RUSA

A one day National Conference on Rashtriya UcchatarShikshaAbhiyan (RUSA) was organized by Association of Chamber or Commerce (ASSOCHAM) in collaboration with Association of Indian University (AIU), Planning Commission Government of India, Ministry of Human Resources Develop (MHRD) on December 18th, 2013 at Hotel Le-Meridian, New Delhi. Prof. B.L. Kaul, Registrar – Dronacharya Group of Institutions, Greater Noida attended the conference.

The title of the conference was “Challenges & Opportunities for HigherEducation Institutions”, Concern – 2014.

The inaugural Session started with the Presidential Address by Prof. D. S. Chauhan Secretary General, Association of Indian Universities. Prof D. S. Chauhan in his address said that RUSA is a centrally sponsored scheme proposed by M.H.R.D. to reform the higher education system in the country. The scheme will spread over two plans i.e. XIIth &XIIIth, for improving access, equity and quality in the State Higher Education System. RUSA also aims to incentivize states to step up plan investment in higher education. The scheme will cover 316 state public universities & 13024 colleges.

It was followed by Shri Vijay Rai, Chairman ASSOCHAM who explained in length the importance and need for up gradation in the field of Higher Education.

Later Dr. Amarendra Pani, Head Research Division Association of Indian Universities, Prof. Shyam Menon, Vice chancellor, Dr. B R Ambedkar University Delhi, Prof. S Parsuraman, Director Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai. Shri Chaitanya Prasad, IAS, Controller General of Patents, Design & Trade Marks & Dr. Arunduti Banerjee, Director International Initiative, MIT shared their views.

All the dignitaries were of the opinion that RUSA will have a completely new approach towards the funding for higher education in State Universities based on the key principles of performance based funding, incentivizing well performing institutions and decision making through clearly defined norms which will establish and rely upon a management information system to gather the essential information for institutions.

The inaugural session was followed by Technical Session I and Technical Session II. Key spokers for the Technical Session were Prof. R.P. Sisodia, IAS, Joint Secretary, Department of Higher Education, GOI, Dr. M.M. Ansari, Member UGC, New Delhi, Dr. Jayanti Ravi, IAS, Commissioner, Commissionerate of Technical Education, Govt. of Gujrat, Prof. Deepak Penta, Former Vice Chancellor, University of Delhi, Prof. P.K. Ahluwalia, Dean Planning and Teacher Matters, H.P. University, Sh. Ashok Thakur, IAS, Secretory, Govt. of India, MHRD, Prof. P.B. Sharma, Vice Chancellor, DTU, Sh. Pawan Agarwal, IAS, Adviser, Planning Commission and Prof. Kavita Sharma, Director, IIC, Delhi.

The speakers were of the opinion that greater autonomy be provided to universities as well as colleges and have a sharper focus on equity based development and improvement in teaching learning quality and research.

Post Tea Session was spent on the introduction and the importance of MOOC- MASSIVE OPEN ONLINE SESSION.

MOOC is aimed at unlimited participation and open access via the web. Apart from the traditional course materials such as videos, readings and problem sets, MOOC provides interactive user forums that enable them in building a community for the students, academics and teaching assistants.

The theme of the conference was to make dignitaries among the audience aware that RUSA is a Pathway to face challenges in Higher Education which included making Financial and Academic reforms as well as Governance regulatory Reforms, in Higher education.

The conference provided platform to Vice Chancellors, senior functionaries of the government and heads of different apex agencies of education statutory bodies to debate and discuss on the challenges, implications and modalities before implementation of scheme. It led the speakers and participants introspect the reasons for poor ranking of Indian Universities at the International Platform for which RUSA is likely to contribute significantly in the field of improving the quality in education delivery mechanism with emphasis on world class research and innovation in enhancing the development of quality education with employability.

The conference ended with a stress to make the Academicians realize that the need of the hour was quality education in pursuit of excellence in Research.