So the IIT Delhi director recently gave an interview. Link: indianexpress.com/article/educat…
Some thoughts below:
Some thoughts below:
1/ Institute of Eminence tag comes with 200 cr annual funding for 5 years. Annual budget for IITB and IITD is ~1000 cr each excluding spend on infra. So this cash infusion is good but nowhere near what's required given how batch sizes have grown and space/amenities crunch.
2/ To put numbers in perspective, student fees are only ~5% of total budget yet IITs have hiked their fees to ~ 1lac/sem which makes it difficult for a lot of students and they end up taking up loans. It is both financially and psychologically taxing as I've observed firsthand.
3/ He also talks about lack of quality applications for faculty positions. Pool is the following - PhDs from abroad who choose to come back. And this pool is drying up fast.
4/ One other thing that I find nonsensical is this fanaticism with QS rankings. Truly said - you become what you measure. So choose metrics carefully. Little credence given to quality when ticking the boxes is more important. Everything is more or less done for those metrics.
5/ Research - Industry feedback loop is horribly broken. Window dressing more than anything.
6/ Prime minister's fellowship was started to attract and retain high calibre students for their PhDs but the response was lukewarm. Given this context doubling or increasing PhD intakes seems like a bad move.
7/ IITs have somewhat lost their way I think. We need to realise what our strengths are - high calibre, really smart students.
8/ However we need to be seriously proactive if we are to catch up with the job market or the research that's happening around the world.
9/ Infra, curriculum, mindset and pedagogy are all severely lacking in terms of relevance.
10/ This turned out to be a rant on IITs but the first step to solving a problem is to acknowledge it exists. However not all is gloomy.
11/ I'm quite impressed by the initiative shown by new IITs like Gandhinagar and Hyderabad. Owing to their small size and need for recognition/resources they're amenable to change and proactive in implementing anything that benefits students.
12/ The older IITs lack this incentive since administration and faculty are content even in status quo. Every change no matter how trivial becomes a nightmare to execute and the older IITs seem to be burdened and shackled by excessive administration. So much inertia.
13/ Prediction: Newer IITs will manage to execute their user journey properly and attract talent/funding. Older IITs will continue to retain their charm owing to brand value and old-school heuristics in hiring being employed by the job market but will stagnate.
14/ We've already seen this with older IITs except Bombay and Delhi failing to attract top ranks and preferences shifting to newer IITs. This is a virtuous feedback loop that will keep getting stronger. Premium on CS/EE is increasing everyday (the primary driver of this loop).
15/ We need more positive sum alternatives since this is clearly not enough to meet market demand.
