Coaching Institutes Upset Over Murthy’s IIT Comment
Infy founder had blamed coaching classes for poor quality of students
Are coaching institutes to blame for poor quality of IIT students? Somewhat, says the industry, but blames other factors like education system too. An entry into the coveted Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) got a snub on Monday from the Infosys chairman emeritus NR Narayana Murthy. Murthy said at a ‘Pan IIT’ summit in New York that the quality of students entering IITs has deteriorated over the years due to the coaching classes that prepare engineering aspirants. The quality of students and their employability has been a cause of concern for the industry. Says Manjunath SR, senior director, human resources, NetApp India, “There has not been any change in the quality of students either for the better or worse. The same hiring and selection process is applied for all engineering colleges and the IIT students do not need any lesser time for training compared to a non-IITian and, after training, their productivity is same as others.” The company takes 50-60 students from IITs every year and has been doing this for the past four years. Ganesh Shermon, people practice head for KPMG, has seen a drop in the quality because now students are tested for admissions only on 2-3 subjects and on questions that can be cracked through sheer practice. Som Mittal, an IITian and Nasscom president, says, “Murthy’s issue is perhaps about expectations. Even today IITs will probably be producing best in class, but are they at the same level as earlier?” Over the years, both in terms of size and volume, IITs have expanded. The standards at IITs are very high. JEE was a great filter, but it is dominated by students trained at the coaching classes. “This is not criticism, but a time to look at what we need to do to maintain the standards in the future,” Mittal adds. Some, like Dhananjay Bansod, chief people officer of Deloitte, blame the education system. “I empathise with Murthy on the coaching bit, but the fault lies with the entire education system. Our education system is far slower to change compared to changing industry needs,” says Bansod. Deloitte visits all top IITs, including Delhi, Kanpur, Bombay and Madras for campus recruitment. The fault, according to him, lies in the selection process that tests quantitative skills. “You need both quantitative and qualitative skills to make it work at the workplace,” he says. Every year more than half-amillion students sit for joint entrance examination for admission to IITs and only 10,000 get through. IIT Kanpur director Sanjay Dhande agrees things are amiss. “The IIT education model has to get more liberalised and the curriculum needs to get revised, but the changes are slow to come. The core courses have to be far more liberal than what we are doing right now, and it has to be more broad-based like a major and a minor subject all together,” he says. The need to overhaul the admission process has already been announced and there is a task force that will be looking to include the consistency in school boards examinations and add an aptitude test as well, says IIT Madras director Bhaskar Ramamurthi. There has been a tendency to ignore school board results that includes languages which will be changed. S Sadagopan, founder director of IIIT, Bangalore, vouches for lack of enthusiasm among the students. “Coaching starts when students are in class 9. By the time students make it to the IIT, their enthusiasm goes down. There has to be more imaginative scheme for admission than just a score.” Coaching institutes, for their part, are upset with Murthy’s statement. Says Satya Narayanan R, founder chairman of Delhi-based coaching institute Career Launcher, “I find the statement a little disappointing. Mr Narayana Murthy is simplifying the problem of employability. Coaching institutes are doing their job. If someone wants to get into an IIT, somebody has to train them.” According to him, the problem is multifarious. “We need to make the education system more student-centric. The school is focused on finishing the curriculum,” he says. Defending coaching methods, Pramod Kumar Bansal, CEO of Bansal Classes, says, “We teach the students keeping in mind the vast IIT syllabus. Coaching centres help students understand the routine and give them a systematic approach to crack the exams.” The institute is training 14,000 students for JEE in Kota and Jaipur. Anand Kumar, founder member of Super 30, an institute in Bihar that has had a success rate of 80% to 100% in terms of its students clearing the exam, blames professors. “Our students are capable enough. Those who set the questions should be questioned as to why they did not set a paper that will bring in the best. IIT professors should then be blamed and not coaching institutes,” says Kumar.
(ET5Oct11)
Showing posts with label IIT. Show all posts
Showing posts with label IIT. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 5, 2011
CHETAN BHAGAT REBUTS NARAYANA MURTHY
Chetan Bhagat takes on Narayana Murthy on IIT remark
PTI Oct 4, 2011
NEW DELHI: Chetan Bhagat, an IIT alumnus turned-celebrity writer, took umbrage at Infosys chairman emeritus N R Narayana Murthy's "sweeping" comments on the quality of engineers churned out by premier IITs.
Slamming Murthy, Bhagat said today that such comments should not have come from a person who runs a "body shopping" company and calls it "hi-tech."
"It is ironic when someone who runs a body shopping company and calls it hi-tech, makes sweeping comments on the quality of IIT students," said Bhagat in a tweet on the microblogging site Twitter.
Taking up cudgels for the students from the country's centres of excellence, Bhagat referred to the contribution of IIT students in the making of Information Technology(IT) major Infosys.
"IITians have made a great contribution in making Infosys what it is. Hope people remember that," said Bhagat, who did his Mechanical Engineering from IIT, Delhi.
In Bhagat's view, Murthy should not have been so "sweepingly highanded."
"Mr Murthy had a point, but wish he wasn't so sweepingly high handed. Fix the system. No point judging students," he said.
Voicing his displeasure over the quality of engineers that pass out of the IITs, Murthy said the majority of these students fared poorly at jobs and global institutions of higher education.
Addressing a gathering of hundreds of former IITians at a 'Pan IIT' summit in New York, Murthy said the quality of students entering Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) has deteriorated over the years due to the coaching classes that prepare engineering aspirants.
It is for the second time that Bhagat has reacted strongly when questions were raised about the IITs.
When the outspoken Union Minister Jairam Ramesh kicked of a controversy with his remark that the faculty at the country's premier engineering institutes, the IITs, is not world class, Bhagat rebuffed him asking how many politicians in India were world class.
Ramesh had however said that students of the IITs are world class.
PTI Oct 4, 2011
NEW DELHI: Chetan Bhagat, an IIT alumnus turned-celebrity writer, took umbrage at Infosys chairman emeritus N R Narayana Murthy's "sweeping" comments on the quality of engineers churned out by premier IITs.
Slamming Murthy, Bhagat said today that such comments should not have come from a person who runs a "body shopping" company and calls it "hi-tech."
"It is ironic when someone who runs a body shopping company and calls it hi-tech, makes sweeping comments on the quality of IIT students," said Bhagat in a tweet on the microblogging site Twitter.
Taking up cudgels for the students from the country's centres of excellence, Bhagat referred to the contribution of IIT students in the making of Information Technology(IT) major Infosys.
"IITians have made a great contribution in making Infosys what it is. Hope people remember that," said Bhagat, who did his Mechanical Engineering from IIT, Delhi.
In Bhagat's view, Murthy should not have been so "sweepingly highanded."
"Mr Murthy had a point, but wish he wasn't so sweepingly high handed. Fix the system. No point judging students," he said.
Voicing his displeasure over the quality of engineers that pass out of the IITs, Murthy said the majority of these students fared poorly at jobs and global institutions of higher education.
Addressing a gathering of hundreds of former IITians at a 'Pan IIT' summit in New York, Murthy said the quality of students entering Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) has deteriorated over the years due to the coaching classes that prepare engineering aspirants.
It is for the second time that Bhagat has reacted strongly when questions were raised about the IITs.
When the outspoken Union Minister Jairam Ramesh kicked of a controversy with his remark that the faculty at the country's premier engineering institutes, the IITs, is not world class, Bhagat rebuffed him asking how many politicians in India were world class.
Ramesh had however said that students of the IITs are world class.
NARAYANA MURTHY BLASTS IITs
Poor quality of students entering IITs: Narayana Murthy
PTI Oct 3, 2011
NEW YORK: Voicing his displeasure over the quality of engineers that pass out of the IITs, Infosys chairman emeritus N R Narayana Murthy has said there is a need to overhaul the selection criteria for students seeking admission to the prestigious technology institutions. Addressing a gathering of hundreds of former IITians at a 'Pan IIT' summit here, Murthy said the quality of students entering Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) has deteriorated over the years due to the coaching classes that prepare engineering aspirants. He said the majority of the students fare poorly at jobs and global institutions of higher education. "Thanks to the coaching classes today, the quality of students entering IITs has gone lower and lower," Murthy said, receiving a thundering applause from his audience. He said apart from the top 20% of students who crack the tough IIT entrance examination and can "stand among the best anywhere in the world," quality of the remaining 80 per cent of students leave much to be desired. Coaching classes teach aspirants limited sets of problems, out of which a few are asked in the examinations. "They somehow get through the joint entrance examination. But their performance in IITs, at jobs or when they come for higher education in institutes in the US is not as good as it used to be. "This has to be corrected. A new method of selection of students to IITs has to be arrived at." Drawing a road map to put IITs among the top engineering institutes in the world, Murthy said it has to be ensured that IITs "transcend from being just teaching institutions to reasonably good research institutes" at par with Harvard and MIT in the next 10-20 years. "Few IITs have done well in producing PhDs but in reality when we compare ourselves to institutions in this country, we have a long way to go," he said. More emphasis has to be given to research at the undergraduate level and examinations should test independent thinking of students rather than their ability to solve problems. Murthy said in order to produce good research at IITs, the Indian government has to be persuaded to create institutions that fund research projects. In addition, faculty members should also be evaluated annually on their research performance by an independent committee, Murthy said adding that India must shift from the tenure system for its faculty to a five year contractual appointment system. The Infosys mentor also lamented the poor English speaking and social skills of a majority of IIT students, saying with Indian politicians "rooting against English", the task of getting good English speaking students at IITs gets more difficult. "An IITian has to be a global citizen and must understand where the globe is going," he added. Murthy also stressed the need to have the governing council of IITs made up of its alumni. The only way IITs can become better is if 80-90 per cent of members on their governing council are alumni. "Nobody is bothered about an institution more than its alumni. We must somehow persuade the government of India to let go of its control and make sure majority of the council members is the IIT alumni." Murthy urged IITians spread across the globe to work with their alma mater to ensure that IITs are among the top 10 engineering schools of the world. He said while only a couple of IITs feature in the top 50, there should be at least five IITs in the top 10 engineering schools in the world in the next 10-20 years, he added.
PTI Oct 3, 2011
NEW YORK: Voicing his displeasure over the quality of engineers that pass out of the IITs, Infosys chairman emeritus N R Narayana Murthy has said there is a need to overhaul the selection criteria for students seeking admission to the prestigious technology institutions. Addressing a gathering of hundreds of former IITians at a 'Pan IIT' summit here, Murthy said the quality of students entering Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) has deteriorated over the years due to the coaching classes that prepare engineering aspirants. He said the majority of the students fare poorly at jobs and global institutions of higher education. "Thanks to the coaching classes today, the quality of students entering IITs has gone lower and lower," Murthy said, receiving a thundering applause from his audience. He said apart from the top 20% of students who crack the tough IIT entrance examination and can "stand among the best anywhere in the world," quality of the remaining 80 per cent of students leave much to be desired. Coaching classes teach aspirants limited sets of problems, out of which a few are asked in the examinations. "They somehow get through the joint entrance examination. But their performance in IITs, at jobs or when they come for higher education in institutes in the US is not as good as it used to be. "This has to be corrected. A new method of selection of students to IITs has to be arrived at." Drawing a road map to put IITs among the top engineering institutes in the world, Murthy said it has to be ensured that IITs "transcend from being just teaching institutions to reasonably good research institutes" at par with Harvard and MIT in the next 10-20 years. "Few IITs have done well in producing PhDs but in reality when we compare ourselves to institutions in this country, we have a long way to go," he said. More emphasis has to be given to research at the undergraduate level and examinations should test independent thinking of students rather than their ability to solve problems. Murthy said in order to produce good research at IITs, the Indian government has to be persuaded to create institutions that fund research projects. In addition, faculty members should also be evaluated annually on their research performance by an independent committee, Murthy said adding that India must shift from the tenure system for its faculty to a five year contractual appointment system. The Infosys mentor also lamented the poor English speaking and social skills of a majority of IIT students, saying with Indian politicians "rooting against English", the task of getting good English speaking students at IITs gets more difficult. "An IITian has to be a global citizen and must understand where the globe is going," he added. Murthy also stressed the need to have the governing council of IITs made up of its alumni. The only way IITs can become better is if 80-90 per cent of members on their governing council are alumni. "Nobody is bothered about an institution more than its alumni. We must somehow persuade the government of India to let go of its control and make sure majority of the council members is the IIT alumni." Murthy urged IITians spread across the globe to work with their alma mater to ensure that IITs are among the top 10 engineering schools of the world. He said while only a couple of IITs feature in the top 50, there should be at least five IITs in the top 10 engineering schools in the world in the next 10-20 years, he added.
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