Probably nowhere in the country do we have a separate planning board for higher education as the one the A.P. government has formed, to improve coordination among institutes of higher education and universities and to better the prospects of research through exchange, said State Education Minister Adimulapu Suresh.
At the second meeting of the AP Higher Education Planning Board (APHEB) here on Saturday, he said about 30 Vice-Chancellors of various universities in the State and directors from the institutes of national importance such as IIM-Visakhapatnam, NIT, IIPE and IIT were attending the two-day meet.
The board was constituted to see that higher education improves in the State and education is accessible for all. “It is the dream of Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy to make good education accessible and affordable to all. The fruits of the board will roll out in two years from now. The suggestions from this meeting will guide us towards that goal,” he said.
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“Every student needs to be groomed as a global citizen. Mother tongue will be promoted while the English language will be taught. The government is ready to bear any cost for the creation of infrastructure,” he said.
Mr. Suresh also said that the performance of the Vice-Chancellors would be reviewed soon and the progress achieved by the students would become the yardstick for the universities.
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Earlier, inaugurating the conference, Prof. Ramgopal Rao, Director, IIT-Delhi, said that the universities in the State need to be transformed into multidisciplinary institutions. There should be an effort to turn knowledge into wealth and the focus should be on increasing the number patents and admission of more international students, as this would better the international ranking of a university.
About 2.4% of the GDP needed to be allocated to the higher education sector. It was important to connect universities with the community, and professors should drive students towards innovation and research, and startups.
Tourism Minister Muttamsetti Srinivasa Rao said universities should also focus on sports. The Chief Minister had sanctioned around ₹6.5 crore for sports in the last two years.
Prof. Hemachandra Reddy, Chairman, AP State Council of Higher Education, explained the functioning of the AP State Research Board, provision of laptops for students, establishment of digital libraries in 13,000 villages and other programmes.
He said dividing universities into five clusters would help them work in coordination and cooperation with local industries and design courses that suited their needs.
Application launched
Mr. Suresh and Mr. Srinivasa Rao jointly launched the Learning Management System (LMS) developed by the Board of Higher Education.
Andhra University Vice-Chancellor Prof. P.V.G.D. Prasada Reddy said today’s education policy should move in a way that prepares the youth for the future. The higher education system needed to embrace new changes. There was an urgent need for students to become entrepreneurs in order to find and generate employment.
He said efforts were being made to increase the number of engineering seats in AU, establish an AU trans-disciplinary research hub and incubation centres to inculcate skills and creativity among youth.
Prof. Chandrasekhar, Director, IIM Visakhapatnam, IIPE Director Prof. V.S.R.K. Prasad, Pola Bhaskar, Commissioner of Collegiate Education and Prof. K. Ram Mohana Rao, Vice-Chairman, Higher Education Council, spoke.
The conference was jointly hosted by Andhra University, the Indian Institute of Management, Visakhapatnam and the Indian Institute of Petroleum Energy (IIPE).