“Higher education in India has become fossilised. We are not ready for any radical change. Even autonomous colleges are only tinkering with the present system, because they have to move everything through the university,” says Reverend Dr. S. Xavier Alphonse, S.J.
As the former principal (and at age 38, one of its youngest) of Loyola College, Chennai and ex-vice-principal of St. Jospeph’s College, Tiruchi, besides pioneering community colleges in India and serving as a 2-term member of the University Grants Commission, Dr. Xavier Alphonse has first-hand knowledge of what ails the nation’s educational system and is not afraid to highlight it.
The exclusionary use of higher education has always troubled Dr. Xavier. “After finishing my term as principal of Loyola College (1992-95), there were lot of questions within me,” recalls Dr. Xavier, who now serves as the Province Coordinator, Jesuit Higher Education Commission, Madurai Province, and is based out of Tiruchi.
“Every year, we used to get nearly 30,000 applications for 1,000 seats. So there were always hundreds of people waiting outside my room. Housemaids, daily wage earners, agricultural labourers, Dalits, auto-rickshaw drivers and railway coolies – I have seen them all waiting for their children’s admission. But I was able to help only around 40-50 such children at the most.” The bulk of the seats, he says, inevitably went to applicants from well-to-do and influential families.
“This was when I started asking myself about what I was doing for higher education, and how we could help those students without the required marks to get admission in these colleges,” he says.
That query would set off the quest to bring quality education to under-privileged and marginalised groups of students through community colleges.
An alternative system
“In the whole of India, nearly 657 million children go to First Standard. But at a very conservative estimate, only about 22 million come to higher education. This is despite the 39,000 colleges and 750 universities and research centres in this country,” says Dr. Xavier. “Definitely we need another system to absorb this population.”
The community college, promoted in India at first by the then-UGC chairman Professor G. Ram Reddy (1929-95), was seen as a viable option to reach out to those students who were dropping out of formal education due to economic or academic reasons.
In the mid-1990s, after an 8-month study of 18 community colleges in the United States supported by the Jesuit mission, Dr. Xavier Alphonse suggested to Archbishop James Masilamony Arul Das that the centenary of the Santhome Cathedral should be celebrated with the launching of a community college in Chennai.
And thus, on August 4, 1996, the Madras Community College came into being, bringing with it a sort of revolution in job-oriented education that was accessible to students from lower-income backgrounds.
“We began with four courses – sales, marketing, computer hardware and cargo management – and selected 120 boys and girls. As the parents insisted on a degree, we linked it to the Bachelor of Commerce correspondence course. So in the end, the students would graduate with a diploma and degree, while gaining industry experience through internship,” says Dr. Xavier.
As the popularity of these colleges grew, along with the variety of courses they offered, the Indian Centre for Research and Development of Community Education (ICRDCE) was started in January 1999 to monitor and help in the establishment of these institutions throughout the nation.
This initiative of the Jesuit Madurai Province and unit of the Jesuit Chennai Mission has to date been involved in 315 community colleges (many of them promoted by non-governmental organisations and charitable trusts) in 19 States. In the 19 years of ICRDCE’s existence, some 1,50,000 students have been trained by community colleges, 90 per cent of whom have been employed on graduation.
The Tamil Nadu Open University has included 204 community colleges under its umbrella.
Last week, ICRDCE co-hosted an international conference in Chennai on curriculum development with Montgomery College, Maryland that was sponsored by the U.S. Consulate. The three-day workshop was attended by over 150 delegates who got an opportunity to meet 11 American academics.
‘Abolish exams’
The community college curriculum is pointedly job-oriented, as an antidote perhaps to the current system that lacks in-service training.
For the first four months, the community college syllabus has courses in life skills, developmental English, computer science and in some places, entrepreneurship that are compulsory for students of all disciplines. Students then undergo two months of industry experience in their chosen field, where they have to work for at least 8 hours daily. Their results are based on evaluations of both theoretical and practical components.
“We should abolish examinations,” declares Dr. Xavier. “The three-hour exam is a waste of time, and is followed only in Bangladesh, Pakistan and India. It is the continual internal assessment that matters, because a mark-sheet doesn’t speak of the individual’s abilities,” he adds.
Colleges that have got a good record of academic excellence and have been rated highly by National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) for three consecutive cycles could be declared as universities, says Dr. Xavier.
And perhaps it is time for the industry to play a more assertive role too, he says. “Students trained in specific skills will be employable immediately, which is why both industry and academics should co-operate,” suggests Dr. Xavier.
Opportunity for elementary, higher and skill development education is what raises a country, says the clergyman. “Higher education is the right of every Indian citizen. Students can demand a job, when they have the skills. That’s when meritocracy comes into play,” Dr. Xavier concludes.
FACTFILE
Rev. Dr. S. Xavier Alphonse S.J. was born on November 17, 1951 in Devakottai, Ramanathapuram District. He joined the Jesuit order in 1969 and has been involved in the field of higher education for needy and marginalised communities in various capacities. He retired from Loyola College of Arts and Science in 2010 after completing 28 years of teaching and administration, and is currently based in Tiruchi.
Dr. Xavier’s book on life skills titled ‘We Shall Overcome’ has been translated into Afrikaans and is used as a text-book in South Africa. It was also translated into Hindi with the title ‘Safalta’.
The Indian Centre for Research and Development of Community Education, started in 1999 under Dr. Xavier’s supervision, has been training, among scores of others, inmates of 9 central prisons in Tamil Nadu for the past four years. Some 1,000 prisoners have benefited from the programmes, of who at least 10 have won gold medals in higher education.
Dr. Xavier has published 44 books and 75 articles on the community college system.
Meeting Mother Teresa
Rev. Dr. S. Xavier Alphonse had an opportunity to interact with Mother Teresa the Albanian-born Roman Catholic nun who founded the Missionaries of Charity, a religious congregation devoted to helping those in great need in Kolkata.
“I first met Mother Teresa in 1973 in Kolkata. With the help of my younger brother James Melchior, I spent three months collecting material for the first-ever Tamil biography of Mother Teresa, based on interviews with people who had seen her work at close quarters,” says Dr. Xavier.
The book, ‘Vasanthangal Meendum Varuvathillai’ (Never Shall the Spring Return), was published in 1978.
“Mother Teresa was very spiritual and highly focused in service to the marginalised, and that is perhaps why nothing – neither the money nor the awards – touched her,” says Dr. Xavier who was closely associated with the nun for over 30 years. “I could see why she was considered the ‘Mother of India,’ in the way people of all faiths and creeds mourned her passing when I attended her funeral in 1997,” he adds.
Dr. Xavier has also compiled a book on the legacy of the nun in the 2003 book ‘Symphony Goes On.’
Mother Teresa, who was beatified in 2003, is to be canonised as a saint in September this year.
