‘Paradigm shift in education system must be observed patiently’

ACADEMICS IN PANDEMIC

At a time the entire higher education system in the country is undergoing an overhaul with shift towards digital teachings and challenges posed by the Covid-19 threat, IIM Amritsar’s first full-time Director Prof Nagarajan Ramamoorthy says it’s time for institutions and students to become more responsible and disciplined in adapting to the new normal. In an interview with Neha Saini, he talked about the paradigm shift in the education system in the country due to the pandemic and the National Education policy 2020. Excerpts:

How has the resumption of academic session been possible for the IIM as shift towards digital learning has become the new normal?

It was challenging for us as an institution as IIMs generally are not in virtual classroom mode. There were a lot of logistical issues that needed to be resolved before we resumed academic sessions, including setting up digital teaching labs and conducted workshops to train our faculty in using web teaching tools. Also, we had to figure out issues like getting our placement brochures made available on digital mode, procuring laptops for e-education despite service disruptions and a lot of other things.

We resumed our academic session from August, with a two-week delay. But we plan to catch up by juggling a few things like cutting down on our vacation time and making sure that the online teaching is done in a way that we get our academic rhythm back and finish our session by March-April 2021 as per the schedule. With a number of precautions, we can easily conduct exams. The only thing is we have to abide by the rules and guidelines given by the Central agencies. — Prof Nagarajan Ramamoorthy, IIM Director

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What’s been the new normal for the IIM Amritsar campus post pandemic?

We resumed our academic session from August, with a two-week delay. But we plan to catch up by juggling a few things like cutting down on our vacation time and making sure that the online teaching is done in a way that we get our academic rhythm back and finish our session by March-April 2021 as per the schedule. As far as hostel accommodations are concerned, whenever we re-open for students, we have set up separate apartments for housing students, including an apartment that will be converted into a quarantine facility in case of need and another for setting up a small clinic with on-call doctor and nurse. I have also scheduled an online meeting to address the new students just to ease them into the new normal.

Professional institutes of higher education have resumed academic operations but the issue of conducting competitive examinations like the JEE, NEET and others has raised a conflict. What’s yout take?

I feel that with a number of precautions and safety practices in place we can easily conduct these exams. The only thing is we have to abide by the rules and guidelines given by the Central agencies. I don’t think we need to be live in fear but only take caution. We cannot afford to lose an academic year as delaying the entrance exams would have recurring effects for two to three years of academics and disturb the sequence the institutes. But again, we do not have to take unnecessary risk but only keep in mind the academic future of students.

How would you read into the NEP 2020 proposals of setting up academic credit bank and converting higher education institutions into multi-disciplinary institutions?

I suspect that all institutions become multi-disciplinary at one point. For example, management schools are already multi-disciplinary in context of the specialised courses offered. Some of these programmes might be a distant possibility, barring sciences, but may be in another 10 years so, I would not be surprised if IIMs offer bachelors courses in education or any other discipline as long as it is relevant to studying management. Also, the proposals like academic credit banks are student friendly that would offer flexibility to student to shift institutions without necessarily having to repeat their academic learning. It’s like academic transfer programmes in the US. Only we have to teach our students to learn to study at different pace while switching institutions. So, it needs a lot of time and thoughtfulness before being implemented and all we can do is wait and watch how it unfolds.

What is the status of placements at the IIM under the current situation?

So far, we have not got any cancellations for our students who were offered placements or jobs during our summer internship programmes. So, being an optimist I would say that we are looking towards a possibility that the placements might get delayed due to uncertainty prevailing but the students would have jobs.