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| EDUCATION TRIBUNE |
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Growth sans quality assurance
Writing assignments boost critical thinking skills
CAMPUS NOTES
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Growth sans quality assurance THE evolution of civilisations and countries is more often due to the dynamism and vibrancy of ideas and their steady ascendancy over the competing visions of good life. An educated society in intellectual ferment is a fertile ground for progress and advancement, provided the clash of ideas is given free play. Education and scholarship provide a terrain on which intellectually arid and stagnant societies encounter new worlds of ideas. Also, the education system is structured transfer of information and knowledge to have wisdom. In common life, though wisdom is not directly related to educational qualification, the level of educational qualification is the strongest indicator of a person’s wisdom. Educational qualification is the gateway to social mobility in an increasingly meritocratic, technocratic society. In an information society, the comparative advantage of the education sector lies in its identity as the custodian and manager of a knowledge-based network that gives it a global mandate and reach. It is also considered a principal responsibility of a society to nurture its future generation and give a positive direction to their developmental needs through education. Every nation must ensure that a critical mass of people move into the university system not less than 30 to 40 per cent. Otherwise, it cannot build wealth. Buffeted by broader global changes, the Indian education system is going through transformation. There has been a lot of rhetoric of reforms in the education system since 2008. While the achievements of the Anglo-Saxon education system are impressive, but the problems of access, quality, quantity, utility and inadequacy of financial outlay accumulated over the years have now assumed serious proportions. Privatisation has created another challenge, i.e., “commodification” of education, which is demeaning the basic purpose of education. Many institutions (which are in fact units only) without showing any considerations for the required infrastructure are already churning out graduates whose future is uncertain. Besides insufficient funds, under-qualified teachers and inadequate infrastructure for educating millions of Indian youth, there is prevalence of severe misallocation of resources across various levels of education, which reduces effectiveness of already low levels of investment. Today, education is a growing concern in India. Over 60 million children will soon be entering colleges and 700-800 universities need to be founded in the next 10 years. On the one hand, this is a great opportunity for private enterprise; on the other, it is not clear whether there are enough qualified teachers to staff so many universities. The pace with which the colleges and universities are mushrooming, the intake of students at heavy cost is increasing. The ratio of outflow and employability is certainly going to create a massive misbalance. And, where are the employment opportunities dreamed up by the young lot coming out of colleges run on a “commercial” basis throughout the nation? Also, India’s economic growth has unfortunately not been inclusive. The people increasingly have high aspirations but limited potential to achieve those aspirations. With limited access to quality education and employment, most of the youth will enter the labour force at lowest levels. Teacher, curriculum and infrastructure are the three pillars of an education system. Therefore, reforms should start with the teachers. The quality of faculty and the teaching methodology are largely inadequate. Teachers need to be trained to use new teaching aids. Continuous training and performance evaluation based on tangible indicators should be there. There is a tremendous knowledge and skill gap at all levels. In case of physical infrastructures, the data is quite embarrassing. Besides these, there is a major challenge of quantity vs. quality in education. Students should be taught to think critically and broaden their intellectual horizons and promote self-awareness. The education system should offer life-long modules that allow acquiring knowledge combined with learning and working. Education should be for acquiring knowledge and not for earning a livelihood. The curriculum at all levels needs to be overhauled because a close connect between theory and practise is missing. Also, there is a disconnect between the industry and the academia. The curriculum should be dynamic and relevent in the current context. Another important issue is academic excellence and social inclusion. Can we be equal and excellent? A society that excludes a significant section of its population from access to education can’t be said to providing equality of opportunity. If academic excellence gets compromised in the process of expansion, it would lose its competitive edge in the emerging knowledge society. So, in India, reservation, inequality of opportunity, crimped access, a skewed geography of work, etc., are major challenges. Today, contemporary problems of environment, universal peace and international co-operation have added new dimensions. Therefore, we are required to promote through education harmonious relationship between the individual, environment and cosmos. We have to realise that harmony and unity can be achieved only when our inner self is purified and perfected. In order to achieve success, we need to build our education system at all levels on the basis of these precepts and insights.
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Writing assignments boost critical thinking skills A new study has found that writing assignments boost critical thinking skills in students. Ann Marie VanDerZanden, an Iowa State University Professor, designed a curriculum that integrates reflective writing into a landscape design course and discovered that students’ quiz scores increased significantly after they completed the writing exercises. “Providing opportunities for students to develop these skills is an essential part of their undergraduate education”, said VanDerZanden. “Research suggests that reflective writing can be an effective teaching method in agriculture-related fields,” he said. In the study, VanDerZanden evaluated the effectiveness of using reflective writing assignments in her Beginning Garden Composition class, a two-credit course at Iowa State that covers the basics of landscape design. For the first assignment, students were asked to describe a selected landscape image using as much detail as possible. The second assignment required students to describe how the seven principles of design, which were previously discussed in class, were evidenced in the landscape image, and for the third assignment students described how historical garden eras influenced the selected image. The assignments were designed to encourage students to write about technical content covered in the course while drawing from their background and experiences. To evaluate the impact of the writing assignments, VanDerZanden compared students’ scores on an 18-point quiz question from two years of classes when the reflective writing assignments were not part of the course and three years when the assignments were used (for a total of 110 students enrolled from 2005). She found that scores on the quiz question increased significantly for the students who completed the reflective writing assignments compared with those students who did not complete the assignments as part of the course. VanDerZanden noted that the use of reflective writing assignments can be incorporated into any technical course. The study was published in HortTechnology.
— ANI |
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CCS Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar FARMERS will now get better boarding and lodging facility at Haryana Agricultural University. A new farmers' hostel has been constructed at a cost of nearly Rs 2.2 crore which was inaugurated by Chief Minsiter Bhupinder Singh Hooda. According to the Vice-Chancellor, Dr K.S. Khokhar, this is the second hostel for farmers on the campus. It has 10 rooms, five dormitories with attached toilets, a dining hall, common room, reading room, computer room and a seminar hall for training of the farmers. Kisan Mela held Over 45,000 farmers from Haryana and adjoining states of Rajasthan, Delhi and Uttar Pradesh thronged the two-day Kisan Mela organised by Haryana Ahgricultural University at its research farm here. According to Director of Extension Education and convener of the Mela Dr J.S. Dhankhar, the farmers purchased certified seeds of various kharif crops and vegetables, as well as fruit saplings worth Rs 21.5 lakh. The university had set up a seed sale counter at the venue in collaboration with various government seed agencies, including the Haryana Seed Development Corporation, National Seed Corporation, Central State Farm and KRIBHCO. The visiting farmers were taken on guided visits to the research farm of the university. They were given demonstrations of the technology applied by the university scientists in raising these crops. Besides, they were also apprised of the technologies for conservation of natural resources. The farmers also purchased literature on agriculture and bio-fertilisers. Workhop on resource conservation A four-day National Training Workshop-cum-Travelling Seminar on Resource Conservation Technologies of different Cropping Systems was organised at the university jointly by the Department of Agronomy and the Directorate of Extension Education. It was attended by more than 100 participants from Haryana, Punjab, Rajasthan, Delhi and Himachal Pradesh. The participants comprised young agricultural scientists and postgraduate students, personnel from extension agencies, manufacturing units and key administrators and planners. Director of Research, Dr R.P. Narwal, said the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) had declared HAU as the lead centre on Niche Area of Excellence (NAE) on resource conservation technologies. He said significant researches and extension outputs of HAU scientists on resource conservation technologies of zero tillage, multiple cropping, bed planting, laser leveling, green manuring and residue retention had inspired national and international scientists to train here. Alumni bag fellowships Two PhD students of the Chemistry Department of Haryana Agricultural University, Jigyasa Jain and Deepika Jain, have been awarded the prestigious Inspire Fellowships. The fellowship is awarded to meritorious students by the Department of Science and Technology, Government of India. It carries an amount of Rs 16,000 per month as fellowship and Rs 20,000 as contingency per year for five years. Anita Rani and Sarita Devi have been awarded Post-Doctoral Fellowship (PDF) by the University Grants Commission (UGC). Both have recently done PhD in the Department of Botany and Plant Physiology of the university. Lala Lajpat Rai University of Veterinary
and Animal Sciences, Hisar Dr Suresh Chander and Dr S.M. Chahal have been appointed as Dean Post-Graduate Studies and Director of Research, respectively, of Lala Lajpat Rai University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences. Dr Suresh Chander was earlier Director of Teaching Veterinary Clinical Complex and Head of the Department of Veterinary Gynecology and Obstetrics. The new Director of Research, Dr S. M. Chahal, was earlier Dean, College of Animal Sciences, CCS Haryana Agricultural University.
— Contributed by Raman Mohan |
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