Dynamism in curriculum
Prasad: There should be some guidelines on management schools establishment. Secondly, as we are seeing changes that are taking place every day. Now the socioeconomic environment is changing day by day so we need some dynamism in the curriculum, in a way that it can address the new challenges.
Seema Mahajan: Inter-disciplined pedagogy and curriculum which sees each subject equally is needed. When we are talking about business analytics, then we are talking about leadership with differential class. I think a neutral disciplined approach is the biggest challenge and I do not know how to really achieve it.
Prem Singh: This requires a whole lot of reorientation on the part of educational institutions. Like what can been done, and what we focus on. Last month in one of the universities in Punjab, I said you are in Punjab, you know the major problem that Punjab state is facing is the drug menace. Can you think of commissioning a project, something which your students can go out there do and would the teachers be willing to give these students the credit for the work they do as if they have completed their subject? And there was a pin drop silence. I think that is something which we also need to introspect as a society.
Rattanani: Today, we have MBA education backing up curriculum of the order that would shock some of us. I remember going to IIM Ahmedabad. During a late night dinner, one of the senior most professors told me pointing to the hostel of the PGDM students that these are the best in the country. I agreed to her comment. Later she added that if they get two hours of sleep in the first year, they should consider themselves lucky. And I kept asking myself, if you are sleeping for less than two hours, are you really learning anything about value? It's a question as a journalist I would ask myself, as educator I would ask myself.
Dinesh Harsolekar: B-schools themselves have their own constraints and limitations in terms of the expertise available with them, in terms of resources available with them. Hence, they are not able to cope up with those challenges. Secondly, the constraints and the limitations under which business schools have to operate. These concerns are being created by the regulator assessment. So here we are all helpless. For example when we talk about a passionate teacher, the question is do I have a choice to recruit a person. I would say yes. But can I hire a passionate t eacher, I would say no as I have to check his paper qualification.
Mohan: We approached a lot of industries to understand whether they could collaborate with us in certain courses. For instance for digital media and marketing, we had a company who gave us the curricular design and they came as faculty members. So if you could have even more such courses where we could collaborate with the industry. I think a lot of our problems and the gap would be minimised.