Education and Career

New Delhi, March 06: The Centre on Friday said a ‘national accreditation authority’ would soon be set up for regulating foreign educational institutions in the country.

“A legislative proposal for regulating the entry and operation of foreign educational institutions in India is under consideration of the government. We want to set up a national accreditation authority for the same,” Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal said in the Rajya Sabha.

Chennai, March 06: With 32 partner institutions coming together to share resources for research and teaching, the Commonwealth Science and Technology Academy for Research (C-STAR) was inaugurated by former President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam at Anna University-Chennai on Friday.

Mr. Kalam said the Academy should provide a virtual platform for collaboration among institutions of higher education. Excellence should be infused into engineering colleges in the country and senior researchers should serve as role models for the younger generation.

New Delhi, March 05: The government on Friday said it proposes to set up a National Education Finance Corporation (NEFC) to finance entities interested in setting up educational institutions on easier terms and conditions.

Replying to questions in the Rajya Sabha, Human Resources Development Minister Kapil Sibal said NEFC will provide loans for infrastructure development and expansion of education institutions as well as for refinance facility for student loans.

New Delhi, March 05: Indian students will need to demonstrate higher English language skills while applying for UK student visas after new requirements intended to curb abuse of the visa system came into effect this week.

The minimum level of English required has been raised while enrolling on courses in the UK to study English. There are exceptions if students are government-sponsored.

New Delhi, March 05: Class 10 students of the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) made their way anxiously to exam centres around the country Friday to answer their first major and compulsory paper Social Science, though some had taken their first exam March 3 in Music, an optional subject.

Doing their last minute studies outside the examination centres, most students said that they were worried about the questions they have to tackle and the lengthy answers required.

New Delhi, March 05: Class 10 students of the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) made their way anxiously to exam centres around the country Friday to answer their first major and compulsory paper Social Science, though some had taken their first exam March 3 in Music, an optional subject.

Doing their last minute studies outside the examination centres, most students said that they were worried about the questions they have to tackle and the lengthy answers required.

Patna, March 05: Nearly one million students across Bihar started their Class 10 exams Friday. The Bihar School Examination Board (BSEB), which conducts the examinations, has made elaborate arrangements for peaceful and fair exams.

Over 974,000 students are taking the high school examination, which will continue till March 11.

“The first day’s exam took place at 1,359 examination centres peacefully and without any trouble as per information received,” BSEB chairman, A.K.P Yadav told IANS.

New Delhi, March 05: The Union Ministry of Minority Affairs is offering free coaching to candidates from minority communities with an aim to enhance their skills to make them employable in IT industries, services and business sectors, both private and public. The last date for registration for the coaching is March 8.

New Delhi, March 05: After dropping its plan to set up of a Central Madrasa Board (CMB) because of lack of consensus on the issue, the HRD Ministry is now set to exempt Jamia Milia University from implementing the 27 per cent OBC quota it has strongly been advocating.

The ministry is likely to amend the Central Educational Institutes (Amendment) Act to exempt Jamia from the quota rollout mandated by the Act, sources said.

New Delhi, March 05: The Cabinet Thursday approved setting up of 137 General Nursing and Midwifery (GNM) Schools in at least 18 states to boost human resource in the health sector. The total cost will be Rs.1,370 crore.

“The schools will be opened in these states at a total cost of Rs.1,370 crore with a cost sharing pattern of 85:15 between the central government and states. The expenditure on the part of the central government would be Rs.1,164.50 crore and the states are to contribute Rs.205.50 crore,” the cabinet said in a statement.

New Delhi, March 05: At least 90 percent of Indian universities are providing below-par education and the time has come when action is required to improve it, Sam Pitroda, advisor to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, said here Thursday.

Speaking at an educational conference titled Edge 2010, Pitroda expressed concerns over the declining quality and said in 90 percent of our universities the quality of education was “not up to the mark” and “needed to be improved substantially”.

New Delhi, March 04: HRD Minister Kapil Sibal today said a bill to facilitate foreign educational institutions operate in India is ready and would be taken to Cabinet any time.

“All the discussions over the Foreign Education Providers Bill is over. The bill is ready to go to the Cabinet any day,” Mr. Sibal said at the Emerging Directions in Global Education (EDGE) summit 2010 here.

The proposed legislation would regulate the entry of foreign education providers as per India’s priorities.

Ahmedabad, March 04: With the first online common admission test results out, Indian Institutes of Management are debating whether to drop the online test and revert to the paper-and-pencil method.

IIM-Ahmedabad favours scrapping the five-year contract with US-based company Prometric, which conducted the online test for 220,000 applicants across the country from November 28 to December 7 last year. IIM-A is considering going back to the pen-and-paper method if a better alternative to the online test carried out by Prometric cannot be found.

New Delhi, March 04: To prepare for her maths paper the next day, Shweta (name changed), a Class IX student of Gurgaon’s Summer Fields, practised with a set of questions given at Amity International School (Gurgaon) the day before.

Chandigarh, March 04: Finding itself in hot water after 25 of its students managed to go on an educational trip to the US by showing bogus papers, Panjab University is now planning to verify the credentials of the American NGO that organised the conference. The issue came to light after one student was arrested on molestation charges while in Boston.

Nitin Jindal, 22, a student of the University Institute of Law Studies (UILS), went to the US to participate in the 56th session of Harvard National Model United Nations (HNMUN), held in Boston during Feb 11-14.

Melbourne, March 04: With its USD 16.6 billion international education industry seriously hit by a series of attacks on Indian students, Australia today announced setting up of a new body to upgrade the quality of education in the country and assured safety for its overseas students.

Australia’s Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard said the newly set-up Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency would assure quality for domestic and international students.

Hyderabad, March 04: After several postponements in view of violent protests triggered due to separate Telangana agitation, the semester examinations of PG and professional courses of Osmania University and its affiliated colleges began today and were conducted smoothly, university officials said.

The exams of different courses were postponed by the University authorities in the backdrop of series of violent clashes that broke out between students and police personnel in varsity campus ever since the agitation for separate Telangana state began in November last year.

New Delhi, March 03: Lakhs of students will take the CBSE class X and XII examinations from Wednesday at over 5,300 centres across the country.

Close to 9.02 lakh candidates will be appearing in CBSE class X examination under the new grading system while more than 6.99 lakh candidates will take their class XII examination.

“The grading system will minimise misclassification of students on the basis of marks, eliminate unhealthy competition among students and reduce societal pressure,” said a CBSE official.

All about grading system

Chennai, March 03: The first semester textbooks for B.E. courses in Tamil proposed for next year will be ready within the next two months, said P. Mannar Jawahar, Vice-Chancellor, Anna University-Chennai, here on Tuesday.

He said committees of three professors were looking at the textbooks for each course and had decided to use technical terms from the dictionary of technical terms published by Tamil Virtual University.

“But, we will also use many common terms like “lathe” without translating them,” he added.

Patna, March 01: Days before the commencement of the UP Board examinations, the question papers of the High School and Intermediate level were stolen from Haideri Inter College in Sakheri village in Bulandshahr on Saturday.

Jeddah, March 01: A Jeddah-based teacher, Shahmida Mohammed, has won a gold medal for her outstanding performance in MA English from the Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) Saudi Arabia.

New Delhi, February 28: The much-awaited results of the Common Admission Test were announced Sunday by the Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs). The scores uploaded on the official website will be the deciding factor for admission to the IIMs and around 100 other management schools.

“IIMs have announced the CAT 2009 scores at www.catiim.in. Candidate short-lists for interviews by each IIM will also be announced on the CAT website as and when the institutes are ready with the list,” said an official statement issued by the institutes.

New Delhi, February 27: As many as 9.25 lakh candidates will be appearing in CBSE class X examination beginning March 3 across the country under the new grading system.

More than 6.99 lakh candidates will also take their class XII examination which start on the same day.

According to CBSE, the number of students appearing for the class X examination is 8.65 per cent more than last year. Among the candidates, 5,33,715 are boys and 3,68,802 are girls.

The examination will be held in 12,303 schools and centres across the country, the Board said in a release.

New Delhi, February 26: The union budget for the next fiscal has pegged an outlay of Rs.31,036 crore (Rs.310.36 billion/$6.7 billion) for school education, an increase of Rs.4,236 crore from the previous year, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee said Friday.

The minister said a lot of this money would go for the implementation of the Right to Education Act, which aims at mandatory education to all students between the age of six and 14.

‘The act will provide good quality and equity education,’ Mukherjee said while presenting the budget in parliament.

—-IANS

Shimla, February 26: The Himachal Pradesh government Thursday gave approval for opening a state-run nursing college in Shimla, a minister said.

“The cabinet this (Thursday) evening gave consent to open a nursing school in the premises of Indira Gandhi Medical College and Hospital in Shimla. This would be the first government college in the state,” Health Minister Rajeev Bindal told reporters after the cabinet meeting.

He said the nursing college would conduct M.Sc. (nursing), B.Sc. (nursing) and post-basic B.Sc. (nursing) besides one specialised course.