Re: Indian Education System
Posted: 09 Feb 2022 11:30
srikumar avare, there is BA math in India too. or used to be.
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As an arts graduate myself with conviction I can say that the B.A English course which I did; did NOT have any special courses/subject which trained a person to be creative, do research, do analytical reasoning or for that matter even improve communicative skills. The English I learnt (and which benefitted me in my career) was taught at a school which had a different philosophy/methodology when it comes to teaching that language.hgupta wrote:Technical skills can be acquired easily however people skills are not easily acquirable.
In case 'ethical judgement' was a quality acquired by doing B.A courses in India, we might have a very honest and super efficient bureaucracy (at state level). Because most of the staff out there are NOT technical graduates. May be your understanding of Bachelor of Arts course is different from what is taught in India. My major was English literature with two subsidiary courses World History & British History. I can understand English taught for communication purposes, but how much of job value does appreciating English literature (Shelley, Keats et.al) have? Again World History is good to know, but what about British History? Other than of academic interest what value is there in learning about Richard the Lionheart, Cuthberts, Henries, Stewarts etc.?oral communication, critical thinking, ethical judgment, working effectively in teams, written communication, and the real-world application of skills and knowledge
I know B.A graduates who have excelled in life. But we must also consider the areas from where they come from, their school education as well as the class of society they come from. For example B.A graduates from Bangalore, Mumbai or Delhi will have excellent mastery over languages such as English. But a B.A graduate from say Srikrishnapuram, Channapatna etc may not have that calibre. My seven year old child today speaks far better English than what a 10th Std "English Medium" child from a rural area can speak. That is because of the city we currently stay at. Yes, teaching profession is what many of them land up in. But that vacancies are also very limited.Aldonkar wrote:Many BAs become teachers, or go into "Management" of large corporations.
I actually shudder to think what would have happened to me if I did not learn computers (as a hobby) and a gentlemen enterprenuer gave me a first break. It was that time when folks like Wipro, Infosys etc wanted B.Techs for even post of peons . I was clueless in pure mathematics, the B.A course did not have any element of maths or statistics as well. Which means that even for a PSC exam it was tough, there would be questions on maths/statistics. From what I understand; even the Public Service Commission exams are skewed towards people who have a bit of mathematical & problem solving skills (which puts even B.Com graduates at an advantage).vimal wrote:Maybe a top percentile gets a chance but most of them are pretty unemployable.
I agree with you here . There should be a mix of both - and what ever gets taught have to help in making the student self reliant and capable of improving life as an individual. Educating technically good people to become glorified mechanics/mestiris or non-technical people to become babus will not help the people nor the country in the long run. We must understand that even with hordes of 'technically brilliant' people we really have not very significant contributions to the world in science & technology. So that education is also mediocre.SriKumar wrote:Actually, arts and humanities are really important and science/engg students should get some exposure to it.
I don't think so such a course now exists. Or it did not exist in late 1990s. My university had lots of courses - including a short lived B.A Acturial Science. But Maths was always B.Sc Maths. Earlier there seems to be some 'Honours' courses, but that also seems to have vanished.Vayutuvan wrote:srikumar avare, there is BA math in India too. or used to be.
What do you mean unemployable? like in the desired fields or what? Maybe in India they are, but here in the US there is no issue of people with liberal arts degrees finding jobs in any field as long as they follow up with learning technical or business skills along the way. Doesnt have to be engineering degrees but skills needed to do the job and grow.vimal wrote:Hgupta I wanted to stress that the quantity of BA grads far outstrips the demand for them every where. Maybe a top percentile gets a chance but most of them are pretty unemployable.
Hgupta Ji,hgupta wrote:You might be surprised that degrees with english literature or liberal arts variety or whatever still have value in the US. In medium sized and large organizations, employers are looking for workers who have people skills, not necessarily technical skills to manage employees and minimize conflicts and achieve teamwork and better efficiency in worker interactions. Technical skills can be acquired easily however people skills are not easily acquirable.vimal wrote:Not just India, even in other countries like USA, degrees like English literature is laughed upon as useless. Eventually these folks tend end up learning some computer skills (STEM skills fwiw) like office or powerpoint and get employed as clerks. In USA a lot of these folks also join a bootcamp (NIIT anyone) and then join a startup to get a toehold in the tech industry. Many of them also rant against the H1Bs stealing their jobs.
Liberal arts degree programs encourage important skills, such as creativity, research, analytical reasoning, innovative problem-solving, and communicative skills. Based on my experience in working with several fortune 500 companies and smaller companies, most employers value oral communication, critical thinking, ethical judgment, working effectively in teams, written communication, and the real-world application of skills and knowledge. Technical skill is a must too but they view those kind of skills as easily acquirable during the course of employment. The other skills mentioned are not that easily acquirable and hard to replace. For instance, I was involved in a university affiliated computer project that relied on grants from several companies to keep going. There was a graduate student from India who had excellent technical skill sets but did not have good communication skills orally or written. Over the year, the professors and even other graduate students (including me) tried to help him out by teaching the communication skills set but in the end it wasn't enough. Even the company realized that he was smart but he couldnt do the required job of documenting and illustrating on paper so the knowledge could be passed on and he was let go. He didn't understand how important communication skills were in a team setting where IP knowledge must be easily translated to other team members in a way that they can hit the ground running in short order. In my experience, I found that people who have excellent communication skills and creativity and have sufficient analytical reasoning and okay technical knowledge tend to be promoted to managers and upper level management all the way to the very top. Some of them had liberal arts degrees.
For a very good example of this, take no further look than Steve Jobs. Yes he dropped out of college but he went to a liberal arts college, Reeds College and he started APPLE with his buddy Wozniak who was a technogeek genius. However due to his own introvert personality and lack of communication skills, Wozniak was not the face of APPLE but Jobs was and he was not even a technogeek genius. He just mastered in communication skills and creativity.
Sorry for the late reply. Very unlikely as I was trying to make the point that this lad was taking the easy options in life. He dropped out of a Medical degree, took a BS in History (the easiest course in the UK) and then use a back door to get a LLB and a job in the City. I lastsaw him a couple of years ago and he had just left his parents house (aged about 30) and was enjoying a life of luxury.SriKumar wrote: Aldonkar:
Is your friend's son following the footsteps of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi? Gandhi too got his law degree from Univ. College, London.
Extraordinary. Very magnanimous indeed.Amber G. wrote:Largest single private donation received (Rs 425 crore ~ 60 Million USD) by IISc after its founding. And that too for state-of-art biomedical R&D and healthcare services!
Karnataka has proposed teaching all school children Sanskrit as a third language and introducing Manusmriti and ancient numerical systems like Bhuta-sankhya and katapayadi-sankhya paddhati in the syllabus. Besides, one of its proposals for inclusion in the new NEP school syllabus, says students should be encouraged to question “how fake news such as Pythagoras theorem, apple falling on Newton’s head etc. are being created and propagated. Gravity and Pythagoras have roots in Vedic maths.
Lamenting the current system of education, the paper attributes it to “policies at both the state and the central level which in the garb of secularisation have systematically ushered our impressionable minds into the zone of rootlessness and ignorance of the achievements by their very own ancestors
The paper pointed out that many of the Smrti literature “have been relegated to obscurity or being proscribed due to incomplete and poor understanding of their ethos and content”. It said: “For instance, even though Manusmirti contains lofty ideals of public and societal good, it has become controversial to the extent that its very name solicits unwarranted bemoan from a section of our society.
From the IITK sources:[Even though ]The number of global offers has gone down as many firms are on a hiring freeze and
many bluechip companies have stayed away, scalded by the ongoing economic slowdown. [still]
High-frequency and quantitative trading firms snapped up top talent from the Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) on Thursday, offering salaries as high as ₹4 crore, as the placements season kicked off at the country’s premier engineering schools.
If we are making it a free market, then more competition is good. The existing pvt universities have to improve their delivery or perish. It may put more pressure on govt premier institutes to retain their talent.Cyrano wrote:https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/edu ... 822191.cms
How do guru log here view this development? One on hand we should wish our premier Indian institutes to set up more campuses abroad, on the other hand premier foreign univs are setting up centres in India...
While more intense bidirectional exchange will be ultimately always good, I'm curious to know the pros and cons and how India can maximise its benefits.
Also noticed that some IIT's (IIT Kanpur for example) are now offering MBA.GATE 2023 examination is being organized by IIT Kanpur. The first phase of the examination was successfully completed this weekend. The overall attendance of the candidates was approximately 76%.
Congratulations to the entire GATE 2023 team of Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur and all zonal GATE teams at different IITs.
These so called high job packages have completely poisoned the atmosphere at IIT Kanpur (and related places) and completely sucked away the talent from on-campus research programmes and startups etc.Amber G. wrote:Some news from my alma mater IIT Kanpur... (Similar news items from other IIT's and premier institutes in India)
As the placements season kicks off -
I - Impressive! ₹40,000,00 (~$500,000) starting salary+comp for a fresh graduate from IIT Kanpur.
IIT-K student hits record ₹4 crore placement jackpot.
https://www.livemint.com/industry/human-resource/iitkanpur-student-gets-record-salary-offer-in-placement-season-11669919505272.htmlFrom the IITK sources:[Even though ]The number of global offers has gone down as many firms are on a hiring freeze and
many bluechip companies have stayed away, scalded by the ongoing economic slowdown. [still]
High-frequency and quantitative trading firms snapped up top talent from the Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) on Thursday, offering salaries as high as ₹4 crore, as the placements season kicked off at the country’s premier engineering schools.
- The placement season 2022-23 offers have broken all the previous records. Till now,145 companies (100+ companies offering Core/Engineering & Software domains) have participated.
- At the end of day 3 of phase 1, 808 students have secured the jobs. The highest domestic package is a record-breaking Rs. 1.9 Crores. 74 students have received international offers and 33 offers are above Rs 1 crore.
I find it very encouraging that compared to earlier days *most* graduates are getting domestic offers. (When I graduated (in late 1960's) - a huge percentage -- nearly all top students -- will choose to go to USA)
Wow! why such negativity?..csaurabh wrote:Amber G. wrote:Some news from my alma mater IIT Kanpur... (Similar news items from other IIT's and premier institutes in India)
As the placements season kicks off -
I - Impressive! ₹40,000,00 (~$500,000) starting salary+comp for a fresh graduate from IIT Kanpur.
IIT-K student hits record ₹4 crore placement jackpot.
<snip>
....
I find it very encouraging that compared to earlier days *most* graduates are getting domestic offers. (When I graduated (in late 1960's) - a huge percentage -- nearly all top students -- will choose to go to USA)
These so called high job packages have completely poisoned the atmosphere at IIT Kanpur (and related places) and completely sucked away the talent from on-campus research programmes and startups etc.
All B-Tech students are crazy about the high job packages and target solely that. They don't give a flying f*ck about any domestic R&D or innovative startups in Aerospace, drones, robotics and the like . In fact although IIT Kanpur now boasts some impressive RnD and products being done on the campus, the entire show there is run by Masters students and talented people from ordinary colleges. Students interest in course-work is at an all time low. Rampant cheating/copying is the norm.. They are not going to work in those fields anyway so why bother learning ? Job package is the sole importance. Believe me, I have even met some students who think research/startups are some sort of scam to lure them away from their well deserved 'high package jobs'.
P.S. I am a graduate of IIT Kanpur.
ukraine medical degrees are accepted for medical practice in the EU countries. Easiest way to get a doctor's job or set up a medical practicesumsumne wrote:Students going abroad: PM nudges pvt firms to expand medical education
https://www.rediff.com/news/report/stud ... 220226.htm
Why are Indian Students going to Ukraine and Wuhan and studying Medicine there despite the language barrier?
Wait - so they're dumbing things down to appease our IITs?The Times Higher Education (THE) World University Rankings reportedly reached out to the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) last month after a three-year boycott stemming from "transparency" issues.
THE informed the premier institutions of performance parameter changes for this year in hopes of allaying past concerns and regaining their participation.
According to source cited by the Indian Express, THE representatives on 7 March made a presentation to IT-Delhi, IIT-Bombay, and IIT-Madras, and listed changes to the ranking criteria modifications, including citation metric changes previously criticised by IITs.The rankings are annually published by the UK-based Times Higher Education magazine.The citation metric, a measure of the average number of times a university's published work is cited by scholars globally, previously carried a weightage of 30 per cent.The Citation metric's weightage has now been decreased to 15 per cent,
Sound like our system is reasonable. We have BA, BSc, MA, MSc, and BEd, MEd if you want to pursue becoming a teacher, but can go for MPhil, Phd if you want to pursue research. Then BE/B Tech, ME/M Tech. Plus polytechnic diploma, ITI certificate, and other vocational training are available after your 10 grade. You have MBA, MCA, etc if you want to go that route. IMHO the problem is really the quality of education infrastructure and teachers.sanman wrote:Look at the Swiss approach -- would that be good for India?
https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/sci-tech/t ... d/48148948
That is true, but Australia, the UK, France, etc too offer 3-year programs. In the US the 4-year programs have a lot of humanity courses, perhaps that could make a difference, especially for STEM programs. I would still contend, consistent quality education standard across India is the biggest challenge.vera_k wrote:Is the difference that the Swiss degrees result in 16 years of education compared to 15 years for many of the Indian programs?
Check Gareeb Scientist. I came across that recently while trying to dig info on ISRO's electric thruster.Haresh wrote:Does anyone know of any YouTube or other Indian science channels in Indian languages, preferably Punjabi or Hindi?
I have found Science Safari
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yf9TOuFGbFU
Anyone know of any others ?
Wow!!csaurabh wrote: <snip>
As per my understanding you are an NRI with not much knowledge of ground realities. I am just telling it how it is based on my own experience.
Purdue was one of the University in GIAP (Along with MIT, Caltech, Princeton etc) which provided enormous help in the formation of IIT Kanpur in late 60's. For every book they bought for their university, they bought one copy for IIT Library, also provided subscription to all the research journals.Purdue has entered into another landmark international agreement, this one with the government of India, to advance workforce development, research and development, and industry partnerships in semiconductors. At a signing ceremony on Tuesday (May 9) are, from left, T.V. Nagendra Prasad, Consul General of the Indian Consulate in San Francisco; Honorable Ashwini Vaishnaw, India’s Union Minister for Railways, Communications, Electronics and IT; Purdue President Mung Chiang; and Vijay Raghunathan, Purdue professor and Associate Head of Electrical and Computer Engineering and Director of Semiconductor Education for Purdue. (Purdue University photo)
Allow me to shed some light: The source of all this is cabal like Dawkins, Nature (amplified by ddm. BBC... etc) who as one IIT Distinguished Professor, FRS, and Emmons Terman Award winner (given by American Society for Engineering Education.. called this Dawkins (on his own face) .. not kidding, What a dumb effing idiot! I agree with him 100%.Jay wrote:Apparently NCERT has removed below listed topics. Not really sure what is going on,