Often, lack of international collaborations and meaningful industry partnerships are cited as ills in the Indian higher education system. International rankings too are affected by the lack of such collaborations. Though it is difficult to forge global partnerships and foster relationships with other institutions, it is necessary to collaborate with the best in the world, for the sheer opportunities and diversity they offer. Such collaborations allow our students, the opportunity to travel internationally via exchange programs besides supporting research.
Research thrives through internationalisation. Scrutinizing, debating, and sharing experience is essential for academic and scientific accomplishment. Even challenging, accepted opinions and ideas is central to development. 20% of the world’s scientific papers are co-authored internationally. Easy communication and travel allow academics and researchers to collaborate with their peers in other universities, facilitating exchange of ideas.
IIT’s and a few other institutes of repute, have forged collaborations with the best in the world. Whereas IIT Bombay has contributed immensely to research through collaborations with the then Soviet Union and now Russia, IIT Kanpur, created with the assistance of a consortium of nine US research universities and IIT Madras, started with assistance from Germany, too excelled in research in some niche areas. Yet, most of our IIT’s stood between 200 to 500 in the international rankings of repute.
At a time when everything is driven by technology, our Institutions and Universities too must seamlessly track and direct international partnerships through its use. Use of ‘QS MoveON’ and similar applications could manage international mobility and partner activities, empowering our institutions and universities to update processes, improve workflows, and maximize available resources.
Research must also be used to improve teacher quality. Inhibitions to online teaching-learning were broken in the covid times. Both faculty and students are now more adept to using asynchronous modes. Judicious use of learning management systems must be made use of. One solution is to aggregate good teaching content and provide an immersive experience by appropriate handholding. Good teachers with domain expertise, presentation skills and access to effective technology must be made to create good content. Reaching out to a large system such as ours that ails from teacher shortages needs collaborations of a different kind. Two instances stand out.
Firstly, citing an example, we may facilitate physics faculty from IIT Delhi, or Mathematics faculty from Presidency college in Chennai and Python coders from IIT Hyderabad to come together to create an immersive online experience. A new Department of Content Management, (DOCM) under the Ministry of Education could possibly hand-hold such initiatives. Necessary state of art technology/recording centres could be established in each of the district headquarters to provide the technology support. Such content when ported on a common learning management system (LMS) like Swayam suitably customised and maintained by the DOCM could be the value proposition that students seek.
Such a DOCM can even address the digital divide. Availability of devices and bandwidth in certain areas is far from satisfactory. Services of BSNL, NIC and other agencies can be used. Providing sanitised mobile vans with PC’s and smart devices and access points in all remote locations, can be very useful. If a maximum throughput and minimal interference is required for conduct of nationwide teaching or conducting examinations, channels 1, 6, and 11 in the 2.4 GHz ISM Band can be made use of. DTH Channels can reach the villages. Use of cable TV Network is another opportunity. Second is to aggregate content of EdTech companies like EdX, Coursera or Udemy or any other similar, in various disciplines. This too could be enabled by DOCM by porting it on the common LMS. It will be affordable due to its per student low cost.
Another conceivable advantage of such a partnership is the realisation of multi-point entry-exit option, accumulation of credits within the academic bank of credits concept, student centric and personalised learning, features of NEP. The LMS that enables all this will be the focal point. A synergetic Virtual University, where everyone collaborates in multiple ways will eventually evolve. This may even facilitate the ‘50 GER’ in the next five years and not fifteen years. One can even aggregate all research and funding initiatives on the platform. International collaborations and meaningful industry partnerships too can thrive on the platform. That being the case, can we expect the DOCM to be setup soon?