Haider Ali KhanManagement Development Institute (MDI), Gurgaon, one of the top B-schools in India has revamped their part time executive programme to cater skill development of the executives for the 2015 session. The changes have been introduced following the review meeting held in MDI.Top industry leaders and thought makers from the institute participated in the review meeting. MDI has launched its 27th batch of its executive part time programme.The millennium city Gurgaon is a hub for start-ups and MNCs. Commutation during the peak hours towards the campus was a concern for the participants and one of the suggested changes. Now, instead of evening classes, the institute will hold classes in the weekends.The Institute has made the course flexible as participants who cannot complete it in three years can be allowed up to five years to graduate in exceptional cases. At the same time, others can finish the programme in two years.“The key to sustainability is adaptation to the changing business eco-system. We invite feedback from the industry to make our curriculum flexible for the participant. Value addition in the participant’s career encouraged to revisit our programmes regularly and make them participant friendly. We are delighted to introduce these changes in our curriculum. The changes will be most helpful in flexible training and skill development of the executives,” said Professor A K Jain, chairperson, PGPM-Part Time programme.The programme is open to working executives with at least three years post qualification experience. It is aimed at including strategic thinking, decision-making and problem solving abilities, team spirit, entrepreneurial and leadership capabilities and mind set ready for innovation and change.
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British-born economist Angus Deaton won the 2015 economics Nobel Prize for "his analysis of consumption, poverty and welfare", the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said on Monday (12 October). The academy said that Deaton's work had been a major influence on policy making, helping for example to determine which social groups are affected by an increase of value-added tax on food. "To design economic policy that promotes welfare and reduces poverty, we must first understand individual consumption choices," the award-giving body said on announcing the 8 million Swedish crown ($978,000) prize. "More than anyone else, Angus Deaton has enhanced this understanding," it said. Deaton also spearheaded the use of household survey data in developing countries, especially data on consumption, to measure living standards and poverty, the academy said. The economics prize, officially called the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel, was established in 1968. It was not part of the original group of awards set out in dynamite tycoon Nobel's 1895 will. Deaton, who was born in Edinburgh and holds both British and U.S. citizenship, is professor of Economics and International Affairs at Princeton University in the United States.(Reuters)
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By C H UnnikrishnanIndia is emerging as a key region for design education as the concept of formal training in design is catching up fast in the country and the standard of curriculum and the faculty is similar to the one that is offered in any other part of the world, says David Van Zandt, president, The New School-Parsons School of Design, New York, one of the world’s top art and design schools.According to Zandt, the importance of design education is increasing as design has started engaging boardrooms now.“Design schools are not only a major source of new talents for the economy’s rapidly growing creative sector, but are critical catalysts for entrepreneurship,” he said in Mumbai while inaugurating the Mumbai Academic Campus of Indian School of Designs and Innovation (ISDI) and Parsons School of Design, on Friday (9, October).The new art academic campus, where two unique design education institutions are coming together to provide a common platform for creative education and design thinking, is first of its kind in India. With this, Parsons School of Design will support ISDI by creating a unique design education delivery system in terms of faculty, ongoing training curriculum student and faculty exchange among others.“ISDI with Parsons in Mumbai is laser focused on building a new generation ecosystem of design and innovation driven by creative entrepreneurship in India,” said Radha Kapoor, ISDI founder and executive director, and an alumnus of Parson School of Design, New York.“By formalising the strong partnership with Parsons, we are building up the capacity of global faculty in the Mumbai campus of ISDI,” said Siddharth Shahani, executive director, ISDI.
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Course providers of EduKart, online education marketplace, are launching a special scholarship programme through a contest to provide a better education to deserving students.The company's investor and brand ambassador, cricketer Yuvraj Singh is supporting the programme and has himself set the criteria for awarding the scholarship.The company has organised a contest for the students basis which deserving candidates will be chosen by the course providers for the scholarship. Many course providers like Assam Down Town University and AskIITians are participating in this initiative.“This is a great initiative as it will help deserving candidates to pursue quality education. I firmly believe that nobody should be denied access to education because of financial constraints and this scholarship program is an amazing step in that direction,” said Yuvraj Singh, founder YouWeCan Ventures.The company announced its referral programme earlier this month which has seen a lot of traction from students. This is another campaign by the company to help deserving candidates make their education decision.(BW Online Bureau)
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In one of the largest philanthropic gifts by a member of the Indian-American community, a couple has donated $100 million to New York University's engineering school, which will now be renamed after them in recognition of its gift.Chandrika and Ranjan Tandon's gift to the New York University's School of Engineering will principally support faculty hiring and academic programs and is intended to build on the engineering school's existing practice of cross-disciplinary innovation and entrepreneurship, NYU President John Sexton and the school's dean Katepalli R Sreenivasan said in a joint statement here.The school will be renamed the NYU Tandon School of Engineering in recognition of the Tandons "generosity and their belief in the school's mission and promise," the statement said.Chandrika is a member of the Board of Overseers of NYU's business school, a member of the NYU Board of Trustees and leads the NYU President's Global Council.Ranjan is an engineer by training and a graduate of the Harvard Business School. He is founder and chair of Libra Advisors, a hedge fund he founded in 1990 that is now a family office.The Tandons' donation is believed to be the largest philanthropic gift by a member of the Indian-American community, the university said."Getting to know the engineering school was truly electrifying. The imagination and inventiveness of the students and faculty as they worked together on real world problems, the cutting-edge work being done both within the school and collaboratively across schools in such diverse areas like the arts, medicine, education, incubators; the entrepreneurial spirit that pervades the place all this inspired us," she said.Sreenivasan said the Tandons' act of generosity is remarkable not only because of the size of the gift, but also because it recognises the importance of a school with which they had no prior affiliation.Funds from the gift will be used to further enhance programs, including wireless, cybersecurity, and digital education and gaming and enhance interdisciplinary programs such as financial engineering, technology management and innovation, and entrepreneurship in important areas such as clean energy.In 2010, Harvard Business School had received a gift of USD 50 million from Tata Companies, the Sir Dorabji Tata Trust and the Tata Education and Development Trust, philanthropic entities of the Tata Group. The gift was the largest from an international donor in the School's 102-year history.(PTI)
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The digital wave in the country has transformed the entire education ecosystem, making it more tech-oriented and student-friendly. As technology seeped into every aspect of life, it was only a matter of time for it to penetrate one of the most important facets of one’s existence i.e. education. Online learning presents various benefits such as easy accessibility, on-the-go learning, flexibility and convenience to name a few. These are the main reasons behind the increasing inclination of people towards this mode. In fact, it has quickly become a default way of studying and has evolved from being an option to being a need. Digitisation of the education landscape is also letting the students residing in tier-2 and tier-3 cities reap the benefits of quality education tools. On the other hand, however, offline learning also has its own merits, which definitely cannot be overlooked. Therefore, a seamless blend of both offline and online pedagogical approaches is now the need of the hour.Online LearningOnline learning enables students with the option to study in the comfort of their homes, without having to travel miles to go to an institution for attending an important lecture. This makes it a cost-efficient mode of learning. Besides this, online learning is suitable for working people as well who do not have the time at their disposal to attend regular classes. They can get a certificate or a degree without having to physically go to a brick-and-mortar institution. Online video lectures help these students stay connected with what is being taught in traditional classrooms. This way they don’t have to miss out on anything and can fulfil their ambition of working and attaining further academic qualifications simultaneously. There has been a slow and steady pick in self-paced courses, and this trend is fairly visible for all.While these are the benefits of online learning, there are some limitations as well. Self-discipline and time management matters a lot in online learning. Limited interaction with fellow students and with the instructors can also result in lesser enthusiasm and confidence as compared with offline pedagogical approaches. Although lectures can be attended online, the interpersonal relationship between a student and instructor is harder to build virtually.Traditional LearningThe concept of traditional learning is slowly undergoing a transformation with the advent of the internet and technology-led education. However, the innumerable benefits of this mode of education cannot be denied. With its multi-sensory appeal, it enables students to grasp what’s being taught easily and quickly. Immediate interactions help them clear their doubts then and there. They can take part in live discussions and know the view-points of other students at the same time. Visual Learning classes have been appreciated by students and faculties alike. It helps students to understand the tough concepts easily and learning becomes fun for them.However, there is no denying that traditional learning eats up a lot of time. It’s expensive as compared to online learning and lacks flexibility. In many cases, the traditional format makes quality education and guidance inaccessible to those students in whose locality there aren’t any good institutions or coaching centres. Advantages of digital education for students of tier-3 and tier-4 cities:Digital education has metamorphosed the education landscape of the country in such a way that students of not just tier-1 and tier-2 cities but also of tier-3 and tier-4 cities are now able to access superlative learning opportunities. Digital courses have tremendously helped in bridging the wide geographical gap that hitherto existed between students and the leading institutions of the country. Such online courses have been instrumental in enhancing the learning experience of students residing in extreme corners of the country.E-learning has made inroads in the entire nation, the result of which is this that students are now rapidly embracing this new concept. A blend of the online mode of learning and traditional pedagogy is being adopted by institutions these days so as to provide a compelling learning experience to students. Live lectures combined with the facility to interact with faculty in real time and give students a feel of traditional classrooms is what many institutions are now focussing on. This combination of the physical classroom and the e-learning experience is enriching the way students understand and absorb information and apply this knowledge.New age education methods like app-based learning also give superlative convenience to students and bolster the result of other learning techniques. The spike in smartphone and mobile data usage has given to rise to new, innovative, creative and highly engaging ways of understanding concepts, memorising difficult topics, taking tests and assessing oneself. Quality content remains the main requirement of students and is pivotal in making the online learning experience rich and beneficial. Education providers have to ensure that they deliver meaningful content to students in the online space and amalgamate this content with the best of traditional learning methods so that more and more students embrace this new way of absorbing information. The offline versus online debate is now not as relevant as the debate about how the merits of both these formats need to be synchronised to create new benchmarks in the Indian education space. The author, Ritesh Raushan, is the director at The Gate Academy
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Technology-driven learning is bringing a qualitative difference to education in rural and semi-urban areas of India. Although rural India has woken up to the online learning trend quite late because of the lack of a stronger mindset in smaller towns and infrastructural challenges, this issue has been gradually resolved. From mobile classrooms to online tutors, today there are hundreds of such startups passionate about transforming the education system in our country.The introduction of digital education in rural India came with its own set of infrastructural issues. The erratic electricity supply and lack of access to educational facilities made the penetration of technology-based education tough. The incursion of cable television eventually changed the prevalent indolent way of thinking. The rural population is now welcoming the idea of using mobile devices and is equally comfortable in handling technology devices. Online learning or Live Virtual Classrooms (LVC) has paved the way for modern education in rural India. Moreover, the integration of technologies such as Cloud, Data Centers & Virtualization into the education industry is making information available to the students from far-flung areas in just one click.At present, the country has over 200 million people connected to the internet and the numbers are expected to reach 550 million by 2018. In such a scenario, the number of competitive exam aspirants is going to increase every year. These learners will not only increase the demand for good content but also easily accessible content, be it through smartphones or tablets. The advent of low-cost smartphones coupled with low mobile tariffs is empowering students from the small cities to go beyond making just phone calls and instead reap the benefits of data connectivity. The further expansion of the data service network in the country, alongside push on 3G & introduction of 4G technologies, is adding to the data usage in rural areas that demand speedier connections.International startups like Khan Academy, Udacity, Coursera, and StraighterLine have already tasted success in this category owing to their role in reforming the educational process with the use of video and advanced web platforms to make learning more affordable and effective. Taking a cue from their international counterparts, Indian online education platforms are following a similar path. They are providing unique advantages of digital learning like Video Content delivery, student-to-student interactions via video conferencing and virtual updating of textbooks to provide personalized attention to the new-age learner residing in the rural and semi-urban areas. Of late, there is a lot of focus on gamification. Interactive online and offline tools are being developed to modernize the segment. Offline tools allow the students to access content without any internet connection or connectivity as low as 100 kbps. Not every student from the smaller cities or remote areas has the luxury of using the internet to take coaching with a tailor-made solution for his/her needs. For such students, the offline study material is available at a certain price wherein students can avail individual modules in respective subjects.Students from rural India value good education and are eagerly waiting to excel in the field. Technology intervention allows them access to the best possible learning resources from across the world, at a very affordable price. The developing wave of adaptive learning facilitates the students with various levels of intellectual capabilities to garner vital skills at their own pace. Numerous coaching centers have also started developing quality study material that can be disseminated on an online platform. This is increasing the success ratio of people learning on online platforms exponentially. Moreover, for a country that depends on the development of its educational sector for its economic and social growth, a surge in switching to technology-driven education will amply propel rural India towards empowerment.The author, Aakash Chaudhry, is the director, Aakash Educational Services
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For the last couple of years, the education sector of India is successful to be one of the most potential employment drivers of the nation. The sector is poised to grow exponentially in the coming decades owing to several factors, the prime of which is the population demographic comprising of more than 550 million people below the age of 25. The strengthening purchasing power of its populace in combination with the want of high career profilehas increased the fervor of Indians towards higher education. On the other hand, the industry is being reinvigorated with raised interests from business conglomerates foraying into the sector. The government policies, with an intention to decrease the gap between the standard of education in India, and its global counterparts, have liberalized the sector opening avenues for Foreign Direct Investments and more international collaborations. Education sector in India is a booming industry with burgeoning career opportunities, the reason for some of the educationists Diaspora to relocating to their motherland.In India, the education sector is on the verge of a massive transformation. The face of education has progressed such that conventional schooling and learning have turned contemporarywith a pro-business approach. In fact, the process has already started with private entities aggressively investing in the sector. The foray of these entities brought a competitive trend to standardized education through modern technology and innovative pedagogy, ultimately benefitting the students. The sector, in contrast to what it was decades back, is on the way to grow as an industry or commercial segment. Presently, 25% of educational setups in the country comprises of private players. This transformation has substantiated an array of career opportunities in the segment apart from teaching or related to teaching.These new range of career includes marketing and management such as financial management, teacher life cycle management as well as fields like curriculum development. The industry is through a massive requirement of human resources in these domains besides core educators.An IBEF, Indian Brand Equity Foundation, report suggests that there are more than 1.4 million schools and more than 35,000 higher educational institutes in the country. Furthermore, the online educational market has carved out a separate niche within the sector. In fact, India attracting educationists from abroad is quite conventional against the backdrop of the country being the proprietorof one of the largest higher educational system in the world. Distance education lately, is through a huge impetus with the online market, which is poised to grow into a market of 40 billion by 2017. Additionally, vocational education and training is emerging as a lucrative sector for educators.The higher education segment is booming in the nation. Reports have suggested that educators with experience more than 7 to 12 years are gaining better traction. Most of the educationists relocating to India are in to higher education segment. Private sectors, again, in this field has been instrumental in substantiating this "Brain Gain". Indian educators residing abroad are attracted by similar opportunities and earning options in the country. Most of the private universities and institutes offer much better salary as per Indian standards that become comparable to their pay grads at foreign institutes. Hence, returning to their homeland has been much rewarding, reinforced by higher earnings. On the other hand, the prospects of venturing their own enterprises have been another lucrative aspect. As new educational setups in the nation is now the need of the hour. Experienced individuals earning good amounts can venture their own institutes, turning educationist cum entrepreneurs.One's own country is always soughed after by mostIndian immigrants. Indians travel abroad in search of good opportunities and life style, which they could not afford living in India. However, the changed economic dynamics have enabled the country to attract these people who settled abroad in search of better career options. Now, when those opportunities are being gradually actualized in their own country, they have no reason to be tagged as immigrants in foreign lands despite of similar opportunities offered here. Moreover, professionals returning to the country aresynonymous to giving back to the nation.The author, Kalpesh Banker, is founder and managing partner of EduShine Advisory Group
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WNS, business process management (BPM) services provider firm, on Wednesday launched a training programme for college students, based on the NASSCOM Qualification Packs (QP) to improve employability and enable them to be industry-ready.With a focus on Tier 2 and 3 cities, this programme aims to train 1,000 students in next six months across 35 colleges in Nasik, Ahmednagar, Aurangabad, Pune, Kaziranga, Chandigarh and Vizag.Keshav R. Murugesh, Group CEO, WNS and Chairman, NASSCOM BPM Council said, "From our experience, we realised students from tier 2 and tier 3 cities are not able to get through the employment selection process due to lack of English language communication skills and soft-skills. In this programme, we are making sure that students undergo English and soft-skills training so that they don't miss out on global career opportunities due to such shortcomings".The training programme has 80-hour long curriculum spread over two months that will enable students to join specialist roles in the BPM industry. Also, WNS will impart training in English, Excel and Soft-Skills to students. The curriculum will cover knowledge of Accounts Payable and Receivables (guided by NASSCOM's QP standards) - duration of 52 hours; Business Skills (Communication, Business Communication, Business Context, Planning, Organizing and Analytical Thinking Skills) - 18 hours and training in Excel - 10 hours."The Indian BPM industry is today completely different from the traditional BPO set-up. It includes careers for specialists such as CAs, MBAs, Doctors, Medical practitioners and so on. The industry also runs processes using high-end technology and analytics. With a goal of delivering $50 Billion by 2020 to the Indian economy, the industry needs more employable talent," added Murugesh.(BW Online Bureau)
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By Kankana Roy ChoudhuryParents in general and Indian parents in particular are known to be obsessed with their children's academic success. Ensuring that our children finish top of their class feels like something passed down the generations in our country. Being part of the country's academic elite has its benefits given the shortage of seats in coveted institutions. A lot of students going abroad, often do so cause they couldn't make the cut for their preferred domestic options.While the economic merit in pursuing certain courses abroad makes for an entirely different article, in this piece we take a look at the economic argument for why craving the best institutions is not out of place.To do so, we took a look at various courses in India across institutes and compared the fee structure and typical job prospects to understand how long would it take a student to recover his/her course fee, based on the institute type and the expected starting salary (industry average). Admittedly these are averages and there are probably several exceptions to these, but the idea is to illustrate the disparity.We took 5 different disciplines and looked at the cost of education as a combination of the course fee plus basic living expenses (like hostel and mess fees etc) and then looked at average salaries people get upon graduating from these programs. We split institutes up by type / tier, based on the rankings by top publications. The premier and tier I are those that rank among the top 10, while tier-2 includes from 11-20. The last column is derived by dividing the course fee by the annual starting salary and is the number of years it takes the student to earn back / pay off the course fee. Click here to view enlarges graphic An MBA course from the country's premier business school costs around Rs 19 lakh. The institute gives you an easy entry to the world of high-paying jobs. The average salary of a fresher is around Rs 12-15 lakh. This means you can recover the money in a year or so.The same course pursued from a tier II college/university is likely to cost around Rs 16 lakh, while the average salary, in this case, will stand at around Rs 8-10 lakh. The tenure for the recovery increases to 1.6 years.An engineering course from India's best institutes costs around Rs 6-7 lakh, which a student can recover within 7-8 months of starting a job. However, he or she may take around three years to get back the invested amount in the case of a tier II college.The trend is similar in other courses as well. A one-year diploma course (inclusive all) in mass communication and journalism from a government-sponsored institute costs around Rs 1 lakh, while it can go up to Rs 5 lakh from a private institute. A two-year masters programme in the same course costs upwards of Rs 12 lakh, whereas the average salary hovers around Rs 2-3.5 lakh.Thus, the tenure to recover the cost would vary from 6 months to around 3 years depending upon the institute.In all the abovementioned scenarios, we distinctly see that the return on investment is way better in case of premier, most often government-sponsored institutes. You are paying only half the fees being charged at private universities, while the payoffs are better. It's therefore hard to fault parents and students alike for wanting to do everything they possibly can to get into the best institutesAs a country though, it deserves a closer look. Why is higher education as in the cases seen above being subsidized. Even if subsidies have come down, is there not a valid case for charging full price and striving to improve the quality of each course consistently? Isn't the money better spent in subsidizing primary education and vocational training that will further the cause of key campaigns like Make In India?For some reason, the current discourse seems to focus on a coherent land acquisition policy as the only impediment to making things in this country. How about availability of quality talent, which most businessmen constantly grumble about?Not all who secure admission in the top colleges come from economically weak backgrounds. For all those who have the merit but not the means, grants and scholarship programmes should be made easily available. The government should also help them get education loans at lower interest rates, which students can pay off in easy installments and claim tax benefits.The author, Kankana Roy Choudhury, is content head at BigDecisions.com
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