada, Japan, even Russia. Japanese pan-asianism, Russian communism, German socialism, Italian facism and Irish nationalism are traced as influences on indigenous akhada culture represented by the Anushilan Samiti, Jugantar, Abhinav Bharat etc. Fragmented information about these revolutionary networks is pieced together alongside biographies of obscure as well as comparatively well-known revolutionaries including Aurobindo and Barin Ghosh, Vinayak Savarkar…
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi: I am an ordinary man — India’s struggle for freedom (1914-1948) Gopalkrishna Gandhi Aleph Book Company Rs.999 Pages 443 The dynamic flux of political, social and economic interventions together with Gandhiji’s relationships with hundreds of people demanded energies beyond the capacity of ordinary mortals A reviewer assessing the sequel to Gopalkrishna Gandhi’s edited ‘autobiography’ of Mahatma Gandhi cannot but be poignantly struck by the unique experiment which was the freedom movement of India, and exceptional values which animated the initiatives taken by the remarkably talented group of leaders who helmed the movement. The ethical energy and discernment which formed its core was of course embodied in the person of Mahatma Gandhi, who created and shaped the most original resistance strategy against colonial rule. Culled by his grandson from Gandhi’s own words as recorded in letters, or by his contemporaries or in the Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, this book offers a ringside view of the unfolding events, even as it connects with the day-to-day affairs of Gandhi’s immediate and extended family members and ashram associates. The first volume covered, as suggested by the title, Gandhi’s early life and the years in South Africa until his decision to return home via London. This second volume attempts to thread together events encapsulating the decades from the beginning of World War I to his assassination on January 30, 1948. In terms of dwellings alone, these years witnessed establishment of ashrams at Kochrab and by the Sabarmati River in Ahmedabad, and others in Wardha and Sevagram near Nagpur. In terms of Gandhi’s engagement with writing, they cover the inception and running of journals Young India, Navajivan and Harijan, besides authoring books including My Experiments with Truth, Satyagraha in South Africa, the interpretation of the Bhagwad Gita, prolific correspondence, speeches and many resolutions he was called upon to draft. The span of major political interventions includes the Champaran Satyagraha; Ahmedabad mill workers Satyagraha; Bardoli Satyagraha; non-cooperation movement; Khilafat Movement; Salt Satyagraha; and the Quit India Movement. These movements meant imprisonment for long spells of time which, despite restrictions, gave Gandhi the solitude and time to catch up on reading and learning languages. His initiatives for social uplift cover the Khadi movement; Harijan Seva Sangh for eradication of untouchability and caste discrimination; the life-long struggle for Hindu-Muslim unity which culminated in the heroic one-man stand against mindless slaughter in the eastern States of Bengal and Bihar during the months before and after the Partition of the country, leading up to the final, tragic sacrifice in Delhi. This dynamic flux of political, social, economic and spiritual interventions together with Gandhiji’s relationships with the several hundreds of people involved must have demanded energies beyond the capacity of ordinary mortals. Moreover lodged at Yerawada Jail in solitary confinement in his very first jail term in India, Gandhiji caught up on his reading. The vast reading inventory comprising more than 150 books provides an indication of his formidable capacity to apply himself to tasks. Richly detailed, such…
Shivani Chaturvedi In the bustling city of Chennai, nestled within the vibrant community of the House of Hiranandani’s integrated township at Old Mahabalipuram Road, popularly known as OMR, lies a beacon of educational excellence – Hiranandani Upscale School (HUS). Established in the year 2011 by the visionary Surendra Hiranandani, HUS stands tall as a distinguished educational institution, proudly offering the globally renowned International Baccalaureate (IB) continuum program. The school’s objective is to provide a superior educational experience that nurtures young minds to flourish academically and personally within a supportive environment. Leading the institution with a wealth of experience is Sivakumar Srinivasan, the Director of HUS. With nearly two decades in the education sector, Srinivasan’s journey began as a physics teacher in 1998. Over the years, he has held various leadership roles, earning accolades such as the American Classroom Teaching Excellence Award in 2008 and the esteemed Best Principal Award in 2022. Spread across a sprawling 3-acre campus, HUS boasts 55 spacious classrooms equipped with LCD projectors, creating an ideal environment for immersive learning experiences. The campus also features specialised facilities including laboratories, libraries, outdoor gaming areas, and multimedia rooms to cater to diverse educational needs. In line with its commitment to inclusivity, HUS recently inaugurated a Special Education Needs (SEN) department, staffed with qualified experts to provide personalized support to students with diverse learning requirements. This dedicated space underscores the school’s dedication to creating an inclusive and supportive learning environment. Beyond academics, HUS prioritises holistic development through a rich tapestry of extracurricular activities. From sports like football, karate, and gymnastics to arts and design programs, students are encouraged to explore their passions and talents. A distinguishing feature of HUS is its adoption of the globally renowned International Baccalaureate (IB) continuum program. With IB-trained teachers experienced in international school curricula, HUS ensures a world-class education that prepares students for success on an international level. The school’s commitment to excellence is evident in its numerous achievements, including receiving the prestigious SDG Hero award for incorporating UN Sustainable Development Goals into its curriculum. Moreover, HUS students consistently excel in academics, sports, and co-curricular activities, showcasing the school’s dedication to nurturing well-rounded individuals. The integration of technology into teaching and learning further enhances the educational experience, with platforms like ManageBac and Kognity providing interactive and engaging tools for student enrichment. In terms of support services, HUS offers ESL programs, remedial education, and comprehensive student well-being services including counseling and medical care. Additionally, the school places a strong emphasis on professional development for teachers, ensuring they stay abreast of the latest teaching methodologies and technologies. Sivakumar Srinivasan, the Director of HUS says, “Our school excels in teaching and assessment across all three IB programs: the Primary Years Programme (PYP), the Middle Years Programme (MYP), and the Diploma Programme (DP). In each program, the school prioritise comprehensive evaluation methods that foster continuous improvement and independent learning. a) DP (Diploma Programme): Coordinated Curriculum Delivery: The DP Coordinator and Associate Coordinator oversee curriculum delivery, ensuring timely student work…
Dr Larry Arnn, President, Hillsdale College, USA Students in elite institutions are highly privileged. Why do they not spend this precious time, while they are young and full of energy, learning about the world instead of fomenting riots to change it? Many of the most prestigious American universities have become dysfunctional during the past month. They have been unable to control violence on their campuses. Several haven’t held in-person classes for fear that some students will be threatened or harmed by others. The immediate cause of these eruptions is the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza. As I write this, the situation is going out of control. A Jewish student has been stabbed in the eye at Yale. Protesters encampments have been set up in Columbia and several other elite universities. In some cases, they are set up along the path that visiting admission candidates take through the campus, and they feature anti-Semitic posters. Groups of students have locked arms across one of the main pathways into campuses holding signs that Jews may not enter. Institutions of higher learning, supposed to be havens of reason and calm, have been taken over by riot and disorder The immediate solution is clear: students who obstruct academic work of a college/university should be arrested forthwith. Universities have a right to do their work and those who seek to stop them violate that right. At the University of Texas, protesters who disrupted the campus were quickly hauled up by the police. This should be done in all cases. The causes underlying these protests are deep and grave. Students in elite institutions are highly privileged people. They live in comfort and have tremendous opportunities to learn. Why do they not spend this precious time, while they are young and full of energy, learning about the world instead of fomenting riots to change it? To condemn Israel, or Hamas, requires one to be aware of facts and principles that universities exist to teach. What is the history of the modern Middle East? How did Israel come into being? How Gaza? How is Israel governed? How is Gaza? What are the stated aims of Hamas? Of Israel? What are human rights? Wonderful things have been written over ages about all these subjects, and an institution of higher learning is the very place to explore these issues. One fact among many that will emerge from any serious study of the history of the modern Middle East is that most of its countries emerged after World War I and the fall of the Ottoman Empire. During that war, Britain and France made commitments to Arabs and Jews that if they joined the fight against Germany and Turkey, they would be given homelands in the Middle East. Thus Israel and Iraq, for example, were born following these promises. Knowledge of these facts might give violent protesters pause, and that is just one of the many facts the protesters need to know. These are serious questions and addressing them will lead one to…
By integrating alternative energy education into school curricula we must raise a generation with an informed and proactive mindset towards environmental stewardship In the wake of escalating greenhouse emissions and climate change impacts, as Planet Earth inches closer to the critical temperature rise threshold of 1.5oC above pre-industrial levels, the urgency to pivot towards sustainable practices has never been more pronounced. An urgent requirement is introduction of alternative energy as a core subject in schools, emphasizing not just the importance of sustainability but ingraining it as a way of life for future generations. Urgency of climate action. Breach of the 1.5oC threshold is not a distant threat but a looming reality, signalling a red alert for humanity’s impact on Earth. This milestone, once considered a limit to avoid catastrophic climate change, is now a benchmark we are dangerously close to surpassing. The urgency for immediate and sustained action has become imperative especially for the younger generation, who will inherit the consequences of today’s decisions. Understanding alternative energy. Alternative energy means generating electricity from renewable sources such as solar, wind, hydroelectric, biomass etc. These sources not only offer an endless supply of energy but also present a pathway to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, combat global warming, and safeguard the planet. Educating students about alternative energy sources, their benefits, and critical role in combating climate change is a necessary first step towards a sustainable future. Need for early education in sustainability. Youth is the springboard of change. Training students early ensures that sustainability is embedded in all forms of their lifestyle and comes naturally to them. By integrating alternative energy education into school curricula, we can raise a generation with an informed and proactive mindset towards environmental stewardship. Such education goes beyond textbooks, encouraging students to think critically about energy consumption, conservation, and the impact of their actions on the health of Planet Earth. Curriculum integration: a multidisciplinary approach. Inclusion of alternative energy education in the curriculum requires adoption of a multidisciplinary approach, integrating STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) with social studies, economics, and ethics. Such a comprehensive framework allows students to explore the technical mechanics of solar panels, wind turbines, and hydroelectric power plants, conterminously with study of environmental ethics of energy consumption and economic principles underpinning a green economy. Hands-on projects and experiments can bring these concepts to life, allowing students to experience the tangible impact of alternative energy solutions. Through project-based learning and community initiatives, students can experience the tangible benefits of sustainable practices, inspiring them to adopt and advocate green solutions to communities and society. Career pathways and skill development. Introducing alternative energy as a subject in K-12 education will not only raise awareness, it will also create new career pathways for students. The renewable energy industry is rapidly growing and is poised to become a major employer in future decades. By acquiring early exposure to this subject, students can develop the skills and knowledge necessary to pursue careers in renewable energy, environmental sciences and sustainability. The…
Dr. Jagdish Gandhi, founder-manager of the City Montessori School (CMS), Lucknow, who passed away in January 2024 at age 89 is mourned by thousands of school leaders, teachers and students countrywide whose lives he touched. The major legacy he has left behind is 65 years of relentless effort to promote global citizenship education. Born in 1934 as Jagdish Agarwal in Aligarh, Uttar Pradesh, in class X he read an essay by Mahatma Gandhi on how students should spend their summer vacations. This prompted him to begin social service activities such as sensitising people about the ill-effects of alcohol and gambling in neighbouring villages which gradually led to people naming him ‘Jagdish Gandhi’, a nomenclature he proudly adopted and persisted with lifelong. Another formative influence was a speech ‘Necessity of World Government’ by Raja Mahendra Pratap Singh which left a lasting impression on young Jagdish, who became convinced that the world needed global governance to become peaceful and prosperous. Burning with zeal to change the world, against the wishes of his family he enrolled in Lucknow University where his simple living and high thinking won him the post of president of Lucknow University’s Students Union in 1958. In July 1959, he co-promoted CMS, Lucknow with wife Bharti. The founding motto of the school inspired by Mahatma Gandhi and Vinoba Bhave’s teachings was ‘Jai Jagat’ (‘victory to the world’). Since then, CMS has steadily evolved into the world’s largest one-city primary-secondary school (certified by Guinness World Records) with an enrolment of 65,000 students in 21 campuses across Lucknow. In 1969, he ventured into politics to give wing to his passion for a world government to establish global peace and harmony, and was elected to the Uttar Pradesh legislative assembly. In December of 1974 at a World Peace Through Education conference in London which the duo organised and which attracted participants from 47 countries, Jagdish and Bharti learned about the scripture of the Baha’i Faith which also envisions global governance, peace, spirituality and virtuous living. However, the tenets of the Baha’i creed discourage followers from engaging in party-politics, prompting Dr. Gandhi to abjure politics forever. Freed from the preoccupations of politics, Dr. Gandhi set about expanding CMS and investing its students with human and spiritual education, with strong emphasis on global citizenship. In the mid-1990s, he constructed a World Unity Convention Centre on all CMS campuses to host annual international events for school contingents from all states of the Indian Union and foreign countries. While these assemblies were subject-focused (e.g, GEOFEST for geography; MACFAIR for computers; IYMC or International Youth Mathematics Convention, etc), a prime objective was to promote cross-cultural understanding and harmony among children from India’s 29 states and countries abroad. Dr. Gandhi’s legendary warmth and hospitality and the growing reputation of these events attracted children from across India and between five-30 foreign countries at 20 annual festivals convened in CMS. From 1999, Dr. Gandhi also introduced an annual International Conference of Chief Justices of the World to bring the world’s judiciary…
Noida-based Ayaan Suri and Shaurya Mahajan — members of Team Quadrex — are the newly crowned under-14 junior champions of RoboCup Asia-Pacific (RCAP) 2023, staged between December 5-9 (2023) at the Alpensia Convention Center in Pyeongchang, South Korea. Team Quadrex was among six teams invited from five countries to compete in RCAP 2023, after winning the RoboCup India nationals in Pune last February. Organised by California-based RoboCup Federation, the RoboCup Asia-Pacific competition (estb.1997) is an annual event staged with the objective of attracting young techies from primary-secondary schools worldwide to showcase their talents in designing and building high productivity robots. Thirteen-year-olds Ayaan and Shaurya, class VIII students of Noida’s Shiv Nadar School — ranked among India’s Top 10 co-ed day schools in the recent EducationWorld India School Rankings 2023-24 — have enthusiastically taken to computer programming and robotics which are on the curriculum for all children from class V onwards. “We began learning about robots using Lego EV3 software. By class VII, we felt confident enough to participate in our first robotics competition — the World Robotics Olympiad (WRO), and successfully advanced to the national level. We are very grateful to our computer science, robotics teacher-mentors Kamini Sharma, Ganga Subramanian, and Pallavi Saran for their invaluable support and encouragement,” says Ayaan. Last year’s RCAP 2023 required competing teams to develop an autonomous program and a robot capable of independently executing a rescue mission for trapped trekkers within an eight-minute deadline. During this short time, the robot was required to navigate challenging terrain following a black line and avoiding obstacles to rescue the trekkers and transport them to a secure evacuation zone. Looking ahead, the duo is assiduously preparing for the 2024 edition of RoboCup Asia-Pacific after having qualified in the Nationals held in February this year. “After Plus Two, we intend to expand our knowledge in STEM subjects along with robotics,” says Shaurya, echoing his teammate’s sentiments. Fair winds!
Mumbai-based music prodigy Ayaan Deshpande (10) has sprung into the global limelight. Last August, he was adjudged winner in piano proficiency and composition at the Golden Key Music Festival, Vienna. This qualified him to perform at the winners’ Gala Concert held at the majestic Ehrbar Hall — once the concert venue for 19th century Western classical composers Brahms, Bruckner and Mahler — and at the World Composers’ Concert at Bosendorfer Hall in Mozarthaus (Mozart’s residence). Last October, Ayaan was conferred the Unstoppable 21 Award of the Times of India. Ayaan’s music education began when he was merely five, with Indian classical vocal music. He however, was attracted to Western classical music and loved listening to Fur Elise, Mozart’s Sonata and Turkish March on YouTube. Inspired by these great compositions, Ayaan started playing a 61-key junior electric keyboard in 2020, a gift from his parents during the Covid-19 pandemic. “I started learning to play the keyboard by following YouTube tutorials. Soon, I graduated to the Synthesia app, a digital keyboard training platform,” recalls Ayaan. When Ayaan turned seven (2021), his father enrolled him in the Symphony Orchestra of India (SOI) Music Academy of the National Center for Performing Arts (NCPA), Mumbai, under the tutelage of Kazakh pianist Aida Bisengalieva. Within six months of tutorials and online classes, Bisengalieva became aware of Ayaan’s extraordinary musical talent and informed his parents. Based on Aida’s assessment, Ayaan’s father Tanmay Deshpande, a mathematician at Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, and his software engineer mother Ashwini, decided to homeschool Ayaan, then a class III student attending online school, to facilitate his learning and practice. Since his solo debut at NCPA in July 2022, Ayaan has performed before several musical maestros. This January, he did a gig with Jazz legends Herbie Hancock and Dianne Reeves. “All my achievements are thanks to my supportive parents, my piano teacher Aida, and Marat Sensei, music director of the SOI Academy,” says Ayaan who is currently preparing for the annual SOI concert. Clearly this young maestro is cut out for great things! Nasrin Modak Siddiqi (Mumbai)
An alum of the top-ranked Georgia Tech University and Stanford University, USA, Raghav Himatsingka is founder-CEO of the Mumbai-based Raising Superstars Pvt. Ltd and inventor of the Prodigy Baby app that arouses the latent potential of 0-6 year-old children. Excerpts from an online interview: (see https://www.educationworld.in/ew-interview-raghav-himatsingka-co-founder-raising-superstars/) An engineering graduate with a postgrad degree in management from Stanford, you have transformed into an evangelist of early childhood care and education. What’s the explanation of this career switch? It all happened at a time when I was deeply concerned about my child’s well-being, his education, his future amid the Covid pandemic lockdown. Earlier after completing my higher studies at Georgia Tech and Stanford universities, I returned to India and joined the family business. Later I founded my own travel & logistics company, Truckola. But when Covid hit, it also massively hit the transport and logistics industry and I was compelled to shut down the company. Consequently, I left Mumbai and moved back to Kolkata with my parents. Around the same time, I also became a father. With all this at the top of my mind, I started Prodigy Baby as a small business to sustain my family and myself. Now four years on, how satisfied are you with the progress of the company? Raising Superstars is a category creator and category leader. There’s no such company in the world at our scale doing what we are doing. There are many physical spaces but nothing in the online world. We are blessed to have 300,000 lifetime parent members in 167 countries worldwide. We have a headcount of 67 employees and half of our business revenue comes from India, and the other half from abroad. Is it like an online class for parents? No, it’s not an online class. The way it works is we provide instructions to parents on some activities they should do with infants through pre-recorded videos of 7-8 minutes. You watch the video, and know precisely what you have to do. Each activity presented for children takes less than 5 minutes in a day. There’s no screen time for the child because we believe that it’s super evil for infants. The app is only for parents. What is the price range of your videos? The price differs from country to country because our costs of production differ. In India, it starts from Rs.500 and could go up to Rs.1.5 lakh for the entire program. What outcomes can parents and infants expect from this app? We never promise that your child will get into IIT or Stanford. Our purpose is to enable babies to realise the best version of their talents and potential. The Prodigy Baby framework is a holistic system to develop whole skills at the foundational level. For example, babies that follow our programs do belly crawling at three months instead of the usual eight months. Their speaking, language, reading, math, memory development, creativity, and problem-solving skills will develop earlier than the norm, including character traits such as persistence,…
There’s something not quite right about the endless rounds of cricket matches, sports, games and entertainment being served up to the Indian public. Currently, IPL T20 cricket matches are attracting crowds upward of 50,000-60,000 every evening in specially constructed stadia across the country, with matches ending near midnight. Moreover, several multiples of the huge in-stadia crowds, including young children, follow T20 matches on television. Five days after the IPL tournament ends on May 26, the World Cup T20 tournament being staged in the Caribbean and for the first time in the US to be played out over 29 days, will begin. And shortly after, the Paris Olympic Games which will serve up 15 days of globally televised international track and field competitive events, will start. At a time when India aspires to transform into a $30 trillion economy by 2047 (from the current $4 trillion), the population is being distracted, if not debilitated, by ceaseless rounds of entertainment on 226 million television sets installed in 217 of the country’s 280 million households. Add to this smartphone addiction suffused with audio-visual entertainment reels. Every day, entertainment weary managers, workers and students are staggering into offices, factories and classrooms, minds buzzing with entertainment. In his classic 19th century treatise Decline & Fall of the Roman Empire, historian Edward Gibbon attributed addiction to ‘circuses’, i.e, entertainment of the general populace, as a major cause of the fall of mighty Roman Empire overrun by Goths, Vandals and barbarians in 476 century AD. “The most lively and splendid amusement of the idle multitude depended on the frequent exhibition of public games and spectacles… From the morning to the evening, careless of the sun or of the rain, the spectators, who sometimes amounted to the number of 400,000, remained in eager attention; their eyes fixed on the horses and charioteers, their minds agitated with hope and fear for the success of the colours which they espoused; and the happiness of Rome appeared to hang on the event of a race.” All this while a greedy ruling elite indulged itself even as barbarians were at the gates. It’s important to learn lessons from history.
Love of luxury and ostentation in a country where nearly a billion citizens struggle for two square meals per day eking out nasty, brutish and too long lives, often — perhaps not often enough — leads to downfall. The precipitate fall of KC Chandrasekar Rao, who successfully carved Telangana out from the composite state of Andhra Pradesh and gifted it and the prized city of Hyderabad to the people of that region as recently as 2014, is a latter day morality tale. After serving two terms as chief minister, KCR was roundly trounced in the legislative election of November 2023. During his second term, KCR began to entertain delusions of grandeur. He believed his service to the people entitled him to build a Xanadu-style palace at public expense. In 2016, Pragati Bhavan, a vastu-compliant home with bullet proof windows and toilets was constructed in Hyderabad at a cost of Rs.50 crore on a nine-acre plot with a built-up area of 100,000 sq.ft. The budgeted cost of Rs.35 crore spiralled because no expense was spared on fixtures, fittings and frills. A year earlier, four Toyota Prado SUVs and a Mercedes-Benz Bus were purchased for inclusion in his convoy that transported him everywhere. Moreover, his son KT Rama Rao and daughter K. Kavitha were appointed cabinet ministers. All this lavish expenditure was funded by the people of Telangana (pop.35 million). Little wonder this megalomaniac was ousted from office by the state’s electorate last year. Such effete epicureanism is common within Indian politicians. Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal elected on an anti-corruption platform, also constructed a Rs.50 crore super deluxe Sheesh Mahal to rest his weary head. Now he is cooling his heels in a tiny cell in Tihar jail after every tribunal, including the Supreme Court, denied him bail. Yet unlike the situation in communist and third world dictatorships, thanks to a free press and media, the excesses of India’s venal politicians luxuriating at public expense are outed. Citizens! Speak up to protect freedom of the press. It’s under threat. Also read: Telangana: BJP vows to enact UCC, offer free laptops to college-going girls
A crass remark or provocative statement can change the outcome of a general election. In 2014, Congress worthy Mani Shankar Aiyar’s too clever by half witticism that Narendra Modi, the son of an OBC tea vendor at a railway station who had worked his way up the social and political ladder and served three successful terms as BJP chief minister of Gujarat state should be serving tea in Congress Bhavan, Delhi, instead of aspiring to become India’s prime minister, cost the Congress party millions of votes and contributed heavily to BJP sweeping General Election 2014. But two-term prime minister Modi doesn’t seem to have learned the lesson of Aiyar’s monumental faux pas. Delivering an election speech in Rajasthan on April 21, Modi warned the audience that if Congress is voted to power, it will confiscate the wealth of the Hindu majority and distribute it to “people who have many children” and to Muslim refugees from neighbouring countries. Such crass demonisation of the minority Muslim community by an incumbent prime minister has dismayed not a few Modi supporters as conduct unbecoming of an incumbent prime minister with global acceptability aspirations. Certainly, Modi’s intemperate remarks are likely to cost the BJP votes in substantial numbers. However, whatever electoral mileage the Congress may have derived from the PM’s shockingly divisive remarks, may well be cancelled by Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s promise to revert to arid neta-babu socialism of post-independence India, and to conduct a national caste census.This irremovable Congress party leader also seems to have learned little from recent history. Alas, in India’s cancel politics culture, the voter invariably has to choose the lesser evil. Also read: Elections must reflect will of all people
The annual EducationWorld India Higher Education Rankings provide comprehensive league tables ranking the country’s Top 500 arts, science and commerce colleges, Top 100 private engineering colleges, Top 300 government and private universities in 15 discrete categories, and Top 100 private B-schools. However, these are all-inclusive rankings rating the most well-reputed higher ed institutions across several subject study programmes. In 2021, in response to public feedback and demand for rankings of education institutions by popular professional undergraduate programmes, EducationWorld introduced rankings of Top 10 higher ed institutions that provide the most popular bachelor’s degree programmes. In EWIHER 2024-45, to rate and rank colleges and universities offering most favoured undergrad study programmes, EducationWorld used secondary data sources, and published reports to shortlist ten most popular undergrad courses and colleges offering them. The most preferred undergraduate programmes are: B.Com (banking and finance); bachelor of management studies (BMS)/bachelor of business administration (BBA); B.Arch (bachelor of architecture); BA-LLB (bachelor of law); B.Sc (nursing); B.Tech/BE (biotechnology); B.Tech (data science); B.Tech/BE (computer science); B.Sc (agriculture); BJMC (bachelor of journalism & mass communication). Please note in the streams of computer science, data science and biotechnology, only private higher institutions are ranked. To conduct this survey, AZ Research Partners Pvt. Ltd personnel interviewed 2,100 higher education faculty, students and industry representatives to rate the Top 10 undergrad colleges under six-nine parameters of higher education excellence. In the following pages, we present league tables ranking India’s Top 10 colleges providing the most popular undergrad study programmes. BA.LLB (Bachelor of arts-bachelor of legislative law) B.Tech/BE (computer science) “We are very pleased that our B.Tech program in computer science is ranked most popular for the third year in a row. Our excellent faculty, curriculum and pedagogy, and infrastructure is reflected in our high scores under these parameters. Our flexible, well-rounded, research-driven curriculum encourages peer-learning and learning-by-doing, and even our undergraduate students work on research projects. Starting this year, we will be awarding credits to students working in summer months on ongoing research projects. We have also created a Division for Flexible Learning to coordinate and deliver online and flexible programmes. Moreover, IIIT-H is launching a new integrated program that combines B.Tech in computer science with a Master of science in geospatial informatics by research” — Prof. Kishore Kothapalli, Dean (Academics) and Dr. Suresh Purini, Head, Computer Systems Group, Indian Institute of Information Technology (IIIT)-Hyderabad “We are thrilled that our BE (computer science) programme is ranked among India’s Top 5. There’s growing awareness countrywide of RVCE’s sharp focus on experiential learning and skill development. Moreover as our high score on the parameter of infrastructure shows, we provide state-of-the-art academic facilities and research labs. In the recent past, 27 Centres of Excellence in niche disciplines including macroelectronics, Internet of Things, computational genomics and robotics and automation, among others, have been established. It is this focus on extending opportunities to learn newest technologies that is behind our higher rank this year” — Prof. K.N. Subramanya, Principal, RV College of Engineering, Bengaluru B.Arch (Bachelor of architecture)…
Samsung’s Solve for Tomorrow initiative New delhi, april 10. Samsung India, the well-known subsidiary of the Seoul-based Samsung Eletronics Co Ltd, announced the third edition of its flagship CSR initiative — ‘Solve for Tomorrow’, in collaboration with IIT-Delhi, the Union ministry of electronics & information technology, and United Nations (India). The objective of the ‘Solve for Tomorrow’ programme is to “usher in a culture of innovative thinking and problem solving among the country’s youth”. This year, the ‘Solve for Tomorrow’ programme has introduced new School Track and Youth Track initiatives. School Track is designed for students aged 14-17, and focuses on the theme ‘Community and Inclusion’. School teams presenting the best project prototype for uplifting underprivileged groups, improving accessibility to health and social inclusion, will receive a Rs.25 lakh grant. Youth Track targets individuals aged 18-22, with a focus on ‘Environment and Sustainability’. The team presenting best prototype for reducing carbon footprint, protecting the environment and promoting sustainability, will be awarded Rs.50 lakh. “At Samsung, we strive to inspire and shape the future through innovative ideas and transformative technologies. Our mission revolves around fostering the next generation of innovators and catalysts for social change. Solve for Tomorrow is truly shaping up as a platform for India’s youth to come forward with meaningful innovations that can improve the lives of people,” said J.B. Park, president & CEO, Samsung Southwest Asia, speaking on the occasion. Exeter U Award Delhi, may 2. The University of Exeter, (UK) announced an India Global Leaders Award (valued at £3,000) which can be combined with the already established Global Excellence Award (£7,500) which has helped students worldwide study in the UK. This new scholarship means a student can potentially be awarded over £10,000 in scholarships to fund a Masters programme at Exeter, starting September this year. According to a university press note, these scholarships are offered for a range of programmes in business management, economics, accounting & finance, computer science, engineering, law, sports science, humanities and social sciences, health sciences, psychology, among others. “At the University of Exeter, we are proud to host students from over 150 countries, and we are fully committed to making studying in the UK as accessible as possible. We fully appreciate the value that students from India bring when they choose to study with us, and I am delighted we are able to offer additional support through our Global Leaders Scholarship to continue to attract the very best students,” says Victoria Isherwood, Director of Student Recruitment. Kulish School, Jaipur Jaipur, april 30. Patrika Group, publisher of the Rajasthan Patrika (estb.1956) and Patrika dailies in north India, launched the Kulish School, Jaipur (KSJ) in memory of Karpoor Chandra Kulish (1926-2006), founder of the Patrika Group of publications. The school was formally inaugurated by Jagdeep Dhankar, Vice President of India. “This school is Rajasthan’s pride, a priceless diamond and a lasting investment in the future and history of education,” said the Vice President, speaking on the occasion. “To Kulish Ji, education meant skilled and…
Maharashtra Minority schools review call Thane, april 15. The Maharashtra State Commission for Protection of Child Rights (MSCPCR) urged reform in the policy of awarding minority status to private educational institutions. “Educational institutions cannot misuse the policy and do injustice to minority communities. The state government should determine a minimum percentage of minority students while granting licenses to such schools. Moreover, schools that have been granted minority status should be inspected regularly,” said Susieben Shah, the commission’s chairperson, addressing the state education ministry. MSCPCR has received several complaints about schools in Mumbai city and suburbs denying admission to poor children citing exempt minority status, Shah added. Jharkhand Class X pass dip Ranchi, april 19. The percentage of children who passed the class X state board examination declined this year with 90.39 percent students declared successful, compared with 95.78 percent last year. According to the Jharkhand Academic Council, a total of 205,110 students passed in first division, 153,733 in the second and 19,555 in the third division. East Singhbhum, Hazaribag and Giridih were the top three districts in terms of pass percentage. “The department will soon launch a scheme for children in districts that did not perform well. A detailed study of schools will be conducted and steps taken to improve learning outcomes,” said Uma Shankar Singh, school education secretary, addressing the media. Mizoram Misconduct charges Aizawl, april 16. Chief Minister Lalduhoma has ordered a probe into alleged irregularities in the civil service examination conducted by the Mizoram Public Service Commission (MPSC) last October. Former chief secretary and MPSC chairman M. Lalmanzuala has been appointed to conduct a preliminary inquiry into alleged irregularities, says an order issued by the state vigilance department. “The allegations are not confined to misconduct under civil service laws, but also seem to be violations of penal laws, which necessitate a thorough preliminary inquiry to initiate timely action,” said the order. Mizo Zirlai Pawl (MZP), the state’s apex student body, has launched an agitation at the MPSC office demanding resignation of the commission’s chairperson J.C. Ramthanga over the alleged irregularities. H. Lalthianghlima, MZP president, alleged that marks obtained by some candidates were altered on answer papers and tabulation sheets using correcting fluid. MZP has also received many complaints from students about their marks, Lalthianghlima said. Uttar Pradesh AMU vice chancellor appointment row Aligarh, april 22. Dr. Naima Khatoon was appointed Vice Chancellor of Aligarh Muslim University (AMU, estb.1875), the first woman appointed to this apex-level position. Dr. Khatoon’s appointment was approved by President Droupadi Murmu, Visitor of the university. Khatoon’s husband, Prof. Mohammad Gulrez, was Acting (interim) Vice Chancellor of AMU last year after VC Tariq Mansoor resigned from the post following his nomination to the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Council. Dr. Khatoon’s nomination had triggered a controversy with some university officials alleging conflict of interest. Last October, the 27-member Executive Council (EC) shortlisted five of 20 eligible applicants. In a letter to President Murmu, Mujahid Beg, one of the applicants whose name was not shortlisted, called for…
“The protests are a product of that suffocating sense of thwarted political agency that a lot of young people feel… The students are, perhaps inchoately, attempting that work of moral repair.” Pratap Bhanu Mehta, former president, Centre Policy Research, on pro-Palestinian student protests at US university campuses (Indian Express, April 24) “The share of youth with secondary and high-school education who are unemployed has increased from 35.2 percent in 2000 to 65.7 percent in 2022.” Ajay Chhibber, co-author Unshackling India, presenting an agenda for the next government (Business Standard, April 26) “The Act has faced three broad challenges. First, at the administrative level, there has been a noticeable increase in harassment and evictions of street vendors, despite the Act’s emphasis on their protection and regulation.” Aravind Unni, urban practitioner-researcher & Shalini Sinha, Asia strategist at the Urban Policies Program, WIEGO, on implementation of the Street Vendors Act 2014 (The Hindu, May 1) “Five high courts – Allahabad, Punjab and Haryana, Gujarat, Bombay and Calcutta – have reportedly 171 vacancies as of April 1, 2024, accounting for over 52 percent of total vacancies of 327 posts in 25 high courts. Sanctioned strength of judges across all high courts is 1,114, and 29.4 percent of positions are vacant.” Editorial titled ‘Fix the judicial supply-demand gap’ (The Economic Times, May 4) “The Prime Minister’s tirade against the Opposition and the minority community only shows that he has no positive issues to persuade them to vote for him. His statements clearly fall foul of the Model Code of Conduct and also amount to corrupt practice as declared by the Supreme Court… If he ceases to be the role model, nothing will be left of our great democracy.” Dushyant Dave, senior advocate (The Hindu, May 6)
Despite a plethora of legislation including the Indian Penal Code 1860, Juvenile Justice (Care & Protection of Children) Act, 2000 and the RTE Act, 2009 expressly prohibiting corporal punishment of children, the ancient tradition of teachers inflicting physical punishment for real and imagined misbehaviour is widespread in India’s 1.60 million schools. Reports of teachers inflicting cruel and unusual punishment on hapless children are commonplace in daily newspapers. The majority of school teachers seem unaware that s.17 of the Right of Children to Free & Compulsory Education (RTE) Act, 2009, expressly prohibits all corporal punishment — and mental cruelty — to children. On April 25, Justice S.M. Subramaniam of the Madras high court issued an unambiguous directive to the Tamil Nadu state government to implement the Guidelines for Elimination of Corporal Punishment in Schools (GECP) framed by the Delhi-based National Commission for the Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) to safeguard the physical and mental health and well-being of 5.26 million children across the state’s 68,000 government and private schools. The court directed the state government to disseminate the guidelines to all educational institutions and District Educational Authorities to “sensitise school authorities” about protection of children’s physical and mental health; conduct seminars and awareness camps to effectively implement NCPCR guidelines, and initiate prompt action by “competent authorities for any lapse, dereliction or negligence”. “This directive of the high court is overdue. Regrettably, corporal punishment is more frequent in government schools, compared to private institutions. Strict implementation of these guidelines will create safer and more nurturing learning environments, which is essential for effective learning and well-being of children. This stern directive sets clear standards for educational institutions and authorities to follow, and mandates strict adherence to child protection laws,” says Chennai-based educationist Dr. S. Somasundaram. With the rising number of student suicides and stress-related mental disorders among children routinely reported by the media, Justice Subramaniam’s directive with special emphasis on teachers and education officials to “protect” children’s mental health and well-being has been widely welcomed by bona fide educationists. “It’s important that District Education Authorities and education ministry officials impact the importance of the NCPCR guidelines on government and rural schools in particular. In government schools, where parental involvement is usually lower, there is general acceptance of corporal punishment. In private schools, parents are more engaged in their children’s education, and this works as a deterrent against corporal punishment and mental cruelty. They operate under stricter regulations and are mindful of their reputation as enlightened institutions. They also tend to allocate substantial resources towards alternative disciplinary measures and teacher training programs to promote supportive environments conducive to joyful learning. Nevertheless it’s high time a clear and unambiguous message goes out to all school managements, teachers and parents that corporal punishment and mental cruelty imposed on children is obsolete pedagogy. Children learn best in conducive stress-free environments,” says A. Karuppasamy, former director of Matriculation schools. However while the high court directive to school managements and educators to abolish corporal punishment is clear and unambiguous,…
Students writing KCET: out-of-syllabus questionsAn education mess in this southern state which has appropriated its description as the Silicon Valley of India, has become messier. On April 8, the Supreme Court restrained the state’s Congress government from publishing results of board exams held in March for classes V, VIII and IX students of KSEAB (Karnataka School Examination and Assessment Board)-affiliated schools. Because the landmark Right of Children to Free & Compulsory Education (RTE) Act, 2009, prohibits stressful formal exams for children in elementary (classes I-VIII). Now, another controversy has erupted over conduct of the Karnataka Common Entrance Test (KCET) 2024, the gateway for undergrad admissions into 290 professional education colleges statewide. Soon after 3.34 lakh class XII students wrote KCET on April 18-19, social media was flooded with complaints that test papers included over 50 questions which were beyond the syllabus prescribed for state board pre-university college (PUC) students. Several higher secondary PUC colleges (class XI-XII), faculty and parents’ associations have registered protests with the Karnataka Examinations Authority (KEA) which conducts the test. KCET is a make-or-break competitive exam for PUC students because it determines admission into all professional colleges statewide providing non-medical higher education — engineering, pharmacy, veterinary science etc. Under a seat-sharing agreement between the state government and private professional college managements, 45 percent of seats in private colleges are allotted to successful KCET students at a subsidised annual fee of Rs.20,000-80,000 (cf. Rs.83,000-Rs.2.3 lakh). This year, an estimated 120,000 private college seats are available for top-ranked KCET students. According to aggrieved students and parents, several questions were taken from class XI-XII syllabuses of the pan-India CBSE and CISCE exam boards. They contend that this put the majority of students, enrolled in PU colleges affiliated with the state’s Pre-University Board at a disadvantage. Moreover, the state government had ‘rationalised’ the pre-university syllabus in 2023-24, i.e, deleted some chapters of textbooks to reduce curriculum load of higher secondary (PU) students. With the chorus of public protests getting louder while voting in General Election 2024 has commenced (the first round of voting in Karnataka concluded on April 26 and the second concludes on May 7), the state’s Congress government elected last May (2023) issued a statement on April 28 saying that KEA has been directed not to evaluate students answers to the 50 out-of-syllabus questions. “An Expert Committee Report has determined several questions from the deleted chapters of the rationalised syllabus of 11th and 12th PUC syllabus of 2023-24. Keeping in view the Expert Committee report and opinion of many stakeholders and the paramount interest of protecting the legitimate interests of the students in mind, KEA is directed to remove questions that are out of 2023-24 syllabus from the assessments, and assess (answers to) only the remaining questions. Two questions with incorrect solutions will also be awarded grace marks,” said the complex statement ruling out a re-exam. Moreover, “the KEA is directed to prepare a detailed Standard Operating Procedure for setting question papers for KCET”. Dr. M. Mohan Alva,…
Mamata Banerjee: credibility challenge A series of teacher recruitment scandals have plagued three-term West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee since 2011 when her Trinamool Congress (TMC) party famously routed the CPM (Communist Party of India-Marxist)-led LDF coalition which had ruled the state continuously for 34 years. Employment in government schools in which salaries for primary school teachers start at Rs.33,000 per month after implementation of the Sixth Pay Commission (2020) recommendations, is highly prized in West Bengal (pop.91 million). During 34 years of uninterrupted Marxist rule (1977-2011), the state suffered continuous capital flight and de-industrialisation. Therefore, jobs in industry, business and commerce have been scarce for decades. Unemployment (7.6 million registered unemployed youth) is pervasive and in small and medium-scale industry, salaries are rock-bottom. Therefore government school teacher jobs are so prized that families desperate for sons and daughters to be employed as teachers in government-run schools — private school salaries are several multiples lower — sell property and take huge loans to pay bribes upto Rs.20 lakh to government officials to land these jobs. Therefore, an April 21 judgement of a Calcutta high court division bench nullifying a 2016 teacher eligibility test (TET) conducted by the West Bengal School Service Commission (SSC) and written by 2.3 million aspiring school teachers, of whom 25,753 were selected and appointed in 15,302 government and aided secondary and higher secondary schools, has generated huge statewide shock. In its ruling, the high court directed the state government to initiate a new TET within a fortnight of declaration of Lok Sabha election results on June 4. Meanwhile, all 25,753 “illegally recruited” teachers have to return their entire remuneration earned within six weeks. The bench also directed the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to probe into the appointment process and submit a report within three months. Two days later on April 23, the state government moved the Supreme Court contending that the high court’s cancellation of 25,753 teacher appointments would create a huge vacuum in government schools in the coming academic year. After an urgent hearing on May 7, the apex court has stayed the Calcutta high court’s April 21 order while permitting a CBI probe against government officials. Meanwhile, over 200 candidates who had written and passed TET 2014 and TET 2016 but hadn’t received appointment letters, have been staging protests before Mahatma Gandhi’s statue in Esplanade in Kolkata’s central business district since 2019. They are protesting the court’s order directing new TET exams as they have become age ineligible (40 years) to write TET again. West Bengal’s government schools teacher recruitment and appointment imbroglio has a long back story. In May, 2022, a single bench of the high court ordered a CBI investigation into alleged irregularities in the recruitment process following writ petitions filed by some candidates who passed TET 2016 but were not recruited. On July 23, 2022, CBI arrested education minister Partha Chatterjee, who during a long innings as education minister (2014-21) had presided over SSC. Chatterjee’s arrest after a huge stash…
India’s private B-schools capable of responding quickly to changes in the business environment and customising their curriculums accordingly, are likely to play an increasingly important role to modernise and upgrade India Inc to compete with the world’s most dominant corporations, writes Dilip Thakore If India’s estimated 5,000 business management institutes, aka B-schools — some of them of over half century vintage — were half as good as they claim to be, the Indian economy would be booming and 21st century India would not be in the bottom rung of economic development league tables including the World Bank’s per capita income, UNDP’s Human Development and the World Economic Forum’s industrial progress indices. Although politicians of all shades and hues proclaim it a developed country, the plain truth is that 77 years after attaining independence from foreign rule, India is routinely ranked among the world’s poorest and backward nations defined by acute shortages of food, clothing, shelter, affordable healthcare and education. Obviously, the nasty, brutish and perhaps too long lives that the overwhelming majority of Indian citizens are obliged to endure, can’t be the fault of the country’s B-schools. However some blame for none of India’s companies being listed among the largest, most respected, competitive and innovative, must surely be laid at their door. Some, but not all because the prime cause of the backwardness of India Inc is socialist ideology foolishly imposed upon newly independent India by the Congress party which remained in government at the Centre and most states of the country for over half a century. Under the “socialist pattern of society”, India’s 256 Central government PSEs and an equal number promoted by state governments failed to generate the surpluses for investment in infrastructure, public health and education. Simultaneously bound up in red tape India’s high-potential private sector companies failed to grow and prosper and were surpassed by Japanese, Korean and latterly Chinese private corporations. Against this backdrop, India’s first B-school, the Indian Institute of Management-Calcutta (IIM-C) was established in 1961 with American funding and grudgingly permitted collaboration with the MIT’s Sloan School of Management (USA). IIM-C was soon followed by IIM-Ahmedabad and IIM-Bangalore. Yet the contribution of these three premier IIMs to the national development effort remained hazy until the advent of the country’s first business magazines — Business India and BusinessWorld — made private enterprise respectable and shone a spotlight on these capital-intensive B-schools which certified 200-300 MBAs annually. Suddenly the two-year wholly residential MBA programmes of the IIMs became very popular and 50,000-100,000 candidates started writing CAT (Common Admission Test) of the IIMs whose number has since multiplied to 21 countrywide. Moreover with the increasing liberalisation of the shackled Indian economy which averaged a pitiful GDP growth of 3.5 percent per annum for over 40 years, several other B-schools mushroomed all over the country providing good, bad and indifferent business management education to an ever increasing number of students. In 2013, we introduced the EducationWorld India Higher Education Rankings (EWIHER). The annual EWIHER inter alia also…
Although they continue to be adamantly unresponsive, every year since 2020 EducationWorld has been eliciting expert opinion to rate and rank government agricultural universities countrywide. Since 2020 thousands of farmers have been periodically protesting countrywide, demanding legally guaranteed minimum support prices for agriculture produce. These protests of the neglected rural majority have struck a chord within the urban intellegentsia if not the academy. Political pundits and economists — including your editors (see https://www.educationworld.in/indias-colonisation-of-bharat-liberating-rural-india/) — have been – even if somewhat belatedly, suggesting ways and means to cut India’s 1 billion-strong rural citizens a fairer deal. However there’s been a deafening silence from the apex-level Delhi-based Indian Council for Agricultural Research (ICAR), an ‘autonomous body’ promoted by the Central government way back in 1929 to “coordinate agricultural education and research” countrywide. Unsurprisingly affiliated 113 ICAR institutes and 74 government agriculture universities spread across the country have also had little to say about this burning issue. Forget about burning public issues, over the past 95 years ICAR and its affiliated institutions have developed a culture of not being answerable to the media or the public which funds the council’s Rs.10,000 crore annual budget. The 113 ICAR institutes and 74 government agriculture universities defined by huge establishment expenses, rock-bottom tuition fees and large mysteriously spent research budgets, are accountable only to their political masters. In recent years, they have substantially reduced extension work and connect with rural communities and farmers. Consequently, modernisation of Indian agriculture has become a huge national blind spot with the great majority of the country’s farmers steeped in obsolete farming practices. Little wonder that average wheat and rice yields in India are a fifth of China and a tenth of France and Ukraine. Nevertheless, every year since 2020 EducationWorld has been eliciting expert opinion to rate and rank government agricultural universities. Last year, India’s #1 ranked agriculture university — ICAR, Delhi — didn’t respond to our several emails and phone calls to share the mysterious secrets of their public service. Ditto this year. Following ICAR, Delhi in the 2024-25 EW league table of India’s best government agriculture universities is the state government-promoted Punjab Agricultural University, which has retained its #2 rank of 2023-24. However, further down the 14-strong league table of reputed agriculture universities, the 2,100 knowledgeable respondents comprising higher education faculty, students and industry representatives polled by AZ Research Partners Pvt. Ltd, have voted for change. Navsari Agricultural University (Gujarat), ranked #4 in 2023-24, has inched up to #3. Ditto ICAR — National Dairy Research Institute, Karnal which is promoted to #4. Govind Ballabh Pant University of Agriculture & Technology, Pantnagar (Uttarakhand) is ranked #5 (#4) and Junagadh Agricultural University (JAU) is promoted to #6 (#7) jointly with the Chaudhary Charan Singh Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar (#5). The Top 10 table is completed by ICAR — Indian Veterinary Research Institute, Izatnagar, Bareilly at #7 (#6), University of Agricultural Sciences, Bengaluru at #8 (#8), Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore at #9 (#7) and Anand Agricultural University at #10 (#8)…
Established in 23 states countrywide, India’s 27 publicly-funded National Law Universities (NLUs) have emerged as the gold standard of contemporary legal education The country’s 27 publicly-funded National Law Universities (NLUs) are the IITs of legal education. Since the first National Law School of India University, Bengaluru was promoted in 1988 pursuant to legal education reforms advocated by the Bar Council of India, 26 additional NLUs have been promoted in 23 states countrywide and have emerged as the gold standard of contemporary legal education. Admission into NLUs is through an IIT-JEE-style hyper-competitive national exam, the Common Law Admission Test (CLAT). Over 200,000 students write CLAT annually, of whom only 3,000 are admitted into 24 NLUs, whose graduates on completion of the rigorous five-year BA.LLB programme are snapped up by top corporatised legal firms at annual remuneration packages ranging from Rs.10-15 lakh. However in the new millennium, several private sector law schools — notably the Jindal Global School of Law of the O.P. Jindal Global University — have also established excellent reputations with their alumni receiving start-up remuneration packages of equivalent amounts. Nevertheless within the category of government-promoted law universities, NLUs have dominated the EW league table of India’s best public law and humanities universities. The latest 2024-25 league table is no different with eight pre-eminent NLUs in the Top 10. The pioneer National Law School of India University, Bengaluru (NLSIU) is ranked #1 for the third consecutive year followed by NALSAR University of Law, Hyderabad at #2, NLU, Delhi #4, West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences, Kolkata #5, NLU Jodhpur #6, Dr. Ram Manohar Lohiya National Law University, Lucknow #7, Hidayatullah National Law University, Raipur #8 and National Law Institute University, Bhopal #9. Non-NLUs which have made it to the Top 10 are The Indian Law Institute (Deemed University), Delhi at #3 and Shri Lal Bahadur Shastri National Sanskrit University, Delhi #10. “We are grateful to receive recognition for our continuous efforts to provide highest quality law education to the next generation who will transform the legal profession and frame laws that govern the country. NLSIU is deliberately focused on admitting a diverse student body to be mentored by expert faculty in law, public policy, social sciences and the humanities. The objective is to provide our students a transformative education experience including interdisciplinarity, experiential and socially engaged learning in all our degree programmes. We are also developing a thoroughly professional administration and implementing comprehensive digital transformation across all academic, administrative and residential processes while also reviving an institutional research framework through our centres, chairs and projects,” says Dr. Sudhir Krishnaswamy, an alum of NLSIU and Oxford University, appointed Vice Chancellor of NLSIU in 2019. Krishnaswamy is especially appreciative that NLSIU is top-ranked on the parameters of faculty competence, faculty welfare and development, and research and innovation. “In 2023, we recruited 22 faculty — the largest cohort in a single hiring round, and also recently completed another recruitment round in February. To ensure an enabling environment for our faculty/staff, we have…
Although the country’s new genre private universities with their sprawling capital intensive campuses, new-age study programmes, and high-quality faculty, are capturing the public imagination, government universities continue to host 74 percent of youth in higher education The latest All India Survey of Higher Education (AISHE) Report 2021-22 (released January 25) of the Union education ministry discloses that India hosts 1,168 universities. Of them, 240 are of the Central and 445 of state governments. Therefore, 40 percent of the country’s 1,168 universities are privately promoted. However, the latter mentor only 26.3 percent of the 43.3 million students in higher education. The great majority of tertiary students are enrolled in the country’s 685 government universities. This indicates that though the country’s new genre private universities are capturing the public imagination with their sprawling capital intensive campuses, new-age study programmes, and high-quality faculty including expats, government universities, which provide highly subsidised education, continue to host almost three-fourths of youth in higher education. With government varsities still dominant in Indian higher education, in 2020, the annual EducationWorld India Higher Education Rankings (EWIHER), which until then rated and ranked only private universities, was expanded to also rank the best Central and state government varsities. Two years later in 2022, in keeping with our commitment to continuously improve and refine our ranking surveys, the broad category of government (and private) universities was further sub-divided according to subject specialisations, to provide level playing field comparisons. In the latest EWIHER 2024-25, government universities are ranked in nine separate silos — multidisciplinary, law and humanities, natural and life sciences (including medical), engineering and technology, all-women, agriculture, physical sciences and sports, maths and research. These subject-specialisation rankings make it easier for school-leaving students and graduates to select government varsities (whose tuition fees tend to be substantially lower) best suited to their aptitudes and aspirations. To compile the EW India Government University Rankings 2024-25, the well-reputed Bengaluru-based market research company AZ Research Partners Pvt. Ltd (estb.2002) interviewed 2,100 sample respondents comprising higher education faculty and students, and industry representatives in 22 states countrywide. These respondents were persuaded to award government universities of whom they have sufficient knowledge, perceptual scores of 1-300 on ten parameters of higher education excellence, viz, faculty competence, faculty welfare and development, research and innovation, curriculum and pedagogy, industry interface, placements, infrastructure, internationalism, leadership/governance and range and diversity of study programmes. Higher weightage is given to the critical parameters of faculty competence (150), research and innovation (300) and infrastructure (150). Within the category of government varsities, multidisciplinary institutions are more popular with students as they provide a wide range of study programmes across numerous faculties including arts, humanities, science, commerce, management, engineering and technology etc, thus offering opportunity for inter-disciplinary study. Consequently, it’s not surprising that the longest league table in EWIHER 2024-25 is of government multidisciplinary universities. And dominating this competitive league table for the third consecutive year is the University of Delhi (DU). This year’s EW sample respondents have once again voted the Central government-promoted DU…
“We are thrilled that SRIHER is once again ranked India’s #1 private medical university. This is public recognition of our continued commitment to excellence in medical education, healthcare, and research. SRIHER is a multi-disciplinary medical university with 14 faculties offering 37 undergraduate, 125 post-graduate and doctoral programmes in medical, dental, nursing and other allied health sciences as well as emerging fields such as biomedical sciences, engineering, clinical research, public health, and sports science. Moreover, our faculty is engaged in 68 extramural funded research projects. Excellence in teaching and research is supported by a fully-equipped campus with advanced teaching facilities including virtual reality and augmented reality labs. Therefore our top score on the parameters of faculty competence, research and innovation, pedagogic systems and infrastructure are well-deserved” — Dr. Uma Sekar (centre), Vice Chancellor, Sri Ramachandra Institute of Higher Education and Research (Deemed University), Chennai (8,670 students and 651 faculty). Also read: Interview with Dr PV Vijayaraghavan, Vice Chancellor, SRIHER
New-genre liberal arts universities created great public excitement and were ranked within the national Top 20 of the composite private universities league table in the annual EW India Higher Education Rankings in 2019. After sub-division of the broad category of private HEIs according to subject specialisation in 2022, they have risen higher. And dominating the exclusive league table of liberal arts and humanities universities since 2022, is the O.P. Jindal Global University (JGU), Sonipat. This year’s 2,100 knowledgeable EW sample respondents polled by AZ Research Partners Pvt. Ltd have again voted JGU as India’s #1 liberal arts and humanities university. “We are delighted and honoured to be ranked India’s #1 liberal arts and humanities university by EducationWorld for the third consecutive year. This is a testament of JGU’s success in providing globally benchmarked interdisciplinary arts education to students. This achievement is also evidence of the commitment of our faculty and staff who often go beyond the call of duty to develop intellectually mature students with critical thinking skills,” says Prof. C. Raj Kumar, the polymath Oxford and Harvard-educated founding vice chancellor of JGU. Raj Kumar is especially pleased with the top score awarded to JGU under the parameters of faculty competence, research, curriculum and pedagogy and internationalism. “I attribute our success to the visionary leadership of the deans and faculty members of JGU including Prof. Kathleen Modrowski, Dean of the Jindal School of Liberal Arts & Humanities. Also to our well-designed interdisciplinary academic curricula, research output, and state-of-the-art infrastructure,” he adds. Currently, JGU’s 12 schools have 12,000 students from 70 countries mentored by 1,100 faculty including 129 international faculty from 50 countries, on their muster rolls. The eight-strong league table of India’s most admired private liberal arts and humanities universities is set out below. Parameters of excellence: India’s Top 10 Private Universities To compile the EW India Private University Rankings 2024-25, AZ Research field researchers interviewed 2,100 higher education faculty, students and industry managers countrywide, asking them to rate institutions on ten parameters, viz, competence of faculty, faculty welfare and development, research and innovation, curriculum and pedagogy, industry interface, placements record, infrastructure and facilities, internationalism, leadership/governance quality and range/diversity of programmes offered. Further, the informed interviewees were asked to assign weightage to each parameter. The scores awarded by the respondents were totaled to rank India’s Top 10 private universities under each parameter of higher education excellence. The ‘research and innovation’ parameter was assigned highest weightage (300) indicating that respondents believe that the ability of faculty to engage in meaningful research and development including publication of papers in reputed international journals, is the most important criterion for assessing the educational capabilities of universities. Parameter rankings which highlight the prime strengths of highly ranked institutions are useful because they enable students to select institutions whose priorities dovetail with their own. The national ranking of Top 10 private universities under all ten parameters, are set out below. Also read: India’s top-ranked private multidisciplinary universities 2024-25
India’s new genre multidisciplinary universities benchmarked against the world’s best are a breath of fresh air with the potential to check, if not stop, the annual migration of an estimated 8 lakh school and college-leavers for higher education abroad. Since the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020, based on the Kasturirangan Committee draft report, recommended transformation of India’s 45,473 undergrad colleges and 1,168 universities into multi-disciplinary higher education institutions (HEIs), multi-disciplinary HEIs have become the flavour of the season. It’s the good doctor’s — actually an outer space scientist — contribution to India’s higher education system that today every college principal and university vice chancellor has drawn up plans to transform the HEI under her care into a multi-disciplinary institution. In retrospect, one wonders why it took the neta-babu brotherhood which controls Indian higher education with an iron hand, so long to figure out that by definition, a ‘university’ is a higher education institution providing advanced learning across a wide range of subjects and disciplines. The Oxford English dictionary defines a university as “a high-level educational institution in which students study for degrees and academic research is done”. Yet perhaps the latter day Wikipedia definition is more accurate — “an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards degrees in several academic disciplines”. India’s ancient and much eulogised universities — Nalanda and Taxila — were reportedly such multi-disciplinary HEIs in which students were free to study subjects across disciplines of their choice. Nevertheless post-independence India’s omniscient politicians and bureaucrats who controlled industry, business, education and everything else through Soviet-style five-year plans, licensed a large number of public single discipline HEIs — IITs, NITs, IIMs, AIIMS, engineering and medical colleges and universities. As a result, IITs teach engineering subjects, IIMs business management, medical colleges, medicine. The few private sector HEIs such as BITS-Pilani and Manipal Academy of Higher Education were restricted to teaching engineering and medicine and allied subjects and despite being granted ‘deemed university’ status, were not permitted to describe themselves as universities simpliciter. They were obliged to always describe themselves as ‘deemed-to-be-universities’ on pain of being derecognised. Moreover, public and private HEIs — colleges and universities — were encouraged to focus on teaching. For research, the Central government established 38 national laboratories and 39 outreach centres under the aegis of a Soviet-inspired Council for Scientific & Industrial Research (estb.1942) as “an institutional arrangement to keep the Science, Society and Industry on the same page”. Unsurprisingly, CSIR quickly metamorphosed into a giant bureaucratic organisation with a well-established pecking order. Over the past 82 years, it hasn’t produced any earth-shattering or game-changing invention despite its head count having grown to 7,683. Against this backdrop of a complete hash of higher education in post-independence India, it’s also unsurprising that the country’s 45,473 colleges and 1,168 universities are certifying millions of ‘tunnel vision techies’ with little understanding of wider development issues confronting the nation, and/or unemployable arts, science and commerce graduates with 40 percent ‘educated unemployed’ having been the norm for half…
Attaining the $30 trillion GDP dream by 2047 necessitates private engineering and technology universities skilling an army of managers and workers in STEM subjects If the lofty Viksit Bharat (‘developed India’) with a $30 trillion GDP dream of Prime Minister Narendra Modi — who seems set to serve a third consecutive term in office after results of General Election 2024 are announced on June 4 — is to be realised, India’s manufacturing sector which currently contributes a mere 17 percent of GDP, has to at the very least double its contribution. Although most economists and pundits believe this requires heavy investment in infrastructure, plant and machinery, it also necessitates skilling an army of managers and workers in STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) subjects. In turn, this requires upgrading and developing excellent engineering colleges and universities equipped with best faculty, latest technologies and laboratories and well-furbished libraries. During the past 75 years after India wrested independence from foreign rule, the country’s omniscient central planners provided for substantial investment in steel, coal, fertiliser, cement, pharmaceutical and other core industries, but did not develop sufficient human resources to efficiently manage giant corporations which were promoted by government under socialist ideology. Consequently public sector enterprises (PSEs), which were budgeted to transform independent India into a manufacturing powerhouse, were dominated by bureaucrats and clerks who quickly drove them into bankruptcy and/or heavy dependence upon annual allocations from the Central and state government budgets. Admittedly, India’s first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru who was enamoured with Soviet socialism and government controlled centrally planned economy, promoted India’s famous IITs (Indian Institutes of Technology) in Kharagpur, Bombay and Delhi which have since multiplied into 23 institutions. But because of the slow growth of the economy (3.5 percent per year) for over four decades, 50 percent of IIT graduates trained at great public expense, migrated overseas every year and those who remained were stuck in technical jobs without the freedom to expand PSEs into large-scale globally competitive corporations. Moreover given the small number of IITs, even to this day they admit a mere 2 percent of the 1.2 million engineering aspirants who write the annual IIT-JEE (joint entrance examination ) and produce a mere 10,000 graduates per year. With the vast majority of engineering and technology aspirants obliged to sign up with private engineering colleges — 70 percent of all engineering and technology higher education institutions are privately promoted — and IITs routinely topping the league tables published by the media and government, a decade ago, your editors resolved to eliminate IITs from the annual EducationWorld India Higher Education Rankings and rank the country’s most admired Top 100 private engineering and technology universities. Since then, we have been ranking private undergrad colleges and private universities separately, even though some private engineering colleges awarded deemed university status are listed in both league tables. In EWIHER 2024-25, the Birla Institute of Technology and Science (BITS)-Pilani has retained its #1 rank as the country’s pre-eminent private engineering university for the third year…
To compile the league table of India’s most admired public and private universities, 2,100 respondents, comprising faculty and students in higher education institutions and industry leaders in 22 states countrywide were interviewed, writes Dilip Thakore and Summiya Yasmeen Although learned professors and academics in their ivory towers seem oblivious and hold themselves blameless, there’s much that’s wrong with post-independence India’s socialist-template higher education system. The poor condition of the Indian economy — GDP $4 trillion (cf. USA’s $23 trillion and China’s $17 trillion); 40 million ‘educated’ unemployed; low factory and farm productivity, rock-bottom per capita income of $2,064 (cf. USA’s $76,000 and China’s $12,720) — is intimately connected with the country’s moribund higher education system. News of any earth-shattering or game-changing invention (the internet, smartphone, electric car, green energy etc) emerging from the shady bowers of Indian academia is rare if not non-existent. Yet taxpayers make heavy annual contributions to sustain India’s sputtering public higher education institutions. In the Union budget 2024-25, an allocation of Rs.47,619 crore has been made for public higher education. The poor condition of India’s universities is reflected in the annual global ranking league tables of the highly reputed London-based academia ranking agencies Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) and Times Higher Education (THE). In the QS World Rankings 2024 which evaluates 1,559 universities across 104 countries, only two of India’s 1,168 universities — IIT-Bombay at #149 and IIT-Delhi #197 — are ranked among the global Top 200. The much trumpeted Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore (IISc, estb.1908) is ranked #225. In the THE World University Rankings (WUR) 2024 which assessed 1,906 universities in 108 countries, Indian universities have fared worse. India’s top-ranked university is the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, ranked in the 201-250 band, followed by Anna University, Chennai (501-600) and IIT-Guwahati (601-800). None of India’s pioneer metropolitan universities in Calcutta, Bombay and Madras established in 1857 are ranked among the global Top 200 by either agency. It’s noteworthy that all the above are public — established by government — universities. Private universities haven’t fared better. BITS-Pilani (estb.1964), routinely ranked India’s #1 private engineering university by EducationWorld, is ranked in the 801-1000 band by THE. Perhaps the new crop of private universities established in the new millennium are too young to merit respectable global rankings. The new genre O.P. Jindal Global University, Sonipat (JGU, estb.2009) “made history” when it was ranked among the global 750 by QS in 2022 and deductively, India’s #1 private university. But it is ranked in the 951-1000 band in QS World University Rankings 2024. The poor rankings of India’s most admired universities in respected international academic league tables is made more painful by the high rankings of Asia’s best universities, and mainland China in particular. Five Chinese universities (Tsinghua, Peking, Fudan, Shanghai Jiao Tong and Zhejiang) are ranked among the QS Top 100 and another three within the Top 200. Moreover, several other Asian universities are ranked well above IIT-Bombay, top-ranked by QS (#149) and IISc (201-250) by THE. Among…
Nasrin Modak Siddiqi (Mumbai) A top priority of left — communist, socialist — governments worldwide, is compulsory, free-of-charge early years and primary education for children. Yet despite newly-independent India’s Congress party passing a resolution in 1956 to establish a “socialist pattern of society”, compulsory primary education wasn’t decreed until 2009 when another Congress government at the Centre enacted the landmark Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education (RTE) Act, 2009. The RTE Act makes it mandatory for the State (Central and state governments) to provide free and compulsory elementary (class I-VIII) education to all children in the 6-14 age group. Moreover, under s.12 (1) (c) of the Act, all private aided and independent schools are obliged to reserve 25 percent of capacity in class I for poor children in their neighbourhoods, and retain them free-of-charge until completion of class VIII. The expense of educating poor neighbourhood children thus admitted into private schools is mandated to be paid by state governments on the basis of average per child cost incurred by government for educating children in public schools, or actual fee charged by private neighbourhood schools, whichever is less. Inevitably this “backdoor nationalisation” of 25 percent capacity of private elementary schools was challenged in the Supreme Court. In Society for Unaided Private Schools of Rajasthan vs. Union of India & Anr (Writ Petition (C) No. 95 of 2010), a three-judge bench of the Supreme Court by a 2-1 majority upheld the constitutional validity of the RTE Act, 2009, and particularly s.12 (1) (c). However, the apex court exempted private boarding and minority schools from applicability of s.12 (1) (c). Since then and especially after financially stressed state governments started foot-dragging on the issue of reimbursing the cost of poor neighbourhood children admitted into private schools under the formula of the Act, private schools have devised several ways and means to avoid admitting poor children into their elementary classes. While the Supreme Court’s logic exempting boarding schools from admitting poor children under s.12 (1) (c) is self-explanatory, the definition of ‘minority schools’ has prompted considerable litigation. Private school managements contended that apart from institutions promoted by religious minorities, schools promoted by linguistic minorities of every state are also exempt. Thus a large number of private schools have successfully skirted provisions of s.12 (1) (c). Moreover, several state governments, especially in Uttar Pradesh, Karnataka and Maharashtra, further diluted s.12 (1) (c) by amending Rules under the Act by decreeing that private schools would be exempt from admitting poor children if there is a government school within 1 km of poor neighbourhoods. In April, a writ petition was filed before the Nagpur Bench of the Bombay high court by an NGO — Yavatmal-based Parivartan Samajik Bahuddeshiya Sanstha — questioning the constitutional validity of this amended Rule. The petitioner contends this Rule change further dilutes s.12 (1) (c) and exempts private schools from the responsibility of educating poor children in their neighbourhood as mandated by the RTE Act. The petitioners’ plea was heard on…
Autar Nehru (Delhi) One of the most enduring — and justified — criticisms of K-12 education in post-independence India is addiction to rote learning through memorisation rather than comprehension. Obstinacy of the country’s 69 school examination boards to reward students’ memorisation rather than originality, critical thinking and problem-solving skills in K-12 education is to a great extent the cause of India’s economic backwardness and pervasive poverty. Although a small minority of academics and development economists as also EducationWorld (estb.1999) have been advocating switch to comprehension aka competency-based learning for several decades, a decisive shift to competency-based learning began just five years ago when the nine-member Dr. K. Kasturirangan Committee in its 484-page draft National Education Policy (NEP) recommended several sensible and overdue reforms. Among them: stress on ECCE (early childhood care and education), high priority for functional literacy and numeracy of all children by age eight; encouraging holistic school education with compulsory vocational learning; exam reforms to test children’s conceptual comprehension, creativity and critical thinking capabilities rather than memory; introduction of continuous formative assessment systems to replace summative exams, and promotion of new digital technologies in school education. In July 2020, the 60-page National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 accepting the Kasturirangan Committee’s draft in toto was approved by the Union cabinet. Four years later, the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) — the country’s largest national school-leaving examinations board which has 29,187 primary-secondary schools including several top-ranked private schools (Emerald Heights International, Indore, Mayo College, Ajmer, DPS, R.K. Puram, Delhi, Modern School, Delhi among others) — affiliated with it, has announced a calibrated switch towards competency-based assessment which will perforce change teaching-learning/pedagogy in affiliated schools. In a circular dated April 3 to the heads of all affiliated schools CBSE stated: “The Board in accordance with National Education Policy, 2020 has taken multiple steps towards implementation of Competency Based Education in schools, ranging from aligning assessment to competencies, development of exemplar resources for teachers and students as well as continuous capacity building of the teachers etc. The main emphasis of the Board was (sic) to create an educational ecosystem that would move away from rote memorisation and towards learning that is focused on developing the creative, critical and systems thinking capacities of students to meet the challenges of the 21st century.” Come 2026, the country’s 29,187 CBSE schools (as of date) will switchover to 100 percent competency-based assessment and by that logic, move away from exam-centric rote learning to competency (skills and critical thinking)-based learning. The move will coincide with the CBSE holding examinations twice a year for which it is reportedly at an advanced stage of finalising an announcement soon. However in light of the long history of rote and/or memorisation learning, CBSE’s shift to competency-based assessment is being calibrated. In the academic year 2024-25 starting July-August, the share of competency-based questions for the year-end board examination (theory) for classes XI-XII will increase to 50 percent and rise to 100 percent in the academic year 2026-27. However, the assessment format…
Enabling summer education option
The best a student can do during summer is something that would be unavailable during the year. Summer is the ideal time for internships and structured programmes. Although they are becoming increasingly popular, most university summer programs are inherently deceptive. These programs feed upon the desire of parents and students to attend top-ranked institutions in the hope that early familiarity with a famous university will send a strong signal that the student belongs in that institution. Nothing could be further from the truth. With few exceptions, summer programs do not represent the university of the regular year. Regular students go home, and regular faculty primarily pursue research. The summer faculty are typically adjuncts or graduate students hired for the purpose, and the other students are just there for the summer. Consequently, success in summer courses does not signal anything to admissions officers about a student’s academic competitiveness, as much as her ability to pay tuition. Such courses may actually generate a counter signal. The best a student can do during the summer is something that would otherwise be unavailable during the year. Summer is the ideal time for internships and structured programs that expose students to corporate environments and the world of work. This is a time for students to explore their interests and discover how they want to spend their lives. This is important because the purpose of education is not to create perpetual students; it is to prepare young people to enter the real world. The best way for students to generate meaningful signals to college admission officers is to show they have what it takes to succeed in college and life. Parents would do well to remember this when they chart their children’s summers. Carefully crafted programs occurring at the intersection of internship and study are rare, but they do exist. Such programs ideally provide the dual benefit of exposure to the world of work while also providing students with formal transcripts and credits. The former ensures that students gain something useful, while the latter guarantees that they don’t feel they are missing out on something they could have had. America’s Automotive Hall of Fame has devised such a program. The Hall was originally created to honour pioneers, innovators, and legends of the automobile industry and to celebrate the ingenuity, leadership, and entrepreneurial spirit that have shaped America’s massive automotive industry. With its evolution into the broader mobility industry, the Hall has expanded its mission to include identifying, educating, and developing much-needed talent. Towards this end, they have engineered an annual High-Tech Mobility Summer Institute that brings companies and universities together to enable high school students to immerse themselves in the dynamic world of the mobility industry. This two-week program hosted at the University of Detroit Mercy that includes participation from the College for Creative Studies and Northwood University, goes beyond traditional classroom learning by providing students hands-on experiences and real-world exposure to careers. Topics explored during the program include transportation design, innovation and entrepreneurship, robotics, AI…