Kerala: Academics skeptical on Swayam

Thiruvananthapuram: The academics in the state are sceptical about the implementation of the Study Webs of Active-Learning for Young Aspiring Minds (SWAYAM), an online platform aimed at addressing the acute shortage of teachers in the country.   As per the norms, no university can deny crediting the score for the online courses being opted through SWAYAM. The parent institution should give equivalent credit weightage to the students for the credits earned through online learning courses in the credit plan of the programme.  No university shall refuse credit mobility to any student. MG University Vice-Chancellor Babu Sebastian told Deccan Chronicle that  there were some issues related to the implementation of the Act in the state.

The universities in the state are governed by the Act passed by the state Assembly. If any change has to be made to the Act, the concurrence of the Assembly and the Governor who is the chancellor of the universities is  a must. The SWAYAM programme is modelled on the Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC) concept which is  based on the distance education mode. MG University has already started MOOCs programmes, Mr Sebastian said. However,  the regulation of the university allowed transfer of credits from regular mode to distance education mode. It does not allow the transfer of the credits vice versa. While for conventional courses,  universities insist on 75 percent attendance, there is no regulation on attendance for SWAYAM course, Mr Sebastian said.

Moreover, the degrees in the distance education mode are not considered for admissions to  higher education or as eligibility for appointments in teaching posts. Equivalency certificates have to be issued by other universities if distance course are considered equivalent regular courses by other universities in the state. In the present circumstances, many courses in distance education mode are not considered equivalent to regular courses by the universities, Mr Sebastian said.   MOOC courses have already been implemented in the university in areas like nanotechnology. However, they are launched as independent course. The transfer of credits to conventional courses is not approved by the university for such courses, Mr Sebastian said.

The idea of such online courses is to bring students from rural, adivasi and coastal communities, who have less access to educational institutions,  to the class rooms. However, the question here is whether such courses were needed in Kerala which has already a good network for classroom teaching, Mr Sebastian said.  Mr M. Sarangadharan, dean of commerce of the Kerala University, said that the issue would come up for discussions at a meeting of deans scheduled to be held shortly. The university should discuss the pros and cons of the scheme before implementing it.

Former Kerala State Higher Education Council chairman T.P. Sreenivasan said that MOOC courses could be used to supplement the conventional courses. All over the world, such online courses were  being utilised for revolutionising education. The outgoing council had mooted MOOC courses. However, the universities have been reluctant to utilise them. There was a resistance to innovative programmes in the state in the past also, Mr Sreenivasan said.

UGC secretary Jaspal Sandhu in a letter addressed to the vice-chancellors  had uploaded a list of MOOCs courses which are proposed to be launched on UGC website . www.ugc.ac.in.  The UGC has also notified UGC (Credit Framework for Online Learning Courses through SWAYAM Regulation, 2016 in the Gazette of India on July 19, 2016 which defined credit transfer for online courses under SWAYAM platform of the Union government. The regulations are also available on the  UGC website.  Earlier, the Union government had also entered into an agreement with Microsoft for providing technical assistance to the online platform. As part of the agreement,  Microsoft will help set up an app for the platform. The company  would run the app for three years after which the AICTE will take over the operations.

Scheme to be launched next academic year

The scheme of  Study Webs of Active-Learning for Young Aspiring Minds (SWAYAM) was introduced as part of the plan to implement the ‘digital India’ programme.   Under this, the students will be allowed to take online courses in whichever subject or university they wanted. The scores achieved in short term courses will be credited to the main marksheet of the university. It would be basically free interactive e-content  on the internet. The scheme is expected to be launched from the next academic session.

SWAYAM is an integrated platform for online courses to be provided by all central universities from school level to the post-graduate level. As many as 2,000 online courses will be launched. The programme is modelled on the Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC) concept.MOOC  is a model for delivering learning content online to any person who wants to take a course with no limit on attendance.  It is  aimed at unlimited participation and open access via the internet.  In addition to traditional course materials such as filmed lectures, readings and problem sets, many MOOCs provide interactive user forums to support community interactions among students.