Call for restructuring degree programmes in Kerala

THERE APPEARS to be a criticism that while Kerala could make rapid strides in literacy as well as education at the school level, much remains to be done in the realm of higher education which comes under the purview of universities that enjoy absolute academic autonomy. Rather than highlighting criticisms, this paper attempts to suggest some innovative solutions for the modernisation and upgradation of higher education, using the presently available teachers on government/ aided payrolls, and the already built up infrastructure, thus causing the least expenditure for the cash-strapped government.

In a nutshell, the crying need of higher education in Kerala is a thorough restructuring of degree and post-graduate programmes, through inter- disciplinary mergers, retrainings, orientation programmes, peer tutoring/peer learning, team teaching and group learning, which can result in substantial benefits to the different segments of society.

Quite a number of factors inhibit the innovative restructuring of the programmes of higher education in Kerala. These include the complacency of many organised groups, rigid rules of Boards of Studies of Universities which believe in uni-disciplinary boundaries that enable the academics to teach and reteach the same old courses with minimal cosmetic changes, the intolerance to any prospect of reduction of hours of teaching in a discipline, proliferation of popular bodies and authorities at universities which have a tendency to resist anything inconvenient to any section they represent, and lack of exposure to the developments outside, to mention a few. Thus, when far- reaching changes have brought about prosperity and development in higher education throughout the world, and even in the neighbouring States, Kerala remains a bit-too-traditional and backward in higher education, although its position in terms of literacy and school education is very impressive.

Barring a few of the recently-introduced-programmes like computer science, hotel management and biotechnology, most of the degree programmes offered in affiliated colleges at present in Kerala, have only a baby-sitting relevance, to keep our youngsters partially engaged for three years. Most of the courses offered are not skill-based and reinforce the negative value elements in the mind set and culture of graduates that they should go in for only white collar jobs, and that it is demeaning to do anything involving manual work. Thus, what appears to be a remedy for the Kerala setting is the introduction of a wide variety of programmes that are job-oriented, craft-based, useful-arts-based and vocational programmes which will enable students to earn full-fledged university degrees and at the same time, impart skills for the dignity of doing manual jobs that are useful to society and rewarding for the students.

Although a beginning in restructuring a few courses on UGC- recommended lines has been undertaken recently, in some of the affiliated colleges in Kerala, the coverage of these courses and the population that was served, remains small. The thrust of these courses appears to be similar to that of the existing ones, at least in the operational context. At the same time, the State appears to be under some compulsion for the continuance of the traditional and non-employment-oriented programmes, may be to protect the interests of teachers and others.

Typical affiliated colleges offer courses like B.A. in economics, history, sociology, psychology or B.Com. at the under-graduate and post-graduate levels in the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences. The strategy suggested is to gradually transform these disciplines without causing hardship to the teachers who can be trained and oriented, to offer more modern and utilitarian programmes which will be of relevance to the job markets in India and abroad.

The model chart shows subjects such as commerce, economics, sociology and psychology, which are ordinarily available in colleges. If appropriate short term and sequential orientation trainings are given, these teachers along with a few practitioners from different fields such as lawyers and clinical psychologists would become capable of giving birth to modern and frontier area disciplines like entrepreneurship, personnel management, business management, counselling or corporate secretaryship.

Once this retraining and orientation are undertaken, and a small core faculty qualified in the frontier disciplines is also infused, the new disciplines would become capable of take-off through peer learning, peer tutoring and team teaching. It is to be noted that the existing and new disciplines suggested are a few examples and many new and frontier area disciplines can be similarly generated.

In about three to four years, these new departments will get themselves fully established. All that is required is a bit of innovative leadership to give the kind of training and the environmental support which the popular government would be able to provide. The proposal envisaged can be attempted in a few colleges with in a locality. It may be noted that in institutions where some new disciplines are evolved, it was only those teachers from the traditional disciplines who were the initiators, and that too, without any formal training or orientation, but mostly as freshers to operate the new department or as researchers who acquired the required skills and wanted to fulfil their dreams. Many of the frontier areas in life sciences such as microbiology, immunology, biotechnology, enzyme technology and environmental sciences have emerged from basic disciplines of botany, zoology and chemistry and even today, we find basic science teachers in the new frontier area disciplines in large numbers.

Computer science teachers of today hail from the basic disciplines of mathematics, statistics and physics. In engineering colleges/universities, it is customary for a physics teacher to handle electronics and then computer science. Teachers of mathematics, statistics, electrical engineering and electronics engineering also make their strides into computer hardware and software disciplines which are now in great demand. As a higher education management strategy, it would be appropriate to try the same strategies. Autonomous status to colleges, as an instrument for market-oriented restructuring can be considered at least for those really deserving institutions.

Teacher organisations may resent the system of autonomy, because it provides for a different kind of freedom for managements and teachers, and may involve more work related to curriculum development and evaluation. But in a State like Kerala, no such freedom will go unchecked.

Therefore, in well managed colleges, the autonomous system can be given a fair trial. If the trial succeeds, the system can be extended to a few more colleges for further experimentation. This will be an opportunity for the college teachers, who are perhaps less exposed to innovations in higher education.

The system of autonomous colleges works fairly well in Tamil Nadu. The present writer had an opportunity to restructure the B.A. corporate secretaryship programme of the University of Madras at PSG College of Arts and Science (Autonomous), Coimbatore, and network the same with user industries when he was working as the Professor and Head of the Department of corporate secretaryship there, way back in mid seventies.

It was heartening to note that all the graduates of this programme used to get absorbed in companies in gainful employments even before the programme came to its formal completion of three years.

G. SIDHARDHAN

(To be continued)

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