Prof.

MJ Xavier
Executive Director VIT University
Email: xavier_mj@yahoo.com

The Key Challenges and Challengers for Growth

of Higher Education Industry Financing,
Regulation, Quality

Presented in the
Higher Education Forum Organized by
Engineering Watch in Hotel Raintree, Anna Salai,
Chennai

Indias Education System

The supply-demand gap: By 2020, India will need 40 million
university places - an increase of 14 million and 500 million
skilled workers. (British Council estimate*)
Indias education system is poor in quality and produces
functional illiterates.
Disconnect between Industry-Academia and the Government
Lack of Innovation (After the invention of chalk nothing new has
come up) No MOOC, Flipped class room or Blended Learning)
Lack of knowledge creation (research)
Poor quality (poor imitation of their western counterparts)
Over regulated and under managed (UGC, AICTE, MCI, etc.)
Shortage of Quality faculty
Lack of ethics and values among students and faculty (Grade
inflation and feed-back inflation)
*http://www.britishcouncil.org/sites/britishcouncil.uk2/files/understanding_india_report.pd
f

Functional Illiteracy
The third edition of the National Employability Report, Engineering
Graduates - 2014, released by a private employability solutions
company, revealed that though 18.33% of the engineers are
employable, 18.09% actually get a job.
Of the 1.2 lakh candidates surveyed across multiple states

91.82% lack programming and algorithm skills

71.23% lack soft and cognitive skills
60% lack domain skills
73.63% lack English speaking and comprehension skills
57.96% have poor analytical and quantitative skills.

Of the 6 lakh engineers that graduate annually

only 18.43% of them are employable for the software engineer-IT services
role
just 3.95% are appropriately trained to be directly deployed on projects.
For core jobs in mechanical, electronics/electrical and civil jobs, only a
mere 7.49% are employable.

TOI, July 15, 2014, Only 18% engineering grads are employable, says
survey

The Regulators and the Unregulated

Regulators
UGC
AICTE
Others

Medical Council of India

Dental Council of India
India Nursing Council
Council of Architecture
Bar Council of India
Pharmacy Council of India
Indian Council for Architecture
Research
Rehabilitation Council of India
Central Council of Homeopathy
Central Council of Indian Medicine
Veterinary Council of India

Unregulated
Language Training
Skill training
Tutorials/Coaching
Education services
companies
Content providers
Corporate Training

Industry-Institutions-Government
(Ideal)
Government

Institute

Nations
Human
resources
and
scientific
Developmen
ts

Industry

Example: John F
Kennedys vision of
sending a man to moon.

Industry-Institutions-Government
(Actual)
Government

Institute

Industry
Picture courtesy, Deamstime.com,
pigandrabbit.com

Teaching and Learning Challenges

Students want flexibility in the process

What they learn

How they learn
When they learn
Where they learn

Student want peer-learning and social

media integration
Students want experiential and
activity based learning

Education Administrators
How do I get the best out of faculty
How do I motivate them to adopt
new methods of teaching
How do I make them do research.
(Knowledge creation is critical for
growth of HE).

Concerns of the Policy Makers

Nations growth and prosperity
depends on the quality of its Human
resources, which in turn depend upon
their physical health and education.
How do we provide quality education
to all?
How much money that Government
should spend on education?

Einstein on education

I can Google
for facts and
information.
Can class
rooms
stimulate
critical
thinking?

Can we reform the exam

system?

Should everyone go in to engineering

education? What about vocational and
liberal arts courses? Dream of an IT job in
America is not going to work for

Can we upgrade our teachers on

technology?

Resistance to introduction of Class-room

Capture.

Our MBAs are Arrogant

An MBA from an IIM asked a boat guy in Bihar, "Do you know
Biology, Psychology, Geography, Geology or Criminology?" The boat
guy said, "No. I don't know any of these." The MBA then said, "What
the hell do you know on the face of this Earth? You will die of
illiteracy!
The boat guy said nothing.. After a while the boat developed a fault
and started sinking. The boatman then asked the MBA, "Do you know
Swimology and Escapology from Crocodiology?" The MBA said, "No!"
The boat guy replied, "Well, today you will Drownology and
Crocodiology will eat your Arseology. I will not Helpology and you will
Dieology because of your Badmouthology."

MBAs Cheat
56% of all
MBA
students
cheat in
Exams.
Source: study by the Academy of Management
Learning and Education of 5,300 students in the
U.S. and Canada

http://thesuccessmanual.bighow.co
m

14

The Future of the University?

Thirty years from now the big university campuses will be
relics. Universities wont survive. It is as large a change as
when we first got the printed book.
Peter Drucker
At a time of great change universities tend to be
repositories of historical ideas, museums if you like, rather
than think tanks for the future.
- Malcolm McIntosh
I wonder at times if we are not like the dinosaurs, looking
up at the sky at the approaching comet and wondering
whether it has an implication for our future.
Frank Rhodes

Alternate Scenarios
Commercialized Learning and Knowledge
Industry

Unbundling
A commodity marketplace
Mergers, acquisitions, hostile takeovers
New learning formats

Social Learning

Learning and education will be responsibility of the

respective Governments
Everything is provided free of cost to its citizens
Knowledge becomes the wealth of the nations

Prof. M J Xavier
xavier_mj@yahoo.com