Introduction
The first question that arises is why should an individual be educated at all? One possible answer is that it is a means of social and material transformation making the physical life of an individual easier through the creation of both societal and individual material wealth. This is mainly achieved through science and technology and made available through trade commerce and economics which also attempt the equitable distribution of wealth. This is accepted as human progress and hence the emphasis in higher education is on disciplines like trade commerce, management, information technology, bio-technology, micro-biology, genetics and other allied subjects. Progress is measured by national and international agencies through parameters like GDP, per capita Income, education and health standards, and consumption.
Individuals and society have a symbiotic relationship with each other and not a confrontationist one which has been the trend especially within the human rights movement. Individuals are the building blocks of a society and hence individuals and society ought to complement each other so that progress may be achieved. When the individual and the society are at odds with one another two view points or tendencies emerge.
The first advocates a collective reorganization, something, which could lead to the effective unity mankind. The second declares that all progress is made first by the individual and insists that individual should be given the conditions in which he can progress freely. However, both are equally true and necessary, and our effort has to be directed along these lines simultaneously. Collective progress and individual progress are interdependent. Before the individual can take a leap forward at least a little of the preceding progress must have been realized in the collectivity. A way must, therefore, be found so that these two types of progress may proceed side by side.
How is this to be done? One of the most important tools is `education.’ To `educate’ means to train, to rear, or to raise. Higher education is predominantly concerned with the training of the mind.
It must necessarily have two broad aims: “a collective aspect and an …. individual aspect.” The collective aspect requires, as P.B. Saint Hillare points out, that an individual be turned into a good citizen who has harmonious relations with other members of the community, who is useful to society and who fulfills his obligations as a good citizen. The individual aspect demands that through education, he develop a strong and healthy body, build up his character, attain self mastery and get opportunities to discover and develop his natural abilities harmoniously. Both aspirations are justified and education must fulfill both needs at all levels. However, it is true in particular in the field of higher education as after this individuals assume decision making and leadership roles in society.
The collective aspect of education pertains to societal requirements. By the need of society is meant what society thinks it requires. Temporary necessities may arise (war, new discoveries, geographical or political changes) which may for some time reflect themselves on education. But it is clear that the formulated requirements of any society, as far as education is concerned, depends on its aim as conceived largely by the ruling class at the time. It may be general culture and adornment of life – artists of all sorts will be encouraged and become the favourites of the princes. It may be military aggrandizement and adventure – then soldiers and sailors will be needed. It may be industrialization as a means towards material well being – the need will be for engineers and technicians. This brings about the change in education programmes that answer to the growing demand for what the society perceives it needs like Scientists, Engineers and Technicians, and by the numerous institutions that are created to satisfy this demand.
Background of Higher Education
The foundations of higher education in India were laid by Macaulay who had a two fold aim: one, to produce cheap clerical labour to serve the needs of the colonial empire; second, to create a class of people who would perpetuate the legacy of the empire by looking down upon their own cultural values and uphold those of the British ruling class. As Amilcar Cabral points out, the experience of colonial domination shows that the colonizer provokes and develops the cultural alienation of a part of the population by the so-called assimilation of indigenous elites distancing them from the popular masses. As a result, a section of the people assimilate the colonizers’ mentality, considers itself culturally superior to its own people and looks down upon their cultural values.
This is the situation of the majority of colonized intellectuals and their position is consolidated by increase in social privileges. The university system set up by the colonizers for their own ends has ironically been expanded and strengthened rather than being dismantled in independent India. From twenty universities and five hundred colleges at the time of independence, there are now almost 450 universities and 20,000 colleges. 88% of all college and university students are in undergraduate course, 9.8% being at the Master’s level and a very small proportion, i.e. 0.9% in research. Only 1.4% are enrolled in diploma or certificate courses. 88% of undergraduate students and 55% of all postgraduate students are in affiliated colleges while the remaining are in the universities and their constituent colleges. In the case of diploma/certificate courses too, university departments and university colleges have an edge over affiliated colleges.
Since the majority of students are in colleges, the foundations of higher education are laid there and their functioning have far reaching implications. Of the undergraduate students, the highest number is pursuing liberal arts and commerce in colleges of uneven standards. The colonial system of education is mechanically churning out unemployable graduates with poor skills and little development of mind or personality.
Why has this happened? Because no sincere thought has been given to what was sought to be achieved through higher education. At the time of independence, India lacked every kind of material prosperity. There was an immense desire to catch up with Western standards of living as soon as possible. Factories and dams were hailed as the new temples of India. However, no thought was given to how the skilled human resource was to be produced to achieve the material prosperity desired through industrialization and technical advancement. Obviously an integrated plan was required from the school to the university level. The report of the First Education Commission or Kothari Commission came in 1964; the First National Policy of Education in 1968, and then in 1986 and 1992. Lacking a coherent vision, pockets of excellence developed that competed with areas of great neglect.
Role of School
In India, access to higher education is about 11% which is very low. Not only that the number of students who drop out at the school level itself is very high, being over 65%. This shows that only a very small percentage manage to have access to higher education. The drop out, and the failure rate even at the tertiary stage for those who do manage to enter collage indicates that for any meaningful access, the school education system must deliver. It is the real base for human resource. No changes in higher education will provide a satisfactory outcome unless the schooling improves. Pratham a leading NGO in education has pointed out that only 16.5 percent of rural children in Class 1-8 can read and only 25.75 per cent can recognize numbers. Further the high dropout rates at each level of the education system, has resulted in a majority of the work force lacking in education. The others have to contend with an outdated system that involves rote learning rather than learning skills, understanding information and solving practical problems. Hence the relevance of education at the tertiary level has also to be looked at.
Thus, a large number of students are left out of the system as a study by Dr. Sudhanshu Bhushan in 2004 shows. The study divides the left out students into three categories; left outs at the school level, pre-college and college levels. In all these areas combined, there are about 30 million students with little or no alternatives. They need to have a well developed tier of vocational education that links with school education on the one hand and higher education on the other. Vocational education is available in the form of Polytechnics, Industrial Training Institutes and, more recently, Community Colleges. However, all of them suffer from lack of resources and poor implementation.
The NSSO 61st Round states that while 70 per cent of the population completed primary education in the 18-22 age group, only 6 per cent completed a diploma course and 97 per cent of the work force in the country, in the 15-60 age group has no technical education. The inability of the system to provide continuation of education leads to fewer students going to next levels of education resulting in an inability to meet the needs of the job market, lower employability and an accumulation of people with low skills at the bottom of the job pyramid. Similar findings can be seen in the Report on Condition of Work and Promotion of Livelihoods in the Unorganised Sector (2007). It states that the average number of years of schooling of workers in the rural, unorganized non-agricultural sector was found to be 4.6 as compared to 9 years in the organized sector, and for the unorganized agricultural sector it was 2.8. Mean years of schooling among casual workers in the unorganized non-agricultural sector was 3.5, thus denying workers access to jobs in the organized sector and confining them to casual labour.
Moreover, with the commercialization of agriculture, crop diversification and introduction of new technologies, education has become a key input even for development and modernization of agriculture and the welfare of the people dependent on it. Levels of illiteracy are such that it is almost impossible for them to assimilate new information on better agricultural practices.
Why Access
Now, why should there be focus on access to higher education when the school system obviously needs so much strengthening? Obviously because one of the aims of higher education is empowerment through economically productive employment. It has been argued in the case of SC/ST that even economic empowerment does not necessarily mean social empowerment. However, in simplistic terms while empowerment can be social or economic but if one has to choose between the two, the latter is more important than the former. With economic empowerment, social gradually follows or even if it doesn’t its effects are not so terribly debilitating. However, the existing system of higher education in India is not conducive to providing skills necessary for employment and a majority of Indian graduates are actually unemployable. The vocational sector of education is woefully lacking and the academic sector is not delivering the way it should. The problems have assumed serious proportions and there is an extreme urgency to introduce a skill or career orientation into tertiary education which is available together with the academic stream and between which points of convergence can be created.
The Indian Labour Report 2007, by TeamLease Services states that while poverty is declining in India, inequality is rising and 57 per cent of Indian youth suffer from some form of skill deprivation. Corporate India cannot find skilled employees and much of the labour force consists of the `working poor.’ Despite the large human resource available in the country, employability remains a key challenge. Pressures on employment arise from several factors including shift in the demographics of the population, the inability of an ailing agricultural sector to support labour and an educational system that is not in sync with the requirements of business and industry. The inadequate interaction between the academics on the one hand and business and industry on the other results in a lack of focus on the skill development of individuals. The decision of most individuals to continue with education depends on their receiving adequate returns for the efforts made, and the current system does not enable them to do so, resulting in dropouts, under-trained and under-skilled labour. Globally, two approaches are followed to achieve better employability – educational reforms followed by a focus on lifelong learning opportunities.
Although the number of colleges and universities has mushroomed in the country, they lack the ability to impart career-oriented knowledge and training; curricula are out-dated; there is little interaction between industry and educational institutes, and only about 10 per cent of the colleges show good academic achievement. The poor quality of colleges means that students passing out of them would earn low incomes or would be unable to find jobs relevant to the courses pursued by them. This is also one of the causes for the high levels of dropouts in higher education. When future prospects are not attractive, the better option appears to be to drop out, particularly for the deprived sections of society.
Further, there is a wide range of income divergence within the same stream depending on the quality of skills. Though higher education levels can help an individual reach the desired employment, sustainability depends on how well the skills are adapted and improved over time. It is thus the quality of the institute that imparts the education or training which is the most important determinant of the income earning potential. For instance, only 30 per cent of IT graduates are actually employable in the IT sector.
A GHRDC-Competition Success Review Survey 2006 reported that out of approximately 1100 Business-Schools in India only 400 met the minimum eligibility criteria. And while the top institutes usually registered 100 per cent placements, the bottom ones barely managed 25 per cent. This was true for all streams of education in the country, emphasising the fact that good infrastructure, instruction and other inputs were essential to ensure high standards of education, liberal or vocational, and this was lacking in the majority of educational institutes.
An analysis of data available from the NSSO 61st Round shows a surprisingly paradoxical finding. According to it, greater education levels can lead to greater income but they also bring with them a lower probability of being employed. The situation was aggravated because formal vocational training had no impact on incomes or the likelihood of being employed, because of its poor quality. On the other hand, informal vocational training not associated with formal certification, such as training in household occupation settings, had a positive impact on the likelihood of being employed, but did not affect income levels significantly This highlighted the importance of having a formal, well-designed vocational training system and the poor quality available in the country.
Resistance to Vocational Education
There has been resistance amongst students to vocational education in India, as there is a perception that it is meant for those who are not good at academics. But with the opening up of the economy the demand for skills has gone up manifold. To meet it, provision has to be made from the school level. It can be argued that vocationalisation of education has been attempted before and it has failed. It is necessary to analyze why this has happened. One reason and which continuous till today is that if a student opts for a vocational subject at the school, he/she has no opportunity to pursue it or an allied field at the tertiary level. In the existing colleges and universities no credit is given for the vocational subject studied at the school level and so it actually becomes a disadvantage to do so. Also, at the time vocationalization was attempted in India, the economy did not have the capacity to absorb skilled human resource at different levels that it has now and the demand can only grow. Another detriment which still persists is that a person in the vocational stream has little or no opportunity to join the academic stream at any point in his/ her life without starting totally afresh. In other words, no credit is given for either the vocational knowledge or the work experience acquired.
While universities may prepare engineers, scientists, industrialists and social leaders of a country, a second-tier educational level is essential to produce the middle-level technologists who can manage and maintain the industrial infrastructure. Without such an educated and technical workforce, there can be no progress. Steps were taken during the early 1980s to introduce Application Oriented Courses (AOCs) within the framework of the graduate courses and in the 1990s several self-financing institutions sprang up, with the approval of universities and state government, to run job-oriented programmes in fields such as electronic, computer science, accountancy, food science, hospital, and hotel management and others, which have been popular with students. The University Grants Commission also introduced vocational courses as part of the three-year bachelor’s degree courses. The curriculum was restructured to integrate the vocational angle. Add on courses oriented towards skill development were also allowed outside the time table.
This appears to be confused thinking as academic colleges are not oriented towards vocational education and do not have the wherewithal to do so. Heads of academic educational institutions have difficulty in identifying industries for practical application work and funding agencies to finance the training. There is still a considerable gap in what the industry wants and the colleges are able to provide. The country needs different levels at the tertiary education system so that a bouquet of options is available. This will bridge the gap between what the students are taught and the demands of the work force. It will also provide opportunities for training to the large unskilled work force available in India. There is also a backlog of school dropouts who are over the school age of sixteen and work as unskilled workers. According to an ILO report, 95 per cent of the Indian workforce has no marketable skills. This vast need for productive skills cannot be achieved only through the formal sector especially if it is as rigid as it tends to be in India. A parallel informal, flexible system is also required to identify and develop local talent for local needs.
Industrial Training Institutes
Vocational and technical training as a means of empowerment is not a new idea. It has been recommended and tried but there has been only limited success. Technical and vocational training was considered very important for the underprivileged and marginalized groups to improve their productivity, particularly as they were usually first generation learners. Traditionally too, they had been engaged in skilled and semi-skilled work and were likely to perform better in those areas. Also there were more opportunities for their employment in the newly established industries where jobs are reserved for them. The major vocational institutions imparting training for middle level technical personnel were polytechnics, Industrial Training Institutes, junior technical schools, crafts and handicrafts schools, and other industrial and technical schools.
The Secondary Education Commission, in 1953, had recommended the setting up of technical schools, as separate institutes or as part of existing institutes, in industrial areas which would work in collaboration with industries. When the Commission reviewed the situation in 1964-66, it found a shortfall of middle level technical personnel and recommended an increase of part-time and full-time vocational and professional courses at the lower secondary level and after Class 12. It also reported that semi-skilled and skilled workers were primarily trained in the ITIs, while technicians were trained in polytechnic. A doubling of ITIs, was recommended. Even then it was stated that the courses should allow for students to move to the academic stream. This, however, has never happened and there are no enabling structures or systems to date.
Further, the Working Group on Technical and Vocational Education recommended in 1978 that the ratio between graduates and technicians should be 1:2, but the output ratio dropped to 1:1. The main reason for this was that students belonging to different backgrounds found it difficult to adjust, facilities were not fully utilized, there was shortage of operating funds and lack of motivation in both teachers and students. The Working Group emphasized that it was necessary to consolidate diversify and improve quality in existing institutions before attempting further expansion. The Sixth Five Year Plan, 1980-85 made similar recommendations, and also stressed that ITIs had to be revamped to orient them towards self-employment.
The thinking persisted well into the 1980s that technical and vocational training was specially useful for the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, the most disempowered sections of society as it could provide skills for the job opportunities that wer continuously expanding. A Study of Five States on `Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in Industrial Training Institutes’ was conducted by the National Institute for Educational Planning and Administration (NIEPA) in the early 1980s. The study indicated that while the utilization of the facilities in the ITIs was good for scheduled castes (SCs), there was a considerable gap in the case of scheduled tribes (STs), even in the special ITIs set up in tribal areas, that were well equipped, but lacked motivated personnel. Their enrolment rates were far below those of other groups and much less than their proportion in the population, with large-scale state-wise variations, despite reservations. Several studies have shown that the reserved quota is seldom fully utilized, mainly because the number of qualified students are inadequate. This is particularly true for the STs. One solution recommended has been to make district-wise reservations rather than course-wise. Wastage in terms of failures and dropouts was high. Most ex-trainees worked as apprentices and self-employment was minimal. Further, the waiting time to get a job was higher for the SCs/STs as compared to others and the special incentives for them were found to be inadequate and the implementation of schemes was defective.
Polytechnics
Polytechnics were set up to build up the technical education system and there are about three hundred institutes which had an annual intake of around 30,000 students. About 70 per cent of the polytechnics were run by state governments and the rest by private agencies or autonomous bodies. The institutes have three and two year full-time courses and sandwich courses. However, there is inadequate machinery for the systematic evaluation of their work and progress and hence there was little feedback on performance.
A National Expert Committee Chaired by S. S. Kalbag was set up in 1987 to appraise the status of community polytechnics in the country. It stated that for a balanced development of the country, human resource for all sectors, organised as well as unorganized, had to be prepared by the technical education system. The All India Council for Technical Education had recommended as early as 1978 that a few select polytechnics that had shown initiative in promoting interaction with the rural community at large and had the necessary capacity to undertake rural development work, could be used as focal points to promote transfer of technology to the rural sector and make contributions to rural development. These polytechnics were designated as Community Polytechnics.
Community Polytechnics were to make a socio-economic technical survey of adjoining villages to determine the needs of the people. They were then to develop human resource and training through a wide variety of trade courses, non-formal training programmes, and entrepreneurial development programmes. Further, they were to facilitate technology transfer to rural areas and provide technical support service to ensure the sustenance of rural technologies. They were to also assist local entrepreneurs in various aspects of enterprise building by disseminating information, creating awareness about various developmental schemes and by applying science and technology to find solutions for specific problems.
However, these met with limited success because of the shortfalls in implementation. There was little attempt to integrate the curricular activities of regular and community polytechnics. Scant attention was paid to costing in most of the projects undertaken by them. In some cases the training courses organized for rural youth did not reflect the skill and potential of the polytechnic either in content or in methodology. This was aggravated by a weak information system that limited technology transfer. Besides, since the entire institution was not involved in this activity, the efforts did not have the expected multiplier effect. It was, therefore, felt that the whole scheme needed to be reoriented. The main objective of the polytechnics should be to develop the human resource in the rural areas through the development of technical skills. A scientific methodology needed to be used to identify the opportunities in the economic environment of the region and exploit them. This required that the polytechnics as a whole had to raise the science and technology level of their own staff and students by solving live rural problems. This meant that Community Polytechnics, needed to be strengthened and guided in the selection of projects so that they could perform more effectively as agents of change in the rural areas.
Since the level of technology in village society was low, polytechnics could be very useful in rural transformation. They could select a village institution, preferably a secondary school, to act as its village extension arm, where they could build training facilities for multi-skill programmes relevant to the village environment or of educational significance. Trainers could be developed from amongst the village youth including school teachers within the village centre and all training had to be multiskilled, oriented towards self-employment. In addition the students had to be given the ability to read, write, communicate and also some computational skills.
However, little progress was made as is evident from the experience of a team from the Community Colleges for International Development (CCID) that visited India in the late 1980s to explore the possibilities of collaboration between the community colleges in USA and the polytechnics of India. CCID is a consortium of colleges that aim to pursue formal higher education with economic development, and take up skills development in developing countries. It found a severe mismatch between the industry’s requirements and the skills learnt at polytechnics because of lacuna in planning and implementation. There was limited specializational and very little interaction between the polytechnics and the industry. The equipment was obsolete, faculty development was poor and teachers had no incentive to make use of the Technical Teacher Training Institutes (TTTI) established in the country. Hence the faculty did not keep abreast with the latest changing technologies within the local industries.
The team recommended that the present and future employment skills, knowledge and abilities required by industry had to be identified for curricula development and purchase of relevant equipment. Further, faculty had to be constantly upgraded and needed to maintain close contacts with industry so that obsolescence could be continuously taken care of in all areas like curriculum, equipment and pedagogy.
A Special Committee for Reorganization and Development of Polytechnic Education was set up in 1991. It agreed with most of these comments and recommendations of the CCID accepting that even earlier there had been serious criticism of polytechnic education in the country by educationists, industrialists, professional bodies and employers. It had been pointed out that the diploma courses in polytechnics were mostly theoretical. Being a poor imitation of degree courses, they did not serve the purpose of training middle level technical personnel. There was little attempt at specialization and the industry linkages were weak. Also, faculty development and better academic infrastructure was required.
A survey of industries made it clear that while diploma holders remained unemployed, a significant proportion of technicians’ positions went to persons without formal qualifications but with job experience at the craftsman level. Further, students of polytechnics did not and could not fit directly into job situations in industry, because there was insufficient application orientation to the education and training imparted by polytechnics. The Committee found that the academic organisation and control did not permit flexibility and freedom to experiment and innovate in collaboration with the industry. Therefore autonomy for polytechnics was essential to allow for innovations in curricula and pedagogy and for establishing meaningful industry linkages where this had been allowed, the quality of the institutions had improved.
Skills for Progress
Lacking effective skill development institutions, several private initiatives were being taken to meet the ever expanding job requirements of the country. For example, Skills for Progress, an all India association of private technical and vocational training institutions describes in its annual report of 2005-6, its collaboration with the Community Colleges for International Development (CCID), USA. CCID and SKIP are working on programmes focussing on curriculum and workforce development, communications and electronic education resources. The programmes aim at capacity building of institutions to stay relevant to the changing needs of vocational and technical training so as to enhance employability of the students.
Skills Development Initiative of the Confederation of Indian Industries (CII)
The Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) took the Skills Development Initiative in 2004, to provide social inclusiveness and bring the marginalized sections of society into the mainstream economy through empowerment by skill development. The main features of the initiative are its localized and need-based approach, practical hands on experience, training and testing, accessibility, quality, cost-effectiveness, and centralized certification. Most training facilities as well as trainers function for 8-10 hours per weekday and they can be used for the remaining periods of time, to save costs.
Geographical areas and target groups are identified, following which the relevant skills – localized and marketable – that need to be developed are identified. The curricula are worked out in collaboration with the local industries. Panchayats and other local bodies are also consulted. Trainees are selected on the basis of their motivation and abilities and the programmes are flexible in scheduling. Constant monitoring and assessments of trainees are undertaken and unsuccessful candidates can reappear for assessments and can even join another batch for additional training. Certification is important as it indicates a certain minimum standard acceptable to industry throughout the country to allow for mobility of workers.
Weaknesses pointed out by the Working Group on Higher Education – Eleventh Five Year Plan
The Eleventh Five Year Plan which has come to be known as the Education Plan because of its emphasis on education also accepts that there are several systemic challenges posed by tertiary education in India. It recognizes that there is an abundance of talent in the country, which is mostly un-nurtured. There is lack of flexibility in the system leading to a mismatch between school and employment hours. Knowledge resources are not easily available and there are inadequate opportunities to use even what is there. The quality of teaching is questionable and there is a gap between the demand and supply of knowledge and skills together with lack of collaborative learning. There is little or no personalized monitoring and long-term tracking of learning, skill upgradation and performance. And finally the situation is being aggravated by a growing digital divide. Most of these issues pertaining are not new.
Changes were introduced in the Indian system that led to the creation of new types of institutions but the implementation has left a lot to be desired. For example, when vocational/technical education was to be introduced, the 10+2+3 system was formulated, with the intention of bifurcating students to academic or vocational/technical education at the +2 stage. As a consequence, Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs) and polytechnics were created, but very little attention has been paid to the way these operate. Hence, as has been discussed their poor quality Also the UGC formulated a scheme in the 1990s to introduce B.A (vocational) in which one vocational subject is taught together with other academic subjects. However, lack of faculty and proper academic and physical infrastructure did not allow it take off with any degree of success. The result is that there has been no appreciable shift of students to vocational streams in the existing institutes nor has the education impacted the students or the economy. An attempt has been made to rectify both access to education and to strengthen vocational education in the Eleventh Five Year Plan.
The Eleventh Five Year Plan and Open and Distance Learning (ODL)
The Eleventh Five Year plan envisages increasing the enrolment from the current 11% to 20% in the coming five years that is by 2012 the last year of the Plan. One of the strategies is to strengthen the open and distance learning system that provides higher education to about 25 per cent of learners. The Eleventh Plan expects this figure to increase to 40 per cent. It has an impressive track record of providing quality education and training to a large learner population, by using ICT to create access and opportunities through the length and breadth of the country. The learner profile includes the employed and the unemployed, those seeking to upgrade skills and knowledge while working, and the disadvantaged and the marginalized rural youth. The system has developed a wide delivery network.
The National Open University which is also the nodal institution for distance learning programming in the country is the Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU), which was established in 1985 to promote distance learning. It has widened access to higher education by adopting integrated multimedia instructions increasing its reach considerably through the use of Gyan Darshan, an educational TV channel and Gyan Vani, FM channels. It has a delivery network of 53 regional centres, 1,400 study centres and about 25,000 counselors providing learner support. It has 28 FM radio stations and 6 TV channels, including three interactive channels. It has been given the responsibility to develop an additional 15 FM radio stations.
The focus of Open Distance Learning during the Eleventh Plan period would be on professional, vocational and career oriented programmes at certificate, diploma and degree levels, concentrating on skill development, vocational training and community development programmes. Skill development has so far been underdeveloped, but two-way interactive platforms like EDUSAT have created a vast potential for short-term training and there has been a shift from enrichment programmes towards curriculum-based learning programmes. The system however, needs inputs in terms of research, innovations, development of resource material and dedicated networks for efficient delivery and system upgradation.
The Eleventh Five Year Plan’s Working Group on Higher Education and Community Colleges
Apart from enhancing the distance learning system of education, the Eleventh Five Year Plan’s Working Group on Higher Education has recommended the setting up of community colleges. It has recognized that there are significant disparities in the GER for rural and urban areas, being 5.58 per cent and 21.74 per cent respectively in 2000, as per Census figures. Growth of higher education can be viewed from both the supply and the demand side. From the supply side it needs to be ascertained that those who have passed the senior secondary level and are eligible to join higher education must have access to it. At the same time higher education must not only grow but also diversify to meet the growing needs of the economy and society. This means that higher education should have backward linkages with school education and forward linkages with the economy to supply the relevant human resource along with well qualified teachers for the education sector itself. For this to happen, the contents of higher education must have continuity with the earlier levels of education. Care has also to be taken to ensure that students do not take particular courses and subjects, in an ad hoc manner as that may lead to wastage, while at the same time the system has to be made flexible enough to enable them to choose their courses according to their own talents and inclinations.
The Eleventh Five Year Plan accepts Community Colleges as an alternative system of education to help the poor, the tribal population and women to find gainful employment in collaboration with local industry, business and the community. It states the importance of Community Colleges as they provide education for a livelihood; and eliminate exclusion from the formal system. They also reduce the mismatch between education and employment and can thus be an important means of reducing poverty, unemployment, under-employment, un-employability and dropouts. It states further, that Community Colleges have the unique record of empowering the socially, economically and educationally backward sections of society during the past ten years wherever these have been started.
The Working Group on the Eleventh Plan recommends the national recognition of the Community College system; and the vertical mobility of the Community College student through open and conventional universities with a three-tier system of diploma, associate degree and degree. Community Colleges need to be set up in educationally backward regions to correct regional imbalances in higher education with emphasis on the development of soft skills. Also, central placement cells can be set up in collaboration with the Confederation of Indian Industries and Chambers of Commerce. The reach of Community Colleges can be further strengthened through distance learning for those students who cannot commute to college or stay in hostels.
Community Colleges
The Community College or the people’s college was developed in the US, and could well be adapted to the Indian system of education to offer quality education, with technical and vocational training, in order to create competent career-oriented individuals.
American Community Colleges are designed as comprehensive institutions combining liberal arts, vocational, technical and adult education. They have two-year duration courses and students accumulate credits that are transferable to colleges of higher education. A majority of students complete the first two years of junior college at such institutions. They have an open-door policy that enables almost anyone seeking higher education or the enhancement of vocational and technical skills to enroll. Today, in the Indian system, barring open universities and schools, and those offering correspondence courses, this is difficult, if not impossible.
Community Colleges can be linked to specific universities and colleges, so that credits gained in them can be used to enter mainstream higher education. Typically, students of Community Colleges would be older to ‘traditional’ students, would not have parental financial support and would most likely be part-time students, who are holding down jobs. Additionally, Community Colleges can work in partnership with business organizations, thereby ensuring that skills are kept up to date and meet the requirements of the job market. Courses could include agriculture, engineering technologies, communications, healthcare, office occupations, computers, data processing, trade, tourism, hospitality, and others. These could be part-time or full-time; short duration courses of 10-15 weeks, or long ones of up to two years.
Community Colleges link education with technical and vocational training, developing skills in the emerging or sunrise industries. They conform to some concepts enunciated in the National Policy of Education of India such as open access, continuing education and vocational training. These have better chance of success in the current environment than before because there is a growing trend to reject ‘liberal’ higher education which is seen as elitist and to view higher education as a source for trained human resource. The technological explosion has created a need for highly educated theoretical scientists and experts in the service and other industries, supported by a strong structure of technicians and middle-level staff. Community Colleges also provide motivational programmes and help the disadvantaged students to develop self-esteem together with realistic career options. They are locally controlled and are responsive to the needs of the local community, industry and business. Their aim is to provide students with relevant, quality job skills instituted in consultation with local industry and business. Teachers work in industry and industry too provides teachers from its personnel. Finally Community Colleges act as cultural and intellectual centres for the entire community and as catalysts in development.
These are all important aspects in the Indian context, with its vast range of cultural and linguistic diversity, differing educational requirements and economic development. An educational institution located in a particular region, responsive to regional needs and aspirations would mean better, low-cost education, resulting in improved economic development opportunities for the people.
There are three types of courses that such colleges can offer which could suit Indian requirements. First, vocational and technical courses. Second, is a two-year programme that prepares students for transfer to a three-year bachelor’s degree in science, arts or commerce at a traditional college. The third is a remedial programme that brings students up to the required levels in reading, writing, mathematics and communication, so that students can pursue further education. This is eminently suited to the Indian environment, with a large number of first-generation learners, who do not have home support for their studies and lag behind, frequently resulting in dropouts; those who have already dropped out of the education system, and could have even reverted to illiteracy; and adults who may not have had an opportunity to study.
Further, it has been proved beyond doubt that several Indian children are not academically prepared to compete for entrance to institutions of higher education. This applies to a diverse body of students but especially to many who have had low quality schooling. These are usually the poor and other marginalized sections of society. On several occasions it has been seen that these students are unable to cope with the courses they have entered. This is where remedial colleges, with an open-door policy would bring significant benefits, even though it means that the period of study may increase. For this, however, the government needs to show sincere commitment and provide the required resources.
Since these institutions would all have a general education component, students who originally joined a vocational or remedial course, have the opportunity to prepare for higher college courses, if they come up to the required standards. Courses could be designed to give diplomas, certificates, and, as in the case of the US, associate degrees, that could equal a certain number of credits, enabling entrance to traditional universities. These could be designed for skill upgradation in collaboration with industrial houses, or for the development of new skills, particularly in the ‘sunrise industries’.
The philosophy of a community college is an institution that provides transfer to higher education and prepares a student for an occupation. Being locally based and supported by the community, it is expected to link the aspirations of the community through an education that provides employment or higher education. It accommodates over-achievers and under-achievers.
Fulfilling the Constitutional Provisions of Access, Equity and Relevance in Higher Education
Community colleges appear to be the ideal solution to fulfill the constitutional provisions of access, equity and relevance in higher education as they give an opportunity to all those seeking tertiary education but are unable to qualify for the university. They provide the much needed skills for employment while simultaneously facilitating lateral entry into academic courses. As the community itself is involved in the colleges, there is a greater commitment to their success. It also enables linkages with the industry and this minimizes obsolence in curricula.
Many of the existing institutions can be transformed to suit the educational requirements of the communities they serve. If the Community College programme of two year duration provides a comprehensive education to students it opens opportunities for those aspiring to higher degrees and graduation, to step into the traditional formal universities and colleges. At present, those students who opt for vocational/technical training at the +2 stage have no opportunity to move to universities at any stage in their lives. Therefore, the Indian educational institutions at the lower levels of higher education need to be transformed to be more receptive to local community needs, while providing adequate comprehensive education and maintaining links with formal higher education institutions and bodies. The latter have to also develop flexible structures to accommodate those coming from the vocational stream.
Community Colleges are needed where there are an adequate number of school pass-outs to make use of them and no such facilities are available. These can be both urban and rural areas. In rural areas which are remote and backward, community colleges could immediately provide the much needed access. Urban areas have a perennial shortage of educational institutions and community colleges could share some of that pressure. Of course, it would help if within a reasonable distance there were large scale industries and businesses which would enable an adequate number of learners to get absorbed within the area. Where facilities such as polytechnics, arts and science colleges are available but are not being properly utilized, these can be converted, partially or wholly to community colleges. Of course, communities have to be aware of and amenable to supporting such ventures.
The UGC needs to recognize Community Colleges and sensitize and motivate the academic to allow for more flexible structures in educational systems. Not only students of Community Colleges but also the left out students and those who have entered the vocational stream in different kinds of educational institutions, all need to have options shifted to their needs to enable them to enter and improve their qualifications at different points of time in their lives. That is, there have to be opportunities for life long learning. For this a bouquet of quality educational institutions has to be created that would give students options to continue their education, exercise options best suited to them and have opportunities to improve levels of academic performance.
(Kavita A. Sharma)