Not later than two years from now, the century-old Indian Institute of Science (IISc) will open its gates to undergraduate (UG) students. This pioneering and hotly debated proposal awaits a final thumbs-up at the next senate meeting, senior IISc professors told The Hindu .
The four-year interdisciplinary Bachelor of Science (BS) programme, modelled in part after the one being offered at the California Institute of Technology, aims to produce undergraduates who will quell the “crisis in education” as highlighted by the report submitted by the National Knowledge Commission. The UG programme also hopes to create human resources for “serving the needs of the country whether in industry, in research institutes, or in medicine.”
More recently, the report submitted by the committee to advise on renovation and rejuvenation of higher education in India, led by noted academic Yash Pal, had also recommended that it be made mandatory for all universities to have a rich undergraduate programme.
The endeavour is intended to create a “synergy” between undergraduate and postgraduate programmes and will draw upon the IISc’s combined strength in science and engineering. The humanities — including history and philosophy — will also form a part of the interdisciplinary programme along with the basic sciences.
“The problems we face today are very different from those that needed to be addressed 100 years ago when the IISc began — we have issues such as environment and energy to contend with. These problems can only be solved through an interdisciplinary approach,” a professor explained.
The programme will be small, with each batch comprising between 50 and 200 students. The existing IISc campus — and not the proposed second campus in Chitradurga as was initially assumed — will house the programme. With the introduction of the course both human resources and infrastructure at the IISc are expected to see a natural augmentation.
Welcoming this move by the IISc, Prof. Yash Pal said this was “marvellous news and a move in the right direction,” pointing out that all major universities across the world have UG programmes. Dismissing reservations about losing out on research time and resources, Prof. Yash Pal said: “If you’re teaching an undergraduate programme, you’ll find that you will come across a certain energy and even questions that will widen the horizons of your research too. It is very valuable, and that is where you will get your best material from,” he said.
