India framing national mission for ICT in education

The Indian Government is developing a National Mission on ICT aiming to create a national IT platform connecting all schools, providing students and teachers with opportunities to collaborate and share knowledge. Through this mission, the Government is looking to take on a learner-centric approach in delivering education by facilitating the provision of infrastructure that will connect the schools to internet at minimum 10 mbps. Radha Chauhan, Joint Secretary of Secondary Education, Government...

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Link education with socio-economic development: Veep

Graduating students of Central University of Bihar (CUB) were advised by the Vice-President of India, Mohammad Hamid Ansari, to become ambassadors of peace, goodwill and harmony between communities and regions.Addressing the students at the CUB's maiden convocation on Thursday, Ansari quoted Aristotle as saying, "Educating the mind without educating the heart is no education at all."Altogether 156 students of various master's programmes of the 2009-11, 2010-12 and 2011-13 batches received their degrees. Altogether 134 were present while the rest...

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India lacks quality education: Pranab Mukherjee

President Pranab Muk­herjee on Wednesday expressed concern over lack of quality education in India and said  Indian universities did not figure among the top-ranked universities in the world.Addressing students on the 23rd convocation of the Pondicherry Cen­tral University, Muk­herjee said the country’s ancient education system had dominated the world for about 1,800 years ago from the 6th century B.C. during which ancient Indian varsities like Taksh­ashila, Nalanda, Vikra­m­ashila, Valabhi, Soma­pura and Odantapuri were the seats of world...

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Recession boosts investment in management education

NEW DELHI: At the times of economic gloom, it is boom time for B-schools. And India is the driving force in the increase in number of application in 24% of the 683 management programmes across 42 countries.In the US 52% of the full-time management programmes have seen increased interest, while in the Asia-Pacific region it is 53%. The biggest draw however is Europe with 73% of the programme receiving more applications than in 2012.Back home, CAT 2013 has so far received 1,93,596 registrations till Wednesday. Registration ends on Thursday midnight.As...

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Indian students make for second largest chunk in online education

More than a year after Harvard University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology launched edX, their massive online education initiative, India has shown the second highest number of enrolments with more than 150,000 students from the country taking various courses on the online platform. Of the 1.2 million students on edX from all countries, 30% are from the US while 13% are from India.EdX offers MOOCs or massive online open courses and interactive online classes in subjects including law,...

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Why Mahindra's foray into engineering education is unique

A close look at the Mahindra Group's foray into an engineering education in tie-up with one of Europe's oldest and most reputed universities reveals a larger design - an ambition to transform engineering talent into business leadership. This objective, at a time when the right combination of technical acumen and leadership skills is woefully short in the Indian higher education sphere, runs throughout the concept and curriculum of Mahindra Ecole Centrale (MEC), set up in the Tech Mahindra's sprawling campus at Bahadurpalli in Hyderabad.Consider...

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Education essential to make India superpower: Kalam

Former President APJ Abdul Kalam on Sunday emphasised the importance of education in making India a superpower by 2020. Kalam attended the 126th birth anniversary of Dr Karmaveer Bhaurao Patil, the founder of the Rayat Education Society, here on Sunday, along with Union agriculture minister Sharad Pawar."Students should work to imbibe qualities like moral leadership, temperament and an attitude for research. They should always try to learn modern technology and keep learning so that their knowledge would make India empowered and a superpower,"...

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IBM Helps Indian Universities Prepare Students For The Future

IBM has announced that leading universities across India are using IBM's technologies to improve the quality of the education process, introduce new curricula and prepare their students for jobs in the future. IBM has played a pivotal role in providing innovative technology solutions to the Indian education sector. Zinnov, a leading advisory firm, recently recognised IBM India as the leader amongst MNC (multinational) Technology Centers that have contributed significantly to the development of the University Ecosystem in India, for the...

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Girl education to bring social revolution: Nitish Kumar

After a gap of two years, Bihar CM Nitish Kumar has resumed blog writing. His latest one posted on Thursday is about girls' education which is ushering in a social revolution in Bihar. Referring to his Independence Day speech this year in which he announced scholarship for all girls studying in class I to X in different government schools, he wrote that it was an important decision to further boost the girls' education."What is significant about this decision is that schoolgirls from all sections of society, regardless of caste, creed, community...

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Worlddidac India 2013 and Asian summit on education and skills 2013

MUMBAI, INDIA: The fifth edition of Worlddidac India and Asian summit on education and skills, the country's only exhibition and conference on educational material, training and technology based solutions for all levels and sectors, proved to be a grand success and ended as being the most productive three days of the year for the entire education and training fraternity.The theme of the summit was ‘Confronting Complexities for Effective Policy Implementation'. The summit brought together the policy makers and eminent educationists from all over...

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Datawind join hands with TES India to provide free educational resources

The UK-based tablets maker Datawind said that it has signed a strategic partnership with TES India, an online community by the teachers for the teachers.A media release from the company said: "With this strategic partnership Datawind would be able to offer a huge library of five lakh ready-to-use teaching material to its end users. Datawind is targeting teachers' community via this strategic partnership. Teachers and institutions can choose to teach their students absolutely free of cost by using...

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Education loans a problem at sub-6% growth

MUMBAI: Pratip Chaudhuri's tenure as SBI chairman has been one of extremes. The bank recorded its highest ever profit of Rs 14,105 crore, but this was marred by a surge in bad loans. The sell-off in bank stocks resulted in SBI losing its position as the most valuable bank but Chaudhuri reaffirmed its fundamentally strong image by bolstering Tier-I capital adequacy to well over 9% and providing for pension liabilities. Excerpts from an interview with TOI:SBI has tightened income criteria for car loans. Will you do this for all retail loans?We have...

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Translating Cambridge research into Bangalore business

BANGALORE: He is fresh from a two-hour talk with technologists, innovators, entrepreneurs and scientists in Bangalore. And for Sir Leszek Borysiewicz, 345th vice-chancellor of the 803-year-old Cambridge University, that's enough to capture the mood of IT city."This is an amazing city of opportunities. People here are always looking forward. The Bangalore-Cambridge connect is great," the 62-year-old medical researcher told TOI on Wednesday, hours after he opened a centre on the sprawling National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS) campus on...

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Weaving education into the social fabric

With an outreach programme, the Aga Khan Academy looks to improve, provide quality education.Thirty-five-year-old Pushpa Ragam talks about the ways in which her students have not just managed to relate to her but also express themselves better in the English language. A teacher at a government school in Hyderabad, Ragam was talking to the media after an interaction organised by the Aga Khan Academy, Hyderabad which trained them as an outreach programme.The Aga Khan Development Network (AKDN) which opened the Aga Khan Academy, Hyderabad in 2011...

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Technology driving educational revolution in villages

In the beginning of the last decade, a simple webcam and a fledgling, though unsteady internet, provided a lifeline of emotional connect between students abroad and their parents and friends back home. That was a video-conference in a very simple form. Cut to the present: we are witnessing a generational shift in technology; so much so that it is quietly triggering a social revolution in the educational and health care sectors in the remote corners of our country.Curious and impressionable minds are being led into a new world of enlightenment,...

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PG medical seats auctioned for Rs 4cr

BANGALORE: A group of parents sitting in a city medical college auditorium, facing a management team, appear to be attending an orientation session. A closer look reveals they are bidding for post-graduate medical seats. A parent stands up and announces he is ready to pay Rs 1 crore for an MD (radiology) seat. Another parent ups the bid by Rs 25 lakh. At the end of the two-hour session, the coveted seat goes to the ward of the highest bidder.So highly contested have been the auctions for PG medical...

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Networking will help special schools: Expert

Chennai: India is a far more inclusive society than the West, but there remain huge challenges when it comes to special education needs. Centres like Sankalp should network with other institutions, coordinate and disseminate information, said Richard Rose, professor of inclusive education and director of the Centre for Education and Research at the University of Northampton, UK.He was in the city on Friday to attend the third international seminar on 'inclusion through education and vocation',...

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Sex education crucial to sensitize children

Moments before Saket Court sentenced Nibhaya rape accused to death on Friday, Justice Leila Seth guided city students on how sensitization about crime against women can start from a very early age.Seth was one of the members of the Justice Verma Committee, which was formed after Nirbhaya's gang-rape, to take a re-look at sexual assault against women. The committee broadened the ambit of the crime and recommended harsher punishment for the rapists.Seth was invited by La Martiniere School for Boys to address the students on its 178th Founder's Day....

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BenQ expands offerings for Indian education sector

BANGALORE, INDIA: BenQ, an internationally renowned provider of digital lifestyle innovations and No. 1 player in the Indian projector market with a share of 20 percent (FutureSource Consulting and PMA report for projector business Q2, 2013), showcased new technologies at the WORLD DIDAC INDIA 2013, an international event that brings together the education and training industry at a common platform.In FY 2012 BenQ installed over 50,000 projectors in the Education sector enabling more than 20 lac students to use the latest technology of delivering...

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Sibal fiddles, education burns

Last week, Kapil Sibal, did precisely what many feared he would. He announced that he was allowing foreign universities to come to India. Almost magnanimously — at least to the foreign universities — he also decreed that they could set up shop in India without partnering with Indian institutes.To circumvent the entire debate in Parliament, he has chosen, quite adroitly, to be more of a lawyer for foreign universities than as a representative of India, to rope in the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) and the Department of Economic...

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Sequester Hits Special Education Like 'Ton of Bricks'

This piece comes to us courtesy of Stateline. Stateline is a nonpartisan, nonprofit news service of the Pew Charitable Trusts that provides daily reporting and analysis on trends in state policy.Since the first day of class for most schools in Michigan last week, Marcie Lipsitt’s phone has been ringing nonstop with parents distraught about cuts to their children’s special education services.A new round of special education cuts were taking hold, prompted by a 5 percent reduction in federal funding...

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Indian education provider to invest $500 mn in UAE

(UAE) education sector.Amity Education Group will build four new schools, one university campus and 12 nurseries in this Gulf nation that is home to around two million expatriate Indians."We are planning to build schools across the UAE. Our commitment to the UAE comes as part of our resolve to build a global network of institutions," Atul Chauhan, president of Amity Education, told the Khaleej Times."We are planning to build schools across the UAE. Our commitment to the UAE comes as part of our resolve to build a global network of institutions,"...

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No Indian university figures in top 200 global list

LONDON: Not a single Indian university is among the world's top 200, according to a new global ranking.The QS World University Rankings published on Tuesday has miserable news for India's education system. Around 11 Indian institutes feature in the top 800 of the global list with the highest ranking going to IIT Delhi which is placed 222 in the list.Two other made it to the top 300—IIT Bombay (233) and IIT Kanpur (295). IIT Madras is ranked 313 while IIT Kharagpur stands at 346.A close scrutiny on the ranking has more bad news for India. Even...

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200 academics to attend meet on higher education

PATNA: Preparations are afoot to hold a two-day conference on higher education at Raj Bhavan on September 21 and 22. Over 200 academics, including vice-chancellors, pro-VCs, registrars, deans, financial advisers and examination controllers of all the universities of the state will attend the conference.According to a notification issued from the governor's secretariat, eminent academics from different parts of the country would discuss topics like the role of institutional leadership in quality assurance, academic leadership and governance, vocational...

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No IDEA Protections for Students Misplaced in Special Education, Court Rules

Children mistakenly identified by their schools as having disabilities may not bring claims under the main federal special education law, despite a recognition by Congress of the problem of overrepresentation of minorities in special education, a federal appeals court has ruled.A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit, in Philadelphia, said that a Pennsylvania family made "emotionally compelling" arguments about the problem of misidentification of minority children for special education.But there is no indication that...

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Indian Students Worry about Currency Decline

For thousands of Indian students aspiring to earn a world-class higher education, the rupee’s continuing depreciation against American and British currencies has been a major setback. Some may have to postpone their studies for a year, while others are desperately seeking additional loans to cover the shortfall.The rupee has depreciated by around 20 percent against the U.S. dollar this year alone.Mallika Ghosh, who secured admission to a leading British university, has requested a deferment. “With the rupee’s depreciation my costs have gone up...

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Foreign universities in India: Dollar education in rupees

Rahul, a Delhiite, has performed exceedingly well in his senior secondary examination and is excited to join a prestigious undergraduate programme at an Ivy league university. He and his parents are least bothered about the weakening of the rupee against the dollar and its negative impact on the cost of overseas education. This is not due to his affluent background but because he will be pursuing the programme at the Gurgaon campus of the foreign university. This dream of thousands, may be millions, of Indian students aspiring for world-class...

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EAMCET 2013 Engineering Web Options from Sept 3: Seat Allotment on September 17

EAMCET 2013 Engineering Web Options from Sept 3: Seat Allotment on September 17Government of Andhra Pradesh revealed that EAMCET engineering web options will begin from September 3.  Seat allotment will be done on September 17.  The information will be sent to the candidates on their mobile phones.Government of Andhra Pradesh announced the dates for EAMCET engineering counselling web options.  Specified rankers have to give their web options from September 3rd to 12th. 2013. ...

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