The Tribune, Chandigarh, India - Chandigarh Stories

EDUCATION

DP (Schools) directive ‘hits’ CBSE’s evaluation work
Vijay Mohan
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, April 23
The evaluation work of CBSE examination answer-books has reportedly been hit hard following a directive of the UT DP (Schools) asking all government school teachers assigned the job to first report to their respective schools and undertake regular teaching work before proceeding to the respective nodal centres.

Consequently, examiners feel that they would be unable to meet the CBSE’s deadline to complete the evaluation work by April 30, leading to speculations in certain sections that it may affect the CBSE’s schedule of compiling and declaring the results.

As per orders issued by the DPI (Schools), teachers deputed for evaluation work are required to stay in their respective schools till 10 am to carry out normal duties. They have to return to school if their period is slated after 10 am.

The head examiner of a nodal centre told the TNS on condition of anonymity that the number of teachers reporting for evaluation duty had dropped drastically. “Earlier, depending upon the subject, around 25 teachers used to be present in the centre to mark the answer-books. Now barely six or seven teachers are available at a time,” he rued.

Evaluators are required to mark at least 20-25 answer-books daily, but are now finding it difficult to meet this target. Besides having their effective working time reduced, the time spent on travelling from the school to the centre also has to be considered. CBSE sources said in such circumstances they were being forced to move answer-books to different centres where a sufficient number of teachers were available to undertake evaluation work.

CBSE officials presume that given the situation, the evaluation work could drag on till mid-May. The tentative date of declaration of result by the CBSE is in the last week of May. “All mark-sheets and evaluation papers are sent to the CBSE head-office in Delhi where the result is tabulated and then declared. If the despatch of papers from here is delayed, it could affect the dates for result declaration,” a head examiner remarked. “A delay of even a day or two matters”, he added. Education department officials, on their part, maintain that the orders were issued as the teaching work in some schools was suffering.

3-day workshop on distance education
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, April 23
A large number of service providers from Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Chandigarh, J & K, MP, UP, Andhra Pradesh, Rajasthan and Kerala attended a three-day workshop organised by the All-India PTU-Distance Education Programme which opened at Zirakpur, near here, today.

Organised by the PTU Service Provider Association, the workshop was inaugurated by Dr Y.S. Rajan, Vice-Chancellor, PTU, Jalandhar. The inaugural function was presided over by Dr A. Kalanidhi. Dr Narsimha Rao, international expert on ZOPP, will conduct the entire workshop.

Dr Rajan emphasised on the role of distance education in the present scenario. “In this world of competition everybody should be competent enough to sustain in the market and so should be the university. Just awarding education to candidates is not enough. Education must be on the line of future trends and requirements on industry. In this direction, a lot more new projects have to be added and removed within a time frame. The existing courses are also to be upgraded from time to time. The Distance Education Programme will not be limited to the present structure. New study centres and new courses will be launched under this umbrella to serve the international market”.

Dr Kalanidhi, Chairman, Task Force\Interim Council, PTU-DEP, said things had changed since he took over the charge. The vision of the university was very clear to provide quality education to working professionals, housewives and depressed ones. But due to lack of a proper system and unpresented growth, the aim was not achieved fully. The Interim Council had taken steps to provide quality education. A few of them were: (1) All study centres will be connected through computer network so that direct interaction between the university and the study centres can take place. (2) Tele-conferencing will be started by the university under which experts will deliver lectures at one location and can be accessed by any of the affiliated centres throughout India. (3) Smart cards will also be introduced to students to keep track of all records like passed exams, fees paid, credits earned etc.

He also said the university would introduce the credit system for DEP courses under which the students who had already got some credit on particular course-subject in any university, would not have to repeat the topic.

Mr D.S. Shekhon, president, PTU Service Provider Association, said before the PTU distance education programme, many universities were also offering the same programmes in regular or distance mode. But the courses offered were of obsolete technologies, so even after clearing the examination, the students were not able to get jobs directly. So the students had to opt for private institutes to acquire necessary skill levels which charged huge fees.

MAAC to offer animation courses
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, April 23
Inspired by the growing acceptance of animation as an inseparable part of entertainment, the Chandigarh centre of the Maya Academy of Advanced Cinematics (MAAC) has introduced full-fledged courses to train people in this new, rather unexplored realm.

Beginning from today, MAAC will offer elaborate courses in the special effect category, that has become critical to almost every new production that is coming in. In the city to hold a special presentation with regard to animation courses to be introduced at MAAC was Mr Rajesh Turakhia, chief operating officer (COO) of Maya Entertainment Limited, Mumbai, an organisation owned and promoted by film director Ketan Mehta and his actress wife Deepa Mehta.

Mr Turakhia informed The Tribune that Maya Entertainment was in the process of associating itself with Discreet, the famous North American company which is the leading creator and supplier of special 3-D effects like flame, inferno, smoke and fire worldwide.

“We are expecting to become the first Discreet authorised training partners in the region. The idea is to provide the best available learning material to students. The main feature of this training programme will be software combustion which will include thorough insight into the best available special-effect softwares in the world,” he said.

Informed Mr Turakhia, “With everything going in favour of the animation industry, it is time that we started offering training in the development of special effects that have become so significant in films as also in small screen productions these days. So we are offering courses at MAAC, Chandigarh, beginning from today. In-house placements is another benefit at MAAC.”

Maya Entertainment is already taking care of special effects in famous small screen serials like ‘Son pari’, ‘Karishma ka Karishma’ and ‘Chacha Chowdhari’, now on air on all prime-time channels. Mr Turakhia added that Maya Entertainment was making inroads in the North with over 580 students passing out of its various centres over the past two years.

Meanwhile, the Chandigarh centre will accept only a limited number of students so that personalised training in animation courses becomes possible.

Seminar held on e-governance
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, April 23
Seth Jai Parkash Mukand Lal Institute of Engineering and Technology (JMIT) and Seth Jai Parkash Institute of Management and Technology(JMIT), Radaur, jointly organised a national-level technical symposium on “E-Governance — A tool for social re-engineering” at Radaur yesterday.

Inaugurating the symposium, Air Marshal K.S. Bhatia (retd), who was the chief guest, said India should focus on computer density, communication, internet facilities and cyber laws. He said western countries had decided to govern their communication and defence sectors through e-governance.

A former Vice-Chancellor of Guru Jambeshwar University, Hisar, Dr K.L. Johar, said e-governance was the need of the hour.

SCHOOL WORLD
ENTER ENGLISH

KNOW YOUR WORDS

noisome\adjective

MEANING

Noxious, unwholesome.
Offensive to the smell or other senses.

The rotting vegetables made the surroundings noisome.

SENTENCES

The body politic sometimes produces noisome and unseemly substances, among which are politicians.
The rotting vegetables made the surroundings noisome.

trepidation\noun

MEANINGS

An involuntary trembling, quaking, quivering.
A state of dread or alarm; nervous agitation, apprehension, fright.

SENTENCES

People of the valley went to the polls with a certain sense of trepidation.
She thought she had seen a ghost. So strong was the feeling that she could hardly recover from the strong trepidation she experienced.

tremulous\adjective

MEANING

If your actions are tremulous you are shaking slightly.
When you are tremulous you are afraid and nervous.

SENTENCES

The twins were holding tremulously to each other.
Her voice went on tremulous, but determined.

ingenuous\adjective\also adverb (ingenuously)

MEANINGS

When you describe people as ingenuous, you mean they are innocent, trusting, and incapable of deceiving anyone; also used for people’s behaviour and expression.

SENTENCES

She was soft-spoken and ingenuous.

His expression was frank, innocent and ingenuous.

His apology was so sincere and ingenuous that his enemy was disconcerted.

IDIOMS

Play a second fiddle

MEANING

Be lower or inferior in position than someone else.
Have a less important role to play than someone else.

SENTENCES

My friend resigned from the job when his junior was appointed as his boss. He could obviously not play a second fiddle.
My friend was sure of her intelligence. She never created a fuss even if she had to play a second fiddle.
Out of thin air

MEANING

As if from nowhere at all.

SENTENCES

Three people appeared in front of us out of thin air. We had no idea who they were.

There are people in this world so hungry, that God cannot appear to them except in the form of bread :Gandhi

COURTS

DBA not to boycott court of Judicial Magistrate
Our Correspondent

Chandigarh, April 23
The three-day-long dispute between members of the District Bar Association (DBA) regarding the alleged misbehaviour by a Judicial Magistrate with a client of an advocate ended today with the DBA deciding on not supporting the complaint in this regard.

At a general house meeting of the DBA held in the Bar room of the district court, a majority of members opined that there was no need to boycott the court of the judicial officer concerned as no personal remarks were stated to have been made against the client. Moreover, the aggrieved party had already lodged a complaint in this regard with the Chief Justice of the Punjab and Haryana Court.

The president of the DBA, Mr Sajal Koser, said the role of the Bar was not required as the matter was pending before the authorities concerned. The members expressed faith in the executive body of the DBA. Meanwhile, the counsel for the complainant said if the DBA would not support the complaint of his client, he would resign from membership of the DBA.