Teaching the teachers

Faced with a massive shortage of quality faculty as the Indian technical education system expands like never before...

Faced with a massive shortage of quality faculty as the Indian technical education system expands like never before, plans are afoot to create India8217;s first Virtual Technical University VTU at IIT-Kanpur to work on the academic quality of the younger teaching community.

8220;A large number of professionals and teachers require training, but because of the shortage of faculty, most institutes do not allow them to go on study leave. That obviously hampers their academic growth and also prevents creation of competent teaching staff in the sector. So IIT-Kanpur had proposed to the high-powered committee to start a VTU that could hold full-fledged academic courses on a flexible credit-based system. There are examples of VTUs in the United States and Europe,8221; said Prof S G Dhande, IIT-Kanpur director.

The idea of a VTU took shape under the high-powered committee headed by Prof P Rama Rao, which pointed out the gravity of the faculty shortage problem. The committee noted that there was a shortage of some 40,000 teaching staff in the technical institutes, with a shortfall of 30,000 PhDs and 25,000 Master8217;s degree holders. It had further submitted that there was a 8220;serious lacunae8221; in the form of teachers not having post-graduate/ doctoral qualifications and sustained research accomplishments besides absence of serious culture in institutes, regional disparity in existence of technical institutes and in the number of students in various engineering and technology disciplines.

Estimated to cost nearly Rs 1,000 crore, complete with infrastructure and an operational start-up, the VTU will initially cater to some 5,000 teachers per annum. But the target is ultimately to look at the needs of near two lakh teachers.

8220;While we will begin with some 5,000 teachers, the problem is acute. As many as 60,000-70,000 teachers require immediate attention in terms of academic improvement. The VTU will offer composite degree and certificate courses, depending on the credits earned by the candidate. An academic council will be set up for content creation, and faculty will be drawn for the university from all over 8212; IITs, IISc and even international institutes. The VTU has been approved and we are expecting clearance and sanction from the HRD Ministry shortly,8221; added Dhande.

Based on the recommendations of a high-powered committee for faculty development in technical education, which submitted its report to the All India Council for Technical Education AICTE last year, the VTU has now been made part of a largescale Human Resource Development HRD Ministry8217;s distance learning scheme.

The Plan

VTU will be a nodal agency for quality improvement of teachers in engg and management colleges in the fields of science, technology, architecture, pharmacy and other areas

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It will provide flexible credit-based courses, using modern technology like video courses, web-based learning material

VTU is envisaged with five broad schools covering different areas of expertise like the School of Engineering Sciences, School of Natural Sciences, School of Management Science, School of Human Sciences and School of Education

A large pool of faculty members is proposed to be created from the teaching community at IITs, IISc and other national technological institutes