Writes: Prashant Singh
The North Bengal University (NBU) features as an endorsement to the Educational aspect of the entire northern Bengal region. Thus, the smooth-functioning of the university is so essential for the upliftment of the entire region.
This makes it very sententious to discuss the university, time and again.
NBU has been a beacon to the students from plains and the hills, and we all must laud its contributions. However this should not obscure us from the blemishes that are hindering the further progress of the university.
I would like to present a list of possibilities that the university can prioritize for the betterment. I will restrict myself to the Undergraduate level (Specifically to the science subjects) as I am not in a position to discuss about the post graduate scenario and the humanities and commerce subjects..
1) The syllabus needs to be thoroughly reviewed, specifically for the Science subjects. The university connected to the Presidency college, and the Delhi University can be taken as a reference for syllabus development because these universities embrace the modern outlook of the syllabus.
When a student from NBU goes to a nationally/internationally acclaimed institutions,they find it difficult to bridge the gap in the lagging syllabus. The computationally skills need to be incorporated in Science subjects, because they are essential at the research level. In addition the Quantum mechanics, the mathematical Physics/Chemistry, Statistical Mechanics course is pathetically rudimentary with no modern outlook. They are least compatible to the modern scientific literature.
It will be a good if the teachers from various colleges could come forward and prepare a syllabus with a modern scientific flavour to it.
2)The exam style should be changed. Firstly the semester system should be implemented to ease the students with academic pressure. Also the exam should more be application oriented because every exam, such as IIT-JAM, NET, JEST, TIFR, GATE, GRE and many more are application oriented. They would never ask you the lengthy derivations of the formula which are asked
in NBU exams.
in NBU exams.
The exam pattern followed in NBU do not really test the grip or understanding of the individual. They just test your memorising ability which is equally futile and callous.
This is precisely the reason why even in today's generation an examination like NET makes us so worried.
3) The teaching style should be more interesting and the teachers need to be counseled properly for this. Many and really many students lose their interest because of bad teaching, even though the subject itself may be very interesting.
The teacher should not be restrict oneself to just the syllabus, but make their students aware about the happenings in the research sector. For this matter, seminars,talks and presentations at the regular basis would be fruitful. Also the concept of project could be incorporated in the syllabus so that a student can pursue his/her choice of topic and study it under the supervision of the professor.
4) Each semester could be of 4 or 4.5 months. The university should interfere and check if a college is conducting the requisite number of classes and there are sufficient number of teachers.
The teachers should also be monitored to ascertain if s/he is fulfilling their part of responsibility properly or not. Many complain about irresponsibility of the teachers, but to no avail. There is no mechanism set through which an inappropriate teacher is punished.
The efforts should also be taken to make the system less tution-dependent and less commercialised.
In conclusion, I want to say that the NBU is our university and its our responsibility to ensure its smooth functioning. The college academics is getting degraded every year, and more so in hills. I would definitely like the intellectuals, teachers, students and parents to give a thought to this.
However, besides reforming NBU, its high time that we all unite to push for the Central University in our hills
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