UGC allows Industry experts to be on varsity panels, bodies

Higher education institutions will now be allowed to appoint industry professionals in governance bodies such as Board of Studies, Academic Councils, and on other committees of the University, as per new rules that the University Grants Commission is set to unveil this week.

Universities will also be able to invite professionals from the industry as ‘Professors of Practice’ as per the UGC Guidelines for Sustainable University-Industry Collaboration in Indian Universities, which was approved in the 570th meeting of the UGC held on Wednesday. The guidelines will be made public on June 30, said ministry officials.

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As per these guidelines these institutions can create an Industry Relations Cell (IRC) to collaborate on projects between a university faculty group and an industry group and to explore funding sources from various stakeholders. On the other hand, industries, too, can form a University Relations Cell (URC) to address and serve the R&D needs of the industry and support student internships and apprenticeships. Enterprises can also establish university-industry chairs and support scholarship schemes to attract meritorious young researchers to universities, as per the UGC Guidelines.

UGC Chairman M Jagadesh Kumar said that the Guidelines are on the lines of the National Educational Policy 2020. “The NEP 2020 recommends a vibrant university-industry linkage, emphasising on the exposure of students to real-life examples, to make them globally competent,” Kumar said.

The Guidelines also called for the creation of ‘clusters’ of universities, industries, and other stakeholders for R&D purposes, which will be tasked with creating a technology-centric mechanism which will give students projects to solve local problems. Significantly, projects and dissertation work of undergraduate and postgraduate students of universities will be allowed to be carried out under the joint guidance of the faculty as well as industry experts on generic or industry problems.

As per the guidelines, industry players may provide endowments and resources for the creation of advanced facilities and vocational training centres wherever needed, in addition to allowing research scholars to use sophisticated and costly equipment available in industry for research. Similarly, the universities will also have to allow industry players to use the facilities of the university for testing and certification. Industries may establish industry chairs in universities and support scholarship schemes to attract meritorious young researchers to university, the Guidelines state.