AICTE's new norms bring admission worries

New norms: You have to score more now to study engineering.

Will the number of admissions to engineering courses in Karnataka come down this year? This is the common question haunting both the State government as well as the managements of private engineering colleges.

The cause of this apprehension is the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) decision to increase the minimum marks required in the qualifying examination for admission to the engineering degree courses.

As per the new norm, students seeking admission to engineering courses under the general category across the country need to score at least 50 per cent marks in their second year pre-university or Class XII examination, instead of 45 per cent.

Students belonging to the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe communities will have to secure at least 45 per cent marks instead of 40 per cent.

The statistics available with the Higher Education Department in Karnataka show that nearly 10,000 students, who secured marks between 40-50 per cent marks in the qualifying exam held in 2010, had become eligible to join engineering courses.

According to the statistics, 1,947 students, who had scored less than 50 per cent and more than 45 per cent marks in the qualifying exams in 2010, were allotted ranks as they had become eligible to seek admission to engineering courses based on the minimum marks prescribed then. Of these, 269 had joined various engineering courses in private colleges.

Similarly, 7,802 students belonging to Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe communities, and Other Backward Classes, who had scored more than 40 per cent and less than 45 per cent marks in the qualifying marks in 2010, had become eligible to join engineering courses. Of these 1,890 had joined engineering courses.

The new norms are likely to make at least 10,000-15,000 students ineligible to seek admission to engineering courses in the State this year. As a result, more number of engineering seats are likely to remain vacant.

About 17,000 engineering seats remained vacant in 2010. In some colleges, the number of vacant seats was in the range of 250 to 278.

Director of Technical Education H. U. Talawar said that the State government has written to the AICTE that the decision to increase the minimum marks for eligibility is unilateral, without taking into consideration the local needs. He said that the students hailing from rural areas will lose an opportunity to join engineering courses.

The State has no option but to follow the AICTE norms as it applies to all engineering colleges across the country, said Mr. Talawar, while pointing out that many new engineering colleges, those situated in north Karnataka region, and those not ranked high among the colleges, would find it difficult to get students.

M. K. Panduranga Setty of Karnataka Unaided Private Engineering Colleges Association said that the revised eligibility norms will increase the number of vacancies in many colleges.

“It is certain that the number of admissions to engineering courses will reduce further. We hope that the increase in the intake into engineering courses under lateral entry scheme for those with a diploma and Bachelor of Science degree will attract some students,” said Mr. Setty.

The new AICTE norms may see increase in the number of admissions to regular undergraduate courses in the science stream and other equivalent courses, and many engineering colleges around Bangalore city too may witness more vacant seats, Mr. Setty pointed out.

He, however, felt that the increase in minimum marks is a good move as it is aimed at improving the quality of engineering graduates. “In fact, I feel that the minimum eligible marks should be 60 per cent in the interest of maintaining the quality of engineering graduates,” he added.

Ramesh R., a teacher in a private engineering college, pointed out that some students who had joined engineering courses by securing only 40-0 per cent marks in the qualifying exams, had done fairly well later and completed the degree in first class.

“What is the point in keeping a large number of engineering seats vacant? The quality of education in rural areas required to be improved so that more number of students succeed in the qualifying exam by scoring more than 50 per cent marks,” he said, adding that some private engineering colleges may opt for reducing their total intake.

Sudhakar Manjunath, a final-year engineering student, said that there was no harm in increasing the minimum marks. “I am unable to understand why AICTE is giving permission to new engineering colleges or permitting opening of new courses or enhancing the number of seats in the existing colleges if the AICTE is concerned with quality of engineering education.”

This year's pre-university examination results and completion of the admission process to engineering courses will decide the next course of action by the engineering college managements and the State government.

SOURCE:http://www.hindu.com/edu/2011/03/08/stories/2011030850070200.htm

Entrance process on steady course

While the scrutiny of the applications received for the State engineering/ medical entrance examinations 2011 is under way, the State government has expanded the normalisation committee, which plays a crucial role in the preparation of the engineering rank-list, reports G. MAHADEVAN.

— File Photo 

Hassle free: More than one lakh applications for the State engineering/ medical entrance examinations 2011 were sold by the end of the first week of February.

Now that the process of selling and getting back the application forms for the engineering/ medical entrance examinations 2011 is well and truly on track, officials in charge of the smooth conduct of these examinations are a relieved lot, albeit for now.

By the end of the first week of February more than one lakh applications were sold and close to 30,000 completed forms were received at the office of the Commissioner for Entrance Examinations (CEE). By then, the task of scrutinising the forms was also in full swing at that office.

While the CEE's office is busy answering anxious queries from parents and candidates —there were a flood of queries to begin with — public attention is also slowly beginning to shift to the level of preparedness of the government to carry out the ‘normalisation' of marks across different boards. This statistical exercise which would precede the preparation of the engineering rank-list is critically dependent on the availability of the data relating to ‘mean' and ‘standard deviation' of the marks/ grades of a batch of students.

What has the government done to ensure that such data would be available and that too on time? To begin with it has expanded the ‘normalisation committee' by inducting among others the director of the State Council Educational Research and Training (SCERT) and the directors of the higher secondary and vocational higher secondary departments.

According to government sources who have participated in the meetings of this committee and in meetings chaired by the Education Minister on this issue, the game plan is to task the SCERT to convene a meeting of representatives of boards prior to the conduct of the entrance examinations.

“Once we know the boards from where students have applied for the engineering entrance, we would invite them over for meetings and impress upon them the need to give us all the marks-related data we need. We would also stress the need for them to do all this before May 31, which is the cut-off date for submitting marks to the CEE,” a senior official present at various meetings of the committee, told The Hindu-EducationPlus. If need be, a government representative can also travel to various States to collect such data, the official pointed out.

The cut-off date is crucial to the preparation of the engineering rank-list. Once all the marks-related data is in, the CEE would then normalise these scores using the software developed by the National Informatics Centre (the same software used till now for carrying out allotments, but modified suitably for the engineering stream). This naturally would require more time. So, if the marks scored by candidates in the qualifying examinations keep shifting, this process would be thrown out of gear.

The cut-off date also implies — though the prospectus does not say so in as many words — that for all practical purposes the marks/ grades scored in any improvement examinations of any board of in the Save A Year (SAY) examinations of the State would not matter in the normalisation procedure and in the subsequent preparation of the engineering rank-list. Members of the normalisation committee have also, repeatedly, told the government that the cut-off date should be sacrosanct if there is to be any meaningful ‘normalisation' for the engineering stream.

Since the marks scored in the qualifying examination would play a pivotal role in this year's engineering entrance examination, the office of the CEE has decided that it would allow one more chance for candidates to submit these marks and/ or to correct the marks they have submitted now. “There was some confusion and anxiety among parents and candidates over how candidates who are appearing for this year's qualifying examinations would submit their marks in the application form.

Whatever, the candidates have submitted now is alright. At the appropriate time all candidates would be given an opportunity to submit/ correct their marks online. So they need not worry at all now,” an official associated with the entrance examinations told The Hindu-EducationPlus.

Moreover, once all the data relating to marks is finally in, the CEE may also publish these scores online so that candidates can verify whether the marks entered against their name is correct. “This step is very important,” the convener of the normalisation committee Rajoo Krishnan explained. “The correctness of the normalisation depends on the correctness of the data relating to the marks. If the mark of a candidate captured by the system is not the same as what he scored in the examination, it will have a bearing on that candidate's position in the rank-list. So, as a final safeguard, these marks need to be published prior to the normalisation.”

From the time all the required data is received by the CEE to the preparation of the engineering rank-list, it would take close to three weeks. This is assuming that there would not be disruptions/ interventions of any kind in this process. Needless to say, all this would not affect the preparation of the medical rank-list this year. That list would be prepared solely on the basis of a candidate's performance in the entrance examination.

Among the many anxious queries received by the office of the CEE, one relates to the tagging of the income certificate with the application form. Though the prospectus does lay down the rules for this, sources in the government say it would be a nice idea for candidates belonging to low-income families to submit an income certificate along with their application form. “There is a tuition fee waiver scheme of the AICTE. Other fee concessions may also apply,” an official pointed out.

Seat-fee talks

So what about the seat-fee talks between the government and the managements of private self-financing colleges which have become an ‘integral part' of the entrance process?

Would the managements want to seal a deal before the elections or even before the model code of conduct comes into play? Or would they prefer to wait and deal with the next government? What if a deal is sewn up now and that is deemed unacceptable by the next government?

So far neither the government nor the managements have aired their stand on this. The president of the Federation of Associations of Private Unaided Professional Colleges in India G. P. C. Nayar told The Hindu-EducationPlus that the Education Minister M. A. Baby has broached the idea of seat-fee talks for 2011. “I told him that the managements are ready for such talks,” Mr. Nayar said. Though Mr. Nayar says he sees no harm in seat-fee talks even when the model code of conduct for elections is in force, he also does not discount the possibility that the managements may also have to talk fees with the next government.

The last word on the engineering / medical entrance examinations 2011 is far from being said

source:http://www.hindu.com/edu/2011/02/08/stories/2011020850030100.htm

Court questions university on 'illegal' study centres

New Delhi:  The Delhi High Court on Wednesday questioned the University Grants Commission (UGC) and  the Sikkim Manipal University on allegations that the private varsity was illegally running 52 study centres in   Delhi.

The division bench of Chief Justice Dipak Misra and Justice Sanjiv Khanna also issued orders to issue notices to the respondents UGC, the All India Council for Technical Education(AICTE) and the Sikkim Manipal University. The notices are returnable by March 15.

The bench was hearing a petition filed by Bhupendra Chaturvedi against the private university, alleging that it was not authorized by the UGC to open campuses outside the territorial jurisdiction of Sikkim.

"The university has 52 unauthorized study centres in the national capital alone," said senior advocate Arvind Nigam appearing for Chaturvedi.

The UGC, through its notifications issued in April and June 2009, had disapproved of the Sikkim Manipal University's move to open centres outside its campus, he said. IANS

source:http://www.indiaedunews.net/Universities/Court_questions_university_on_%27illegal%27_study_centres_13454/

Options in automobile engineering

Specialised job: Automobile engineers who specialise in design can find jobs in the research and development wing of major automobile manufacturers.

I would like to know more about automobile engineering courses. Please also detail the job opportunities in this field.

PRASHIBH KUTTAN, EMAIL

Automobile engineering is one of the options available for graduate level study in engineering. In Kerala, the selection is based on the rank obtained in the entrance examination and the marks scored in Plus Two examination. In Tamil Nadu, there is no entrance test and students are admitted on the basis of marks obtained in the qualifying examination. Deemed Universities conduct entrance test for admission.

The discipline involves understanding the mechanics of vehicle chassis, internal combustion engine, electrical systems, design and maintenance of automobiles.

Aspirants should have passed Plus Two examination with at least 50 per cent marks in mathematics and 50 per cent marks in mathematics, physics and chemistry/ computer science/ biotechnology/ biology put together. Those who are appearing for the qualifying examination can also apply.

To become an automobile engineer, one should opt for BE/ B.Tech. course in automobile engineering or mechanical engineering, and further specialise in transportation and automobile design at the postgraduate or postgraduate diploma level.

A few engineering colleges offer B.Tech./ BE degree courses in automobile engineering. In Kerala, Sree Chitra Thirunal College of Engineering, Pappanamcode, Thiruvananthapuram (affiliated to University of Kerala) offers B.Tech. course in mechanical (automobile) engineering. The total number of seats is 60. Fifty per cent of the seats fall under the government merit seats. Phone: 0471-2490572.

KMCT College of Engineering, Mukkam, Kozhikode (phone: 0495-2289227); Nehru College of Engineering and Research Centre, Pampady, Thiruvilwamala, Thrissur (phone: 04884-283484); Matha College of Technology, North Paravur, Ernakulam (phone 0484-2672291); SCMS School of Engineering and Technology, Karukutty, Ernakulam (phone: 0484 -2450330) offer B.Tech. degree course in automobile engineering.

The total number of seats in each of these private self-financing colleges is 60.

The selection is based on the rank obtained in the State-level engineering entrance examination and marks obtained in the qualifying examination.

Outside Kerala

The following colleges/ institutes/ universities offer degree course in automobile engineering. The list is only indicative.

Hindustan Institute of Technology and Science (Hindustan University), Chennai. Web site: www.hindustanuniv.ac.in.

Rajalakshmi Engineering College, Thandalam, Chennai.

SRM University, Kattamkulathur, Chennai. Web site: www.srmuniv.ac.in.

Bharath University, Selaiyur, Tambaram, Chennai. Web site: www.bharathuniv.ac.in.

Noorul Islam University, Kumaracoil, Thuckalay, Kanyakumari. Web site: www.niceindia.com.

Aaru Padiveedu Institute of Technology, Chennai. Web site: www.avit.ac.in.

Shanmuganathan Engineering College, Arasampat, Tamil Nadu.

PES College of Engineering, Mandya, Karnataka.

SJM Institute of Technology, Chitradurga, Karnataka.

SJB Institute of Technology, Kangeri, Bangalore

BLDE Association's Dr. PG Hallakati College of Engineering, Bijapur, Karnataka.

Basaveshwar Engineering College, Nigalingappa, Vidyanagar, Bagalkot, Karnataka.

Malanad College of Engineering, Hassan, Karnataka.

List of more engineering colleges and institutes can be collected from the engineering handbook published by the Association of Indian Universities, New Delhi, which will be available for reference in university employment information and guidance bureaux functioning under all universities in Kerala.

Before seeking admission to private engineering colleges or institutes, students should ascertain whether the institutions have the approval of the All India Council of Technical Education (AICTE) and are affiliated to a university.

Higher study facilities

BE/ B.Tech.degree holders in automobile engineering or mechanical (automobile) engineering can opt for M.Tech. degree course in automobile or automotive engineering.

They can also opt for postgraduate diploma course in transportation and automobile. The selection to the M.Tech. degree course is based on GATE score/ admission test and interview.

The following are a few institutes that offer M.Tech./ ME degree level course in disciplines related to automobile/ automotive engineering:

IIT Madras, Chennai, offers M.Tech. degree course in automotive engine technology. Web site: www.mech.iitm.ac.in.

Anna University offers M.Tech. degree course in automotive electronics. Web site: www.annauniv.ac.in.

Jadavpur University, Kolkata, offers Master's degree course in automobile engineering. Web site: www.jadavpur.edu.

Bharat University, Selaiyur, Chennai, offers M.Tech. degree course in automobile engineering.

At NID

The National Institute of Design (NID), Paldi, Ahmedabad, is a prominent Institute that provides an opportunity for meritorious B.Tech. degree holders in automobile and mechanical engineering to pursue a postgraduate diploma in transportation and automobile design (10 seats).

The course duration is two and a half years. The selection is based on an all India entrance test and interview.

In Kerala, Kochi will be the entrance test centre. This programme is a very good option for those who desire to become a professional designer in the automobile industry.

Job opportunity

Automobile engineers who specialise in design can design models of vehicles by joining the research and development wing of auto companies. Automobile maintenance engineers are entrusted with the general supervision of mechanics in a workshop, factory or garage.

Automobile industry giants provide job opportunities to qualified engineers in their production plants.

source: http://www.hindu.com/edu/2011/01/25/stories/2011012550120300.htm