Technical Education in Gujarat : present and what can be done for the future

Since last one year or so I have had a lot of discussions with my friends regarding the state of technical education in India. And I decided that it was high time that I documented it all. So, here I have tried to summarize the discussions I had. The below mentioned points are  related to tier 2 and tier 3 institutes and are more specific to Gujarat, but I think that they are applicable at the national level as well.

State of Technical Education

Current scenario:

• A large number of engineering colleges have sprung up in last 10 years.
• We have sufficient colleges now.
• But the quality is lacking significantly.
• The next focus should be on improving quality rather than increasing seats.

Why is quality lacking:

• Highly non-motivated faculties.
• Very few sufficiently qualified faculty.
• No recognition in society for faculty.
• Industry more lucrative than academia.
• Not good work in institutes for faculties (unnecessary burden of a lot of administrative duties).
• Many administrations more interested in making money rather than improving quality of education.
• Lack of knowledge about opportunities beyond Bachelors or during Bachelors among students and faculty.
• Non motivated students.
• Getting a job only goal for majority of students.

How to motivate faculty:

• By taking help of faculty from good local (eg. IIT Gandhinagar, DAIICT, PDPU, BISAG, ISRO SAC etc.) and other national and international institutes. Through regular interaction sessions.
• Recognition for their work, in society, and it has to be initiated by government, through some awards.
• Informing them about the long term contribution to the society, that they are doing.
• Training sessions to improve their skill sets.
• To put some sort of assessment mechanism (other than publications), on which promotion is based. This mechanism should measure their teaching through student feedback and technical skills, through some exam like GATE.
• Last but by no means the least, 'Money' is the biggest motivation to attract good faculty, so pay well.

How to motivate students:

• Give them the knowledge of what lies beyond a job.
• Show them the beauty of technology and they are sure to be fascinated by it and delve deep into it.
• Give them the freedom to find out their passion,and show them how interesting things are.
• For all above points best way is to have highly motivated faculty.
• Also organizing regular lectures and seminars by eminent people, and alumni.
• Building a strong alumni network to help and guide current students.

I have tried to put as many points as I can remember. I request you all to contribute to this and give your suggestions and feedback.

What it takes to be 'Virender Sehwag' aka 'Viru'?

Source : cricinfo

Virender Sehwag, recently won ESPNCricinfo Award for 'Best ODI Batsman' and 'Best Test Batting Performance', for his 293 against Sri Lanka in Mumbai. The article on cricinfo about his innings of 293 tells you what can Viru do to a team. In that innings the longest he went without a boundary was 12 balls. To quote one more stat from cricinfo, 'of the 593 balls he faced in ODIs in 2009, he scored 810 runs'.

Now anybody who knows something about cricket, can tell that he seems to be super natural. No mortal can do this. But how does Viru (definitely a mortal) achieve this feat? What is it that enables him to defy logic and give such spectacular performances? I think the secret lies in his uncluttered mind.

He has a very clear cut approach. I'll just quote a few of his statements that show his mindset :
“I don’t have a game plan when I walk into bat. I like to keep my mind blank.”

"When I take guard I like to clear all the negative thoughts out of the mind first. That I do by singing a song or a bhajan [hymn]."

I think that this is a very important trait of fearless achievers. He is able to give such spectacular performances because he is not afraid of failing. He can hit a six to reach his century (or double or triple century for that matter), because he is not afraid of missing out on a century. He does not care about records. Even the GOD of cricket, Sachin, gets a bit tentative on approaching a century, even after scoring 93 centuries, but Viru is always unfazed. This is not to discredit Sachin in any manner. It is just that, Viru has a different mindset. And I think that makes him so special.

Once again as Viru aptly puts it:
"Half empty or half full. A cover-drive for four or disaster. Praise will come when you do well. So, be prepared for brickbats when you fail. You are learning from both. Success prepares me well for the failures."

If you want to describe him in one word, it will definitely be 'Viru', which aptly justifies his character, brave and fearless.

PS: This article has been in my drafts for long, so it starts in a 1 or 2 month old context.

Dr. JP Narayan's Talk @ IITM

Today I attended a talk by Dr. Jayaprakash Narayan, president of Loksatta party and a former IAS officer. To say the least, it was a great learning experience for me. His insights on our problems, solutions to those problems and the road blocks in implementing those solutions were really well thought out.

He made a very important point while answering a question on uplifting the poor. He said that policies like food subsidies were needed in the short run, but they are not a long term solution. To make India a developed country, in true sense, the areas we need to focus on are education, health care and developing skill sets (vocational training). I think this point is a practical implementation of the very famous quote, "Give a Man a Fish, Feed Him For a Day, Teach a Man to Fish, Feed Him For a Lifetime". But for this to happen these areas need to be viewed more than just as money making machines.

Another point that I really liked was regarding politics. True politics is not a profession or a career. It is not a source of income. You come to politics because you have a vision of solving a problem, of doing something good. It is a means to help improve the system, the governance, the organizational structure. And once you are done, you leave it quietly. This is politics in true sense. You come in only when you see that you can improve something, make something better. You come in with a sense of belonging which motivates you to do your bit to improve the system. This feeling of belonging should be the foremost inspiration in any field, not just politics. If this feeling of belongingness is cultivated in each and every citizen then many problems will be solved. Say, for example the problem of cleanliness in public places. If people have a sense of belonging, they wont spit, they wont throw garbage anywhere. It will make a huge difference.

He also talked about the decentralization of power. Giving more power to the local authorities, because they really understand the ground situation very well and usually have a better understanding of what needs to be done. You need to increase the number of decision makers. Of course, those decision makers have to be competent enough and should have vision and leadership qualities. But local issues should be handled locally.

These were a few key points that I could remember from the talk.

Characteristics of Speakers giving talks on "Unlock the Infinite Power" | "Power of Subconscious Mind" | "Success : At your finger tips" | ...

I happened to attend a few seminars on some topics that I have listed above. While attending those seminars I noticed that these speakers follow a set of principles, some very peculiar principles. I thought it would be fun sharing what I think those principles are. So I am listing those here:

• First and the foremost thing 'Never define success'.
• Be very confident, speak loudly with a lot of enthusiasm and energy.
  
• Be over-polite.
• Ask a lot of questions, and for each answer you get, heave praises (like excellent, wonderful, very good etc.) upon the person who gave the answer.
• Crack jokes (even though they are ages old).
• Keep on doing some experiments on audience, and give the results you want to give. Because the audience does not know what everyone's reaction was as they all were looking at the speaker, so what ever the speaker says will be accepted.
• Ask people their names and use them in examples. Also, remember those names for future use.
• Give a set of rules.
• If you use somebody's name in a negative example, clarify after the example that he/she is good, intelligent and it was just an example and so on.
• Favorite phrases : "I have two news for you. Good news and bad news. Which one you want to hear first?" & "This reminds me of a quotation..."
• Use some standard textbook examples for self confidence.
• Keep on telling the audience that whatever you are sharing with them is of great value, is awesome , is superb, is amazing and so on.
• Keep on telling the audience that they have been so attentive, enthusiastic, brilliant and grasping whatever you are saying, so that everyone feels that everyone else is doing what the speaker is saying.
• Glamorize success, but never say what it really is.

Hard Work vs Smart Work

I always used to have this debate with myself. Well, actually it was never a debate, rather a one sided argument that smart work is superior than hard work, and if you do smart work, you need not go for the hard part. It was not until fairly recently that I changed my stand.

There were many reasons for my earlier stand. One of the main reasons was that without much of hard work I got grades that satisfied me. And since it was the easier way out I cherished it. I was a sleep hog all throughout my under-graduation (all my school and college friends would testify to that). But somewhere in the corner of my heart there was a feeling that I was not doing justice to my potential. And I think it was one of the major reasons for my lack of happeeness(about which I have already described in my previous post).

But during last one year I have realized that its not enough to do smart work. Hard work is equally necessary. Actually both of them go hand in hand. You can achieve success with smart work, but only smart work is wastage of your potential.

But how did I realize that hard work is important? Well, honestly speaking I do not know. But I had done some sort of "soul searching". During this period I realized a very important thing. Some how I have managed not to study for grades, and I am very thankful to GOD for that. But during my undergrad since I used to get decent grades with very less effort, I got addicted to it in a way. This was one of the main reasons why I did not work hard. But then somehow after graduation I realized that this is not enough.

One of the reasons for my changing stand is a friend of mine. He is a really intelligent guy. Especially his understanding of mathematics. Awesome for a person of his age. It is not that he is very fast at calculations, but the fundamental understanding of various concepts he has is simply amazing. It took me years to grasp this much understanding of math. In spite of all his abilities, he still works hard, in anything he likes. Its not just studies. He does not study all day, which is not even desirable, but when needed he does really work hard. Say for example during the exams, this 15 year old kid keeps an alarm to wake up early and study (whereas for me, I needed my friends to wake me up even during B.Tech). He also has played a very big role in helping me to shift my stand.

So, Hard Work vs Smart Work is still not a debate for me. It has become a balanced argument. I have come to believe that both are necessary, for a happee life. I think I found a diplomatic (or should I say, a non-violent) solution. :)

Source Ben Tremblay

How to get Swimming Pool membership at IITM?

The procedure of acquiring swimming pool membership in IITM is very simple. All you need to do is the following steps:

1. Go to Gymkhana office between 2:30 pm to 4:30 pm.
2. Get the application form from the desk by swearing that you have got money, a passport size photograph and ID card*.
3. Fill the form and give it at the desk.
4. Wait until your name is called out (Warning : This might take arbitrarily long time).
5. When your name is called go to the desk and, give all the things that you swore for when you took the form.
6. In case anything is missing go and get it. Goto step 4.
7. Get your membership card and receipt. You are ready to swim.

Looking at all the above steps you might think that it is a painstakingly long process, but that is not the case. For me to get all these steps completed when there was a big crowd of 10 people in queue, only took slightly more than an hour.

Two very efficient people were at the desk. A gentleman, who helped people take oath before giving them the form, and also stapled their photographs on the membership card(going around in between to attend phone or nature's call with all the prospective members waiting). And a lady, who took membership fees, entered half the details in membership card and gave the receipt.

* ID Card strictly means the institute ID card that you had collected from library basement when you had joined the institute. No other cards like mess card, film club card, old swimming pool card, or any other such card from among the few you have got will do.