aglasem.com EDITION AUG 2020 LEADER DIARIES AMITY UNIVERSITY VC, SPSU PRESIDENT NARRATE THEIR PLANS FOR THE FUTURE EXPERT TALKS PROF NEERAJ GUPTA, DURGESH TRIPATHI, SEEMA SHAH ON TEACHING, LEARNING ASSESSMENT IN THE NEW WORLD TEST FROM HOME EMBRACING THE NEW AVATAR OF ONLINE HOME BASED EXAMS HALL OF FAME SCHOLARSHIP EXAM TOPPERS ON THEIR JOURNEY AND FUTURE PLANS 20+ Free online courses to enhance your CV
Welcome Warm greetings, and welcome to Spectrum, the magazine by Aglasem. I f you have come across the words “unprecedented”, “challenging”, “dark times” more than once in the past months, and are quite weary of them by now, we hear you. But can we ignore the “crisis” simply because we have gotten bored of it? Spectrum is a movement to connect and empower a community of engaged stakeholders to share their work and ideas in the world of education and career, learn from each other, and foster innovation. While many of us are stepping out of our safe spaces and trying to go about our daily life as before, truth be told, things are no longer the same. Whether we like it or not, living with COVID-19 is the new reality. On one hand it is heartening to see that the education space has reacted extremely maturely to the situation: classes went online almost overnight, assessments and examinations were redesigned, and there has been an impeccable level of coordination, commitment, and communication between the administrators, faculty, students, and all other stakeholders involved. On the other hand there are evident challenges that these changes bring like requirements of access to technology, adaptability to new methods of teaching, learning, and assessment et al. But arguably the worst demons are the ones we cannot see - panic, anxiety, ignorance, misinformation. As education leaders spend long days and nights to implement new solutions, we bring Spectrum as a platform to collate and present the meaningful. Through Spectrum, we want to bring movements in the education and career space to the forefront; to highlight the work that’s being done, and get involved. Most important of all, we want to provide an inclusive forum for the community, where everyone can bring their work together to learn and be inspired by the work of others. Thank you, for joining us in this beautiful journey. ANWESHA BOSE EDITOR ABOUT AGLASEM THE TEAM Aglasem Edutech Pvt Ltd is an Indian EdTech company, in operations since 2012. The portal aglasem.com and various apps of the same provides study materials and updates on education for school studies, entrance exams, college admissions, government jobs, talent search exams, olympiads. What started as a simple way of helping the student community with study notes, and papers back when the founders were in college, has today transformed into a movement where information, resources and guidance is available to all students and govt job aspirants. All thanks to the growing community of millions of students, teachers, educators and aspirants. EDITORIAL 2 AUG 2020 Anand Meena, Anwesha Bose, Ifrah Rehman, Arunima Sharma, Ginni Tyagi, Mamona Majumdar, Juel Parag, Yogesh Chawla FEATURES EDITOR Laxman Sharma SPECTRUM
Experts Talk 6 16 Evolution in teaching and learning with Prof Neeraj Gupta On success and safety of students with Dr Balvinder Shukla 10 Thinking long term for fruitful outcomes with Mr Ashok Ghosh 51 28 e: Test from hom w ne Embracing the s avatar of exam Beginning of a new world Plight of schools amidst pandemic 21 Free online courses to enhance your CV 14 The privilege pyramid 55 Coronavirus warriors: Students who made a difference 56 Pros and cons of online classes 57 Traditional schooling vs online schooling Insight Edge 50 On choosing a career and the changing face of education SPECTRUM Light Byte 48 When teachers matched the skills of gen-z, for gen-z with Dr Durgesh Tripathi 24 Op-Ed 4 20 44 In memory of classrooms and conference chambers Nex Gen 58 Free app for JEE, NEET by IITM startup NEET, coaching, students' rights: Honest talk with Dr Amit Gupta 30 Overcoming challenges, one step at a time, with Dr Seema Shah Hall of Fame 36 Aarshiya Mittal 37 Ayush Sankaran 38 Praneet Raj 39 Tripathy Divyajyoti Senapati 41 Eknoor Singh AUG 2020 3
OF A NEW WORLD Now that the unprecedented has descended, the way we lead an everyday life is undergoing changes every day. Fighting, one battle at a time. 4 AUG 2020 SPECTRUM
I t was the morning of Holi, and like every year, I was peeking from behind my curtains to check whether my friendly neighbors in the posh society of Gurgaon (sorry, Gurugram) were rolling around in muddy waters already. Though the distant sounds of rang barse had been playing since 9 am, I was not surprised to see that this year, the celebrations were not as much in full swing as last year. As opposed to a ground full of over 200 people surrounded by colorful puddles, open beer bottles, sweets aplenty that I witnessed in 2019, today, only a few groups of people could be seen playing only with dry gulaal, that too rather coyly. After all, people were taking the advisories on the novel coronavirus seriously. However that was not the larger picture. During a conversation with a colleague 2 days later, he brazenly confirmed that he did not give a damn about the virus. After all “beemar to padhte rehte hai, holi toh saal me ek hi baar aati hai” (we keep falling ill, but Holi comes only once a year). True that. The novel coronavirus though, seems to have taken rather an offense to that and decided to well make its point. This less than 100 nm sized virus has wreaked havoc globally: More than 4.6 M confirmed cases have been reported all over the world, with more than 310K deaths. The figures rise as you read this. IN INDIA The first case of the novel coronavirus was first reported in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. It was then on 30th January 2020 that India reported its first case. Hours later on the same day, WHO declared the novel Coronavirus to be a global emergency. Today India has the 4th highest number of confirmed cases, having surpassed the UK. While efforts are in full force from all fronts, the country SPECTRUM of 1.36 billion people is facing an unprecedented challenge - to survive, and emerge uncrushed, on the other side of the storm. EDUCATION Lockdown was imposed from 24th March. A necessary action to pinch the growth of the virus, the first edition of lockdown gave way to the second, then third, then fourth. Schools and colleges were shut, students in hostels were sent back to their homes. Board exams were cancelled. In the beginning, students cheered the delay in board exams, deferment of annual exams, and shutdown of schools and colleges. No crime there. A child after all finds no joy in exams, and has his own complaints about the general education system. So for many, it was just an extended vacation. When little Chintu was asked by a smartly dressed news reporter “Aapko Coronavirus ke baare me kya pata hai?” (what do you know about coronavirus), he wasted no breath in answering “Jaise diwali, dussehra bade bade festivals hote hai India me, waise hi coronavirus ek bahut bada tyohaar hai, jiske liye hume bahut saari chhutti mili hai.” (just like diwali, dussehra are big festivals in India, similarly coronavirus is a big festival for which we are getting lots of holidays!) However the happiness turned to confusion, then fear and alarm. Ruchika, mother of young Puneet said mid- April “When will classes begin? My son will fall behind if schools do not open soon!”. Gayathri Reddy, another concerned parent voiced “My daughter has consistently been a topper in her class. She just appeared for her class 12 board exams and was looking forward to college admissions. We are worried how that will happen now”. THE ANSWERS India is an adaptive nation. We are known problem solvers. So, it was not much of a surprise to see the education system quickly trying to adapt and adopt technology to answer the questions. Schools started using online classes. So did colleges. Paper checking of board exams was outlined to suit the circumstances. And by mid-May, details of datesheets for the delayed board exams also started coming. But, this is not the happy ending. THE CHALLENGES To “take education out of brick and mortar classrooms” is one of the visions of Aglasem. The goal is to ensure that education is not restricted to schools and colleges - that everyone, wherever they are, should get access to it. And this can be possible through technology. And the times of COVID-19 have shown just how important a role technology plays in connecting people and enabling solutions. However now that the system is falling back upon online education as the sole resource, it appears that this plan is not without its flaws. Moreover, the education system is not only about imparting education. For many, school is a source of satisfying their hunger via the mid-day meal. Going to schools and colleges means interacting with peers, a seamless flow of thoughts and brainstorming. All stakeholders involved - students, teachers, professors, parents, principals, vice chancellors, deans, educationists, and politicians - are actively working on identifying the challenges in the field of education in a COVID-19 / post COVID-19 world, planning ahead for viable solutions, and implementing them at a breakneck speed. LET US TAKE A WALK DOWN THIS ROAD AUG 2020 5
ON SUCCESS & SAFETY OF STUDENTS WITH DR. BALVINDER SHUKLA M y father has taught me a couple of things. He always used to say, “Do what you really enjoy and enjoy what you do. Don't do anything that you consider a burden. Once you feel like it is a burden you will not be able to satisfy yourself.” Dr. Balvinder Shukla, has been following this philosophy throughout her life and career. An intelligent female, with forward thinking, she is heading Amity University, Uttar Pradesh, as a Vice Chancellor. Throughout these tough times, priority has been the safety of the students and the staff. Yet, Amity University has not compromised with the education quality. In a one on one talk with Dr Shukla, we unveiled how Amity University efficiently coping with the pandemic and is leading in the new era of education. 6 AUG 2020 Hello ma’am, how are you? How are you coping with COVID-19 situation? keeping morale high and ensuring the engagement of students. First of all, thank you for having me. I am doing fine. I am thankful that at this time my entire family is with me. Dealing with the situation was not difficult for us. We started using an online teaching medium the next day the lockdown was announced. We are using face to face remote teaching and during the month of March to April we had 1,65,000 classes and our faculty developed 6000+ e-content. How do you think COVID-19 has impacted the education space? And How is Amity University dealing with the situation? The pandemic has really changed the educational sector and it is not going to be the same anymore. Amity University is closely monitoring the global pandemic and our priority is the safety of our students and the staff. We have been in constant touch with the students and faculty members and have been keeping them updated about what is happening at the University. You see, at this time, it is not just about teaching, it is about As a group, Amity has 10 Universities, we have campuses in 17 countries, we have schools that run groups of 175000 students, so without wasting any time we got online classes for everyone online. Our faculties have also been engaged in producing research papers. Thousands of research papers have been published in this period. Faculties and students of Amity are also engaged in developing low cost ventilators, SPECTRUM
nowadays. We have distributed the masks to people. So these are all we have done to cope with COVID-19 and we are preparing for the next academic session. When the lockdown was first announced in March what was the first instinct of the University? How did you move around it, what was the first step? As I said earlier, the first step was the safety and the well being of the students, and second was to ensure that the learning doesn’t stop for them. We directed the students to go back to their homes, hostelers were also asked to move back, however, some international students could not go back. They were with us on the campus till May. The last international students to stay back with us was from Afghanistan. We kept the hostel cafeteria open and asked the staff to take care of the students staying there. Facilities provided to such students comprises paramedics, security etc. One of the challenges that we have been facing is the examination of the students. We are conducting the online examinations, almost 50% of the exams are already over. Keeping the current situation in mind, semester as well as entrance exams for admissions are being held online. This is what happened when the lockdown started. However, as we have seen since March a lot has changed. So what is the approach of Amity now about the lockdown, COVID-19 and everything? We all are working from home and are well prepared from the beginning. Amity has its branches across the globe and we need to maintain uniformity in all our campuses. Thus, most of the things were already online. That was not a big challenge for us. But the biggest challenge was that if the students were not able to meet us face to face how can we keep their motivation high throughout? So we made the Amity counselling center. It is called as Amity Centre for Guidance and Counselling (ACGC) and is very active. It is a 24X7 service, where SPECTRUM students can approach the trained and professional counsellors anytime if they are facing any psychological issues. Then we decided on how to support our faculties and staff. For that, we started the faculty emergency support services. Thirdly, we started taking weekly reports on the well being of the students. We try to extend help in case of need and provide all sorts of online resources to our students like e-books, e-library, etc to help them as much as possible. All resources have been made accessible from anywhere and anytime. Very impressive. Everyone is focusing on online teaching right now but education, as a whole, is a lot more than just classes. How is Amity compensating that during this pandemic? We did a lot of planning at the start, due to which we are able to hold awareness campaigns for the students, faculties, community and others. Since the spread of the virus many discontinued the newspaper subscription, we stayed connected viaTwitter, Instagram, Facebook, Linkedin etc. Also, we encouraged the faculties and students to download the Aarogya Setu app to know the COVID-19 status around them and stay safe. sectors which are highly affected due to pandemic. However, these webinars aim to inform students that not everything is lost. The sectors will eventually bounce back and getting tensed or worried is not a solution. How different will be the post COVID19 and pre COVID-19 era, especially in the education sector? In pre-COVID era we always valued face to face education. All emphasis was on the brick and mortar factors, having big campus buildings and all. Value of distance education and online education wasn’t known to all. But now the people have started to realise the power of technology. So here are the following things that can happen: Mobility: Now fewer students will opt for international education. I am not saying that it will finish but will definitely reduce. Even travelling to far off states will be restricted. Use of technology will increase: UGC and MHRD are promoting online education. Earlier not all Universities had approval to provide online degrees. Amity was the first University of India to receive it but given the situation, UGC has approved all the Universities, which meet the set conditions. Fee might be reduced: With changing times certain programmes may lose their popularity and hence their fee might be reduced. Online learning will be the way of life in the times to come. Another concern was how to connect with the industry as Amity always believes in Industry connect. We had conducted nearly 1900 online webinars for our students until now. Every day, around 25 to 30 webinars are conducted and as we speak, few are going on right now as well. The Industry connect webinars have many roles to play. Students get to know and learn about different sectors like insurance, banking, manufacturing, telecom, tourism hospitality, aviation, etc. sectors. These are the Online learning will be the way of life in the times to come. No one could have imagined the current situation back in January. How is Amity preparing for future crisis situations? Is there any crisis management programme that the University is planning? We already have a disaster management programme. But COVID-19 is a very different kind of disaster, it is like a natural disaster. Now the team is reviewing the situation and we will try to include the pandemic under AUG 2020 7
courses. Schools and Universities are adopting innovative online tools and techniques to teach students. Of these, what technology or methodology do you think will sustain, even if the situation is all back to normal like before and physical classes resume? Technology is going to be an integral part of teaching and learning now, even more than before. For example, the webinars are so engaging and helpful as they bring the industry experts, global laureates, management gurus to the computer screens of the students. I think the webinar must go on. We will also continue MS team mode of interaction where the experts of all the courses will interact with the students every semester. Moreover, earlier if a faculty could not attend a class, the class was called off. However, now if the faculty wants they can conduct online class even if they are not physically present, thus classes will continue. We will continue this too. Lockdown has been lifted by the center, however, many states are still under it. Do you think it is a good idea to go back to face to face teaching now? No. Unless you have a 100% accommodation facility for faculty and students, one cannot resume face to face classes. It is not safe now. We cannot monitor each and every one. It is risky now and at least for the coming semester, classes should be conducted through remote teaching methods only. Maybe we can start face to face classes in December, which also depend on the situation at that time. But what about lab work and practical works? Talking of this, we have created virtual labs. Here students can use the labs for their practicals and experiments. For clinical experiments which are not possible via virtual labs, we will be focussing on completing the theory as of now, later the lab based classes will be held. Also these classes will be planned keeping the ease of the students in mind. No student will be forced to attend the class, only 8 AUG 2020 those who can, will be asked to come. What are the common concerns of the students and their parents that you have come across in this pandemic situation? One of the concerns are the examinations, especially the final year’s. Students are worried about how the exams will be conducted and how the results will be declared. Their decision to go for higher education or to take up a job is based on this entire thing. Secondly the students who got placed are worried about their future. They don’t know when they will be called for the job. In order to lessen their burden, we are constantly in talks with the companies. Some industries have asked the students to join early and we have allowed it. However, in few industries, like hospitality and tourism, the situation is a bit bad. In such cases we are counselling and guiding the students. Thirdly, students are worried about their admissions. Those who are passing out this year and had plans to take admission overseas, are feeling helpless. We are guiding them and trying to figure out the best possible available options. So these are the 3 major concerns from the students: exams, placements and admissions. Parents on the other hand are majorly asking about the safety and well being of the students in the campuses. Keeping this in mind, we are not conducting the physical classes. However, there are students from remote areas who cannot access online classes due to lack of internet facility like students from Jammu and Kashmir, north east and all. Many such students, who have booked their seats in the hostels are welcome to stay in the campus and take online classes from their hostel rooms. They can get internet connectivity in the campus. Many students had plans to get a job after their graduation. But most of it has now come to a halt. What is your word of advice for them? My advice to all the students is to first take care of their well being and safety. Secondly, if they already have a job then they should wait for the company to ask them to join. In case there is no job in hand, then I suggest that instead of waiting for ‘a particular job with a particular’ package, students should accept the offer that they have in hand. Experience is more important than the profile and money. This experience will help them to get into a better job as the situation improves. Most importantly have patience and do not lose hope. If you get a job continue it and enhance your skills and competencies. Keep a positive attitude, that is very very important. Industry might be going through a difficult time but that doesn't mean that jobs are not there. Jobs are there. The old generation jobs are vanishing. Now be ready to take up new generation jobs where creativity, technology and innovation is very important. Also this is a very good opportunity for those who have an idea and want to start a venture with it. This is the time to test your skills. Amity University is known for its campus. The campus life is talked about among the students and is one of the major reasons Amity is most sought after Universities. Now because of the pandemic, do you think students will miss out on it and how can it be compensated? Campus life is campus life. As per the situations I need to go to the campus now and then with all safety measures. When I enter the campus, the campus now feels so lonely. The hustle and bustle, students roam- SPECTRUM
that is what is called campus life. Campus is not a campus without the students. So if I as an administrator is feeling this way, what must the students be feeling. They are missing it more than anybody else. The only thing we can try is to try giving them that life, via online platforms. These platforms will help them to interact with their peers and they can do some fun activities. If you can go back in time, what one lesson will you give humanity? KEY TAKEAWAYS We are moving very fast. We need to slow down, take care of ourselves and spend time with family. We are chasing materialistic life, rather we must take care of the environment and rejuvenate ourselves. Be more health conscious and have a value based life. It was a scintillating session, talking with the woman who is steering the ship in this stormy weather. Here are 7 things she said that you must take a note of. » » » » » » » In these times the most important thing is to take care of self and stay safe. Technology should be embraced as it has all sorts of advantages. It can barring students close to their choice of industry while they are in their student life. Webinars and online video conferencing cam bring industry experts closer to classes with students. Graduating or graduated students must not be choosy right now about jobs. Experience can be gained from any job and it is more important than profile and salary. Now the jobs that will take off the market are going to be creative, technology based and more innovative.Thus learn new skills that cater to these demands. This is also the best time to give shape to the ideas that were once nurtured just in the mind. One can take a step forward to execute their plans and test their skills. One should learn from the pandemic that we are running way too fast. We must be more considerate towards what is actually important in our life rather than chasing materialistic things. It is important to prioritise self care and health and then rest of the things. Staying positive and hopeful is important. A single platform to drive over 500 mn visits in the education industry. Over 2.5 mn leads generated and lacs of application forms delivered. 70+ Most prominent educational clients, 23 NIRF top ranked. Increased enrollments and batch size build. Call 99901 22044 REACH OUT TO MILLIONS OF STUDENTS THROUGH Expand brand reach and target the right students INDIA'S LARGEST EDUCATION AD NETWORK & MORE! OUR PORTALS SPECTRUM AUG 2020 9
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