Some food for thought
"It is questionable if all the mechanical inventions yet
made have lightened the day's toil of any human being."
—John Stuart Mill (English Philosopher, 1806-1873)
Word for the day
Scaturient (adj)
Gushing; overflowing.
First thought this morning
I was quite bewildered, looking at the admission statistics in
various colleges of Delhi University in recent years. For a course like B.Com
(Hons) or BA (Economics) which require virtually no additional infrastructure
besides a classroom, the 12th standard cut off percentage varies from 82% to
97%. For colleges which charge almost 5x fee from the minimum, and are located
in North campus of the University (at great distance from East, West and South
parts of the city), craze is much highest.
Some colleges affiliated to the university have been established
by private trusts and managed by the trustees, while other colleges/departments
have been established by the Delhi or Central government and managed by the
managing committees appointed by the government. The fee to be charged from
students for a particular course varies from college to college. However, in
general fee for undergraduate courses range from Rs5500 to Rs30000 per annum.
All teachers in the university are likely paid the same
salaries. In case of colleges established by private trusts, about 90% of the
total expenses are borne by the government and the rest is met through the
charges from student. Most colleges have similar facilities for students in
terms of sports infrastructure, science labs, libraries etc.
Regardless, all colleges/departments in the university follow
the same curriculum and governed by the same rules and regulations of UGC and
Delhi University. But still some colleges consistently attract high scoring
students. Naturally these are the colleges which attract better recruiters
also. And this vicious cycle continues year after year, widening the divide
between students and therefore society. I think this academic apartheid needs
to end.
The only point of differentiation between colleges, besides
perception, I could think of is quality of teachers. In my view, it is high
time to review the entire admission and academic processes in Delhi University,
and all other Universities where similar situation exist. The following
suggestions may be considered. These may sound radical to many. Nonetheless, I
believe these are implementable if desired.
(a) The admission
process must be fully centralized. All students should be required to apply to
a central office, without naming any college. An algorithm may be developed
that should allocate college to each qualifying student based mostly on
proximity to his residence, choice of course.
(b) All the available
teachers in the university should also be similarly required to apply to the
central pool every year, and the algorithm should randomly assign teachers to
various colleges.
(c) The businesses
willing to hire students from the university should also approach to the
central pool, which shall use the algorithm to assign a group of students to
the recruiters (based on their specification excluding the name of college) to
choose from.
(d) All future
recruitments of teachers should be made by a central authority with no
involvement of colleges. The colleges may though make request for faculty with
specific qualifications.
(e) Universities
across the country should be encouraged to sign a faculty exchange program,
whereby teachers can gain experience of working in different states to gain a
wider perspective.
Indian Equities: outlier and susceptible to overreaction
Indian equity
markets have welcomed the outcome of exit polls for recently concluded general
elections. Benchmark indices have scaled new peaks. Broader markets have also
recouped some of the losses in past couple days.
Indian equities
have yielded best returns amongst major global markets.
However, as per
preliminary analysis done by Business Standard, "Corporate India looks set
to disappoint investors for the second quarter in a row, defying D-Street prediction
of strong earnings growth during the fourth quarter (Q4) of 2018-19 (FY19). The
combined net profit of 564 companies (excluding financials and energy), which
have declared their results for the January-March 2019 quarter, is down 10.3
per cent year-on-year (YoY), their worst showing in at least 12 quarters.
The combined net
sales of this universe was up 9 per cent YoY in Q4FY19, growing at the slowest
pace in six quarters, hinting at a demand slowdown in the economy." (Business
Standard)
Accordingly, on
the valuation map, India now appears an outlier and susceptible to overreaction
in case of an adverse event.
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