Semester System: The problems that be

The haste

The haste is what heckles the teachers. University administrators were professors once,and they are well aware of how long it takes to revise the syllabi. It is lengthy and slightly inefficient,but time-tested. Over the course of revising the syllabi,teachers meet over and over again to sort out the finer details. The result has been some of the best curricula in the country. So what if they take three years each to make,ask teachers.

The semester system,on the other hand,has tried to do away with these procedures. The haste has never been explained,and it clearly threatens to break something that is not broken. Teachers have been merely asked to bifurcate,compress courses,or even drop some papers in some cases. The university administration has made no attempt to explain the haste.

College teachers

Teachers in DU colleges will be teaching these semeterised courses and they have been excluded from the process.

Though its colleges are the face of DU,those who teach there have very little say in how they are governed. The major statutory bodies of the university are loaded in favour of the postgraduate departments,and those who teach there.

Over time,the postgraduate departments have come to correct this flaw by including college teachers in various processes through means such as a general body (GB) of teachers. A GB,even though informal,has been a vital platform to address the concerns of college teachers when it comes to syllabus revisions. The GB has been the first victim of the semester system. DU administration has done everything to discredit it,and teachers have struck back in all fury.

Academic arguments:

It is important to note that the DU administration almost danced its way to implementing the semester system at the postgraduate level. The undergraduate courses,therefore,are a special case. Most of the arguments parallel each other — teachers of a department such as Geography did not provide a unique reason when they rejected the system at a GB last week.

English Literature

One of the clinching arguments against the semester system has been OBC reservations,and the English department is likely to bear the brunt. Teachers point out that the reservations will bring a large number of first-generation learners into the system and,in some cases,it will take them at least a semester’s time to even teach them the language.

Political Science

Political Science teachers have conditionally agreed to semesterise their syllabus. One of the conditions is that DU would agree to them having more than 18 Major papers. The other is that the syllabus will be a Plan B — in case the Delhi High Court greenlights semesterisation.

Sociology

The Sociology department’s Committee of Courses rejected the semester idea primarily due to time constraints. The CC was reportedly willing to revise the syllabus for the first year of the BA (Hons) Sociology course this year,but backed out after being told they would have to revise the whole syllabus together.

History

History’s CC first rejected semesterisation on viability grounds. The prevailing argument was that DU’s diverse student population would not be suitable for the semester system. In a later meeting,the History CC also raised questions about the legality of the system.