BCU sets tall order for its affiliated colleges

Bengaluru Central University (BCU) has come up with a new set of parameters to rank its 183 affiliated colleges.

The institutions will be allowed to do a self-assessment of their facilities and the quality of teaching. The university’s local inquiry committees (LICs) will later review them during spot inspections.

S Japhet, the vice-chancellor, told reporters on Wednesday: “Based on the guidelines of the University Grants Commission (UGC), we have come up with special parameters. We will allow colleges to do a self-assessment, which will be later reviewed by LICs. There will be no interference from anyone.”

It’s an annual practice at the university to review the affiliation of each college. The committees would conduct spot inspections and recommend affiliation or disaffiliation, as the case may be. But this process was prone to human frailties.

LIC members were often accused of taking bribes to recommend affiliation of colleges whose facilities did not meet the quality standards.

The new parameters framed by the BCU include some extra facilities that it thinks are required in today’s colleges. Although the university has made them optional, colleges that do not have these facilities will get poor rankings.

Wi-fi, CCTV camera coverage, drinking water, women’s restrooms, faculty, personal counselling for students, health centres with doctors, language labs, recognised research centres, usage of technology in classrooms, etc are some of the parameters set by the university.

Additionally, colleges will have to mention their unique facility or achievement, if any, during the self-assessment. The committee will decide on including it after reviewing its pros and cons, the vice-chancellor said.

At the same time, the BCU is preparing to fully digitise its operations.

It’s the first university in Karnataka to be part of the Next Generation Learning Initiative announced in the 2019-2020 state budget.

The BCU has also made the affiliation process online. “After the spot inspection, the LIC will publish the details online. A data entry operator will accompany the LIC members and feed the information to the software,” Japhet said.

M Ramachandra Gowda, Registrar, BCU, said: "Since the chief minister preferred our university for the Next Generation Learning Initiative, we have to be tech-savvy. We have successfully adapted e-governance in our examinations."