EducationWorld January 15

œThey say the world is spinning around; I say the world is upside down, sang the legendary Jimmy Cliff almost half century ago. The latest (December 26) issue of Forbes India features its third  ranking of 100 ˜celebrities™ dominated by Bollywood stars and the mind-boggling sums they have earned for provision of lowbrow services. Among […]

At The Helm: A Memoir by V. Krishnamurthy; Collins Business; Price: Rs.599; Pages 305

Although Jawaharlal Nehru (1889-1964) — free India’s iconic first prime minister — dug deep foundations for the nation, which emerged from the crude vivisection of the country in the last year (1947) of almost three centuries of rampant loot and beggarisation, he made an […]

Memories of the attempts of the first BJP-led NDA government at the Centre (1999-2004) to ‘saffronise’ school education are still green. Now with the BJP back in power — this time with an absolute majority in the Lok Sabha — there’s pervasive fear this interrupted agenda will be resumed. Summiya Yasmeen reports

Indisputably the defining event of […]

Maharashtra, 2010. In a village 130 km (80 miles) from Mumbai, the head of a nursery is weighing a child. Four years old, she is just 10 kg (22lb), two-thirds of what she should be. More than half the nursery™s charges are below their proper weight (œwasted in the jargon) or short for their age […]

China has cemented its dominance of the Times Higher Education BRICS & Emerging Economies Rankings 2015, with more than a quarter of its institutions in the 2015 Top 100.
In the second annual table which recognises higher education institutions in Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa and 17 other œemerging economies, China has 27 […]

Universities in developing countries are ignoring potential areas of strength because they™re too focused on imitating successful Anglo-US institutions, a vice chancellor has claimed.
Speaking at the Times Higher Education BRICS & Emerging Economies Universities Summit, held in Moscow on December 3-4, Malegapuru Makgoba, vice chancellor of the University of KwaZulu-Natal, said universities in his […]

Sparkly, spotted or Hello Kitty: every colour, theme, shape and size of frame is available at Eyeglass City in Beijing, a four-storey mall crammed only with spectacle shops. Within half an hour, a pair of prescription eyeglasses is ready. That is impressive, but then the number of Chinese wearing glasses is rising. Most new adoptees […]

The uproar about sexual assaults on American college campuses is growing louder. Barack Obama has called them œan affront to our basic humanity. Several universities ” including Johns Hopkins, San Diego State, Emory, MIT, Clemson and the University of Virginia ” have shut down or suspended parties at fraternities (undergrad students™ societies) in recent months. […]

At The Helm: A Memoir by V. Krishnamurthy; Collins Business; Price: Rs.599; Pages 305
Although Jawaharlal Nehru (1889-1964) ” free India™s iconic first prime minister ” dug deep foundations for the nation, which emerged from the crude vivisection of the country in the last year (1947) of almost three centuries of rampant loot and beggarisation, […]

An internationally respected education system is a crucial prerequisite for India Inc to compete on the world stage. Indeed, perceptions of integrity in educational assessments are vital for India™s education system, national economy, and international image. For without credibility, education qualifications are of little value, and the respect accorded by other countries to the certification […]

After completing my engineering degree, I want to sign up for a Master of computer science programme abroad. Please recommend a safe and affordable country for Indian students.
Shekhar Rao, Bangalore
The US offers the widest range of higher ed institutions where you are most likely to find a college to suit your budget. Universities […]

The demand for professionally qualified geologists with a sense of adventure has increased almost tenfold during the past decade

For outdoor types who like to explore the environment and hike through the wilderness, professional qualifications in geology could open up a world of opportunities.

Geology is the science of earth studies. Geologists study geographical data and material […]

Suddenly almost out of the blue, a clutch of private edupreneurs have negotiated forbidding and grudging licensing processes to establish several globally benchmarked liberal arts universities across the country. Dilip Thakore reports

AFTER MANY YEARS IN exile on the periphery of national consciousness, a liberal arts education renaissance is sweeping the country. This is manifested not […]

Changes in technology are happening at a hitherto unprecedented and unimaginable scale and will cause disruption in industry after industry. This has really begun to worry me because we are not ready for this change and most of our leading companies won™t exist 15-20 years from now. Here are five sectors to monitor closely.
Manufacturing. […]

Section 19 and the Schedule of the Right to Free & Compulsory Education (aka RTE) Act, 2009 mandates that all schools had to comply with several infrastructure provision norms, teacher-pupil ratios and other requirements by March 31, 2013 ” three years after the RTE Act came into force. Since then, according to one estimate, government […]

The Doon School, Dehradun (TDS) has signed an agreement with the MCC Cricket Academy, London, under which school boys from across India can receive MCC cricket coaching at a camp in TDS on January 25-29.
œThe MCC Academy will provide pupils with the very best coaching and technical analysis while developing team building and leadership […]

Assam
Education progress report
In an initiative to record teachers™ attendance in government schools statewide scientifically, and streamline the administration of the state™s education ministry, education minister Pradyut Bordoloi announced a pilot project to provide teachers with mobile phones equipped with biometric GPS registration. The minister was addressing the state™s legislative assembly on December 17 […]

œI am disappointed. Because, I think that Mr. Modi™s vision of taking the country forward is not possible without the right human capital. I don™t see any fundamental change in a view ” common to our Left and the Right ” that somehow, higher education is something to be controlled, centralised.
Dr. Devesh Kapur, director […]

WITH THREE PROMINENT Trinamool Congress (TMC) leaders behind bars for their alleged involvement in the Saradha scam ” in which an estimated Rs.20,000 crore was misappropriated by the Saradha Group, a consortium of over 200 private companies managed by financier Sudipto Sen ” and increasing lawlessness arising out of frequent inter-party conflicts over political turf, […]

AN INTERSTATE MEDICAL admissions scandal with Lucknow™s King George™s Medical University (KGMU) at its centre, is generating tremors in India™s most populous (200 million) ” and arguably most lawless ” state. While this is by no means the first scam in KGMU, it is of such massive proportions that the state™s Special Task Force (STF) […]

It speaks volumes about the supervisory dedication and competence of the Karnataka state government™s education ministry that on December 23, 1,266 primary-secondary schools in Bangalore, some of them over a century old, were declared œillegal by the department of public instruction (DPI).
A list published by the DPI declares the pre-primary sections of over 50 […]

AS IF TAMIL NADU’S 52,303 government and aided primary-secondary schools suffering the weight of crumbling buildings, teacher shortages, depleting classrooms and poor learning outcomes didn™t have enough problems, of late they have been afflicted with the additional problem of spreading indiscipline and violence.
On December 1, a class XII student of the Government Higher Secondary […]

ONE OF THE FIRST THREE modern universities established in India to commemorate the takeover of the administration of India by imperial Great Britain from the East India Company, right until the mid-1960s, Bombay University (estb.1857) enjoyed a good reputation for scholarship and research. But since then, it has experienced a steady decline, particularly after the […]

GIVEN HER BLOOMERS AND BLOOPERS, former Miss India contestant and television soaps star Smriti Irani, the surprise choice as Union human resource development (HRD) ” aka education ” minister of the BJP-led government at the Centre which was sworn in on May 26, is proving less inspired by the day. Morale in the shady groves […]

I am surprised and shocked the EW Mumbai Preschool Rankings 2014 (EW December) has omitted to include EuroKids, Lokhandwala. I hope you™re aware that in all your previous preschool rankings, EuroKids, Lokhandwala has consistently featured in the league table of the Top 10 preschools in Mumbai.
Few months ago, Rajesh Gupta of C fore, the […]

An alarming social phenomenon is becoming ubiquitous in the sovereign, socialist, secular and holier-than-thou Republic of India.
When women are assaulted and sexually molested in plain sight by anti-social perverts and deviants, post-independence India™s socialist man, shaped by the heirs of the Mahatma and founding fathers of the Constitution, rarely steps forward to protest and […]

AS THE COUNTRY’S MOST committed ” even if not most successful ” champion of high-quality early childhood and primary-secondary education for all, I am often obliged to explain the criticality of the connection between universal elementary education and national development to individuals and larger audiences. It is often necessary for business development reasons ” to […]