UGC TO CONSIDER VISITING PROFS AT INSTITUTES OF EMINENCE AS FACULTY

NEW DELHI: Offering relief to universities designated as Institutions of Eminence (Ioes), the University Grants Commission (UGC) has decided that visiting professors, including those from overseas, will be counted as part of their faculty in measuring their teacher-student ratio.

Under UGC norms for these elite institutions, which the government aims to nurture to become among the world’s best, Ioes should have a stiff teacher-student ratio of 1:10.

The UGC has also made other amendments, allowing them more flexibility in opening off-campus centres while also specifying the criteria for calculating heir net worth.

According to the amendments made on January 1, the faculty student ratio should not be less than 1:20 at the time of the notification declaring an institution as an IOE and should increase over time to not less than 1:10 after five years.

“The faculty for the purpose of calculating the teacher-student ratio shall include the regular faculty, adjunct faculty, overseas faculty, visiting faculty, contractual faculty, industry faculty or faculty as otherwise permitted by the statutory councils”, the regulator said in an official notification.

It added a caveat that 60 % of the faculty shall be appointed on a permanent or regular basis and part-time faculty shall not be counted for this purpose. Moreover, 60% of the permanent/ regular faculty shouldn’t breach the 1:10 faculty-student ratio at any point of time.

The earlier norms had only included regular faculty, adjunct faculty, and long-term faculty (with a tenure of at least three years). Part-time faculty shall not be counted for the purpose

The student- teacher ratio is a major parameter considered by international bodies like Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) or Times Higher Education when they rank global varsities.