IIM-A profs want pay on a par with Harvard dons

Vasundhara Vyas Mehta | TNN

Ahmedabad: Quality comes at a cost and the IIM-A faculty members have made it very clear in a memorandum to the HRD ministry on Friday.

The missive comes in response to a notification sent by the ministry on August 20, detailing their salary structure according to the Sixth Pay Commission, which took the wind out of their sails.

The four-member committee that framed the memorandum have quoted Harvard salaries to justify their demand. Designed on the lines of the Harvard Business School, IIM-A is upset that the Sixth Pay Commission has wrested this ‘special status’ from it, so they are demanding bigger pay packets.

The memorandum says that an assistant professor at Harvard gets $140,000 as annual starting pay, equivalent to Rs 23 lakh, and Indian School of Business (ISB) pays over Rs 20 lakh to its APs. Against this, an IIM-A AP gets only Rs 5.5 lakh as starting pay annually.

A major concern of the the IIM-A faculty council is that if institutes of excellence are not given special status, the faculty-student ratio in these institutes could suffer. To retain the ‘top notch’ faculty in the institute they have to be given enough reason to stay. “Till the sixth pay commission, we were given the status of being premier, even though we did not have salaries. But now there is neither,” said a faculty member. One of the recommendations is that the faculties should also get a scholastic pay of Rs 15,000 per month over and above their pay band and grade pay.

The memorandum urges that the pay divide be addressed if these premier institutions are expected to continue to have services of top notch faculty and avert brain drain. “The present notification will worsen the already existing crisis at the entry level AP (assistant professor) position and will cause additional problems at all faculty levels in the IIMs. The following analysis assumes that the HRD ministry would want the IIMs to attract and retain world class academic talent in these premier institutions and to enable the expansion of the IIMs and that the revised pay scales are intended to be a significant contributor to this purpose, says the memorandum.

PAR-FECT SALARY
A Harvard assistant prof gets $140,000 (Rs 23L) as annual starting pay, but his IIM counterpart gets a meagre Rs 5.5L

The IIM-A faculty members want a scholastic pay of Rs 15K per month besides their pay band and grade pay

IIM-A memorandum to HRD

IIT faculty to go on hunger strike today

Hemali Chhapia I TNN

Mumbai: Faculty members across all Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) will resort to a hunger strike on Saturday. They are protesting against the ministry of human resource development’s failure to re-examine the pay structure that was designed under the Sixth Pay Commission.

“We are extremely disappointed and hurt by the recently announced pay scales. IITs have long been regarded as pillars of excellence in higher education. Instead of giving recognition to this fact, the government has offered a pay package that is not helpful in filling the shortfall of faculty in IITs,’’ said Kishore Chatterjee, joint secretary, IIT-Bombay faculty forum.

Faculty members fear that with such “unattractive’’ pay scales, even existing staff may consider other options, “resulting in a dilution of the high standard that the IITs are maintaining today’’.

On August 23, IIT teachers from across the country had submitted a memorandum regarding their minimum expectation to the ministry. “We had also mentioned that if the government did not come up with a new notification addressing concerns of IIT faculty by September 4, we would hold a day-long fast at the premises of IIT Bombay on the Teachers’ Day, September 5. Contrary to newspaper reports that appeared on September 3, there has not been a satisfactory resolution to the problems highlighted in our memorandum,’’ added a press note from the faculty forum.

Faculty in other IITs will also see similar hunger strikes on Saturday.

Teachers in twenties play professor & pal for students

Sharmila Ganesan-Ram | TNN

Mumbai: Studying animal behaviour is not the only reason zoology professor Conrad Cabral allows his students to eat in the classroom and at times raise a racket. For Cabral, who completed his MA in zoology two years ago, these are liberties that lead to evolution. Perhaps that’s why, after a particularly exhausting lab session, the 29-year-old brings out his laptop to play computer games with the boys, discusses Britney Spears with the girls and occasionally accompanies the bunch to the nearby burger joint.

To his students, Cabral, who walks into St Xavier’s College in jeans and T-shirt, is as much professor as friend, for the generation gap is negligible. This dual role is characteristic of all who belong to the small but significant population of teachers in their twenties. While more elderly professors are treated like parent-figures, younger teachers are thought of as siblings or friends. “In class, I command respect. Outside, I am their buddy,’’ says Cabral, who interacts with his students on SMS, email and blogs.

Some senior teachers may turn up their nose at his lenient ways, but Cabral, who uses powerpoint presentations in most lectures because “I can’t draw’’, has other twenty-somethings for company. These teachers don’t demand pin-drop silence or subject students to fiery lectures if they are late.

“If a lecture of mine is boring, students don’t mind telling me so,’’ says 29-yearold Deepak Mathew, professor of psychology at Wilson College. When he joined in 2005, Mathew was fresh out of college and didn’t want to appear strict to students. So, “I went to the opposite extreme. I wouldn’t pull them up for
not paying attention,’’ he recalls. Two years later, he found the middle path. “Now they call me a taskmaster,’’ says Mathew, whose success stories include a dyslexic student initially reprimanded by many for choosing psychology. “She was among the top five students in that batch,’’ recalls Mathew.

Although not a lucrative profession, “there are many advantages like respect, job satisfaction and timings,’’ says 21-year-old Anushi Chaturvedi, who has just completed her first term (six months) as visiting faculty for Ruia’s media programme. For her subject, ‘Features and opinion’, Chaturvedi subscribed to online newsletters and encouraged students to analyse and compare stories. If they didn’t submit assignments on time, students would flood her inbox with apologetic SMSes. Chaturvedi, who will shortly fly to the UK to study journalism, says being almost the same age dissolves inhibitions. “Once, we had a good laugh over a daily sex advisory column,’’ she recalls.

Speaking the language of the youth, “Hinglish or other language cocktails’’, helps. “If they see somebody who talks, dresses and looks like them and is more in tune with their experiences, the ice is easier to break,’’ says Gauri Sarda, psychology lecturer at SNDT, Matunga. She uses modern examples like the Queer Azadi march, the MTV Roadies show and the latest nail-polish ad to talk about how media influences behaviour. Since, “I am perceived as a single woman who may have similar problems,’’ says Sarda, students freely broach subjects like ex-boyfriends without fear of being judged.

Although the fear of being taken for granted haunts this tribe, it isn’t all that easy to pull the wool over their young eyes. One boy in 24-year-old Suman Kalra’s class of media students constantly listened to music on his I-pod. “One day I fired the hell out of him,’’ she recalls. Another time, in reply to a student who directly copied from the internet for a project on the East India Company, Kalra emailed him a PDF document of the internet page. “You have to draw the line somewhere,’’ she says.

Sometimes, the line is automatically drawn. When 29-year-old Saravanan Vijaykumar, who joined the faculty of IIT-B three months ago, plays basketball, students ask him “Which year?’’ After he clarifies, “The ball always comes to me.’’

Psychology professor Deepak Mathew (right) with his students

CBSE plans independent body to grade its schools

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Mumbai: The CBSE board is all set to help you out. The board is planning to set up its own national accreditation body to grade CBSE schools across the country. The body will be an independent one and will consist of experts in the field of education.

Those present at a recent CBSE board meeting say there were plans to grade schools on various parameters, and not just academics alone. “The board may not even give schools one single overall rating. Instead, schools may be get separate grades for the various parameters, like sports,’’say board sources.

The board is also mulling over a proposal on new schools, whereby all schools wh i ch have recently started will have to run for three years and get themselves accredited before they get CBSE affiliation. Board officials, though, say there is no clear time frame for setting up this accreditation body.

Mumbai parents have given the move a thumbs up. Commenting on CBSE’s plan to give accreditation to schools, parent Shaira Shaikh says “This is a fantastic idea. It will certainly help us choose appropriate schools for our children. I had a tough time when it came to searching for schools for my eightyear-old son. If CBSE implements this policy by next year, it will be easier to zero in on a school for my daughter.’’

The Maharashtra government too had been weighing a proposal to grade its schools. A parent of a student in a state board school suggested a common accreditation system for schools across the country.

Some schools in Mumbai had at one time even sought ISO certification as a measure of quality.

Reexamine the Exam System in India

Gasper D'Souza

The HRD Minister, Kapil Sibal, succeeded in pushing through his proposal to abolish class X exams for the Central Board. The plan was approved by a high-level body on education.

According to the plan class X exams will now be optional for students who wish to continue in the same Board. Instead, stress will be placed on comprehensive and continuous evaluation so that education standards do not suffer. Students who wish to switch to State Boards after the class X could take the optional online test.

Not Welcome

The news should have been welcomed by parents and students alike. After all, both have, for long, been subjected to the pressure cooker Board Exam system. It has become a sieve that separates the 'grain' from the 'chaff'. Lives have been lost when crestfallen students have sought the quick way out of the ignominy of failure in the Board Exam.

But, surprise, surprise! Many schools and parents in Goa expressed scepticism over the move. They felt no accountability would be fixed for poor performance.

A parent is quoted to have said, “We will lose control over the child. This system will not work in India where education is still the means to ensure a job.”

School Dropouts and Financial Lures

Now consider another recent report. Educationists are concerned over the drop out rates in government schools, especially among girls. Attributing this to economic factors they have implemented a scheme where every girl child from a family with less that Rs 150,000/- annual income will receive Rs 2000/- per year.

The report states that last year Rs 13,98,000 was disbursed.

I won't get into the merits or otherwise of financial lures for development. But this is bull. Drop out rates are high not just because of economic factors (although this is a factor). The problem with education in India is that the entire system is flawed and needs urgent overhaul.

Singular Goal:

From Standard I itself, students are geared towards the singular aim of passing the Term exams. Everything else is secondary. Why, my 4-year old who is in kindergarten comes home with two pages of written homework daily and has 2 “exams” a year. Sports, art class, singing class, drama whatever are mere frills that adorn the syllabus. The primary goal of education is “pass that exam” else you're worthless.

But parents feel that by removing the exam system, the competitive edge of students will be lost.

More than Removing Pressure

Abolishing the Board Exam is not about removing the pressure on students. Of course training in tackling pressure is important. You don't need the Board Exam for that. These have only served to encourage rote learning in the months just before the exam. All of this, only to forget everything a few days after the exam.

By making Class X exams optional and putting the emphasis on year-round evaluation, the HRD Minister has taken a step in the right direction. But this is a baby step. I hope Mr Sibal does not stop at this. State Boards must follow suit. Unfortunately, the Goa Board has already announced it would not adopt this system.

Re-examine Exams:

Going further, the very concept of exams should be changed to mean year-round evaluation as opposed to single term exams from Standard I. This will ensure rote learning is discouraged.

But there's more by way of overhauling the system. In opposing the optional Class X exams for CBSE, principal of the Navy Children's school at Chicalim said, “Standard X is the checking point for students. That is where they decide which stream they will get into.”

This is the other major problem with education in India. While focus is on exams, individuality is lost.

And the people in the houses
All went to the university,
Where they were put in boxes
And they came out all the same,
And there's doctors and lawyers,
And business executives,
And they're all made out of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same.

- from the song Little Boxes by Malvina Reynolds

Encourage Individuality:

Students should be encouraged to take up subjects that interest them, right from their early years instead of waiting until Class X. And more importantly, subjects should be presented in ways that will encourage curiosity. After all, curiosity builds interest.

I was never a lover of History in school. In fact, I detested the subject. But later on when I saw popular films like Man in the Iron Mask, Schindler's List and the like I was drawn to study the historical background of these films. Now in the media, I routinely find myself looking up topics on civics, economics and politics. And yet, I graduated in Chemistry in college!

So what are we really trying to “teach” our children?

Leo Babuta, over at Zen Habits has a great post titled “Education Needs to be Turned on its Head”. He terms the current education model as flawed and calls for “un-schooling”:

“Mostly because it is based on the idea that there is a small group of people in authority, who will tell you what to do and what you need to know, and you must follow this obediently, like robots. And you must not think for yourself, or try to do what you want to do.”

The Future Workplace:

Today, more and more people work independently and this trend will continue as companies seek to become leaner and cost effective. More people will freelance for multiple companies. And in doing so, we will need to learn continuously and, more importantly, on our own.

I already find myself spending a major part of my time researching and learning online – on my own, without a teacher or employer.

Are our schools preparing our children for such a scenario? If not, when they are finally out there on their own they will become like little boats without rudders.

Those in power in education must see this reality and step out of the way of children as they continually seek to learn – on their own. This is the innate ability of all children before it is destroyed in the process we call “education”. Mr Sibal, in his reforms should hopefully have this in mind.

A TONGUE FOR AN EYE

Vision device helps the blind to see by converting visual information to electrical pulses that stimulate the tongue

Scientists have created an electronic vision device that helps blind people to “see” using their tongues. The device, called BrainPort could dramatically enhance the quality of life for people affected by blindness.

The extraordinary technology works on a principle known as sensory substitution.

Brainport, which resembles a pair of sunglasses attached to a plastic lollipop, takes pictures filmed on a tiny camera, and turns the information into electrical pulses, which can be felt on the tongue.

“We see with our brains, not with our eyes.” declared the late Paul Bach-y-Rita, a US-based UW-Madison neuroscientist and inventor of BrainPort.

He proposed that visual perception in the brain could be restored using an alternate sensor and input source, such as a digital camera providing visual signals through the tongue.

Tests have shown that the nerves send messages to the brain, which turn these tingles back into pictures. Users describe it as pictures drawn on their tongue with champagne bubbles. With fewer than 20 hours training, users can perceive shape, size, location and motion of objects in their environment. Its users have revealed that they can make out household objects, and even read signs.

“One guy started to cry when he saw his first letter,” News.com.au quoted William Seiple, research director at Lighthouse International as saying.

The scientists behind Brainport say that learning to picture images felt on the tongue is similar to learning to ride a bike. The control unit allows users to zoom in and out and control light settings and electric shock intensity.

The device could be available for sale later this year following FDA approval.

“It enables blind people perceive their surroundings. They cannot necessarily read a book but they can read a sign.” said Robert Beckman, president of Wicab, developer of the BrainPort device.

Erik Weihenmayer, who used a prototype of BrainPort to climb 21,500 feet on Mount Everest recognises the revolutionary implications of the system. “It gives children and adults a better chance of being in the thick of things instead of listening to life go by.” he said. AGENCIES

1) Brainport captures video and converts it into electrical pulses on the lollipop 2) The control unit converts the image into a format compatible with the 600x600 electrode array 3) Erik Weihenmayer used BrainPort to climb to 21,500 feet on Mount Everest

Playing Tetris increases gray matter

LONDON: Playing Tetris may help increase brain efficiency, says a study published in the open access journal BMC Research.

Researchers from Mind Research Network in Albuquerque, US, examined the effects of practice in the brain using two image techniques.

Dr Rex Jung and Dr Richard Haier, co-investigators in the Tetris study, made use of brain imaging and Tetris to see if practice makes the brain efficient because it increases gray matter.

Jung, a clinical neuropsychologist, said “Recent findings in brain research have shown that juggling practice increased gray matter in the motor areas of the brain.”

“We did our Tetris study to see if mental practice increased cortical thickness, a sign of more gray matter. If it did, it could be an explanation for why previous studies have shown that mental practice increases brain efficiency.” he added.

Haier, lead author of a previous research that discovered practicing Tetris led to greater brain efficiency, added “There was a difference in cortical thickness between the girls that practiced Tetris and those that did not. But how a thicker cortex and increased brain efficiency are related remains a mystery.” ANI

BRAIN GAME: Tetris

Tomorrow’s innovators unleash new ideas

Amrita Nair-Ghaswalla | TNN

Mumbai: Fifteen-year-old Varun Vasudevan from Bangalore was ‘cheesed off’ with the constant power cuts. He dreamt of uninterrupted power supply sans cables, on the lines of Wi-fi.

Pune-based Tejas Modak wanted a device to track and erase air pollution. Pranjal Chaubey of Lucknow dreamt of smart utensils that would indicate the nutritional value of each meal.

Crazy stuff ? Not exactly, if today’s dreamers turn out to be tomorrow’s innovators. In a bid to develop technologies for a better tomorrow and ignite the power of ideas, Intel teamed up with The Times of India to enable consumers come up with futuristic solutions for today’s problems.

The ‘Innovators of Tomorrow’ contest invited participants to share their vision of how technology could change lives. Ten people were felicitated for dreaming it big.

So, while Nikita Wankhede from Nagpur dreamt of a ‘substitute planet residence’ based on the basics of a satellite revolving around a bigger planet—to combat the growing population on earth, Sachin Chalapati from Hyderabad ideated on a process where water molecules could be transported in nano level jets in designated streams so that there would be no wastage.

Modak dreamt of an unmanned craft orbiting the earth that would convert pollutants like carbon monoxide, sulphur dioxide and nitrogen oxide into fuel, to power its flight around the earth. “The function of the craft would be to monitor and map the maximum emission areas and suck in pollutants,’’ Modak said. “As long as the craft is up there, pollutants could be checked. And the day it ran out of fuel, the earth would have been rid of its pollutants,’’ he added cheekily.

Could it be done? Are the ideas too far-fetched? “Not at all. All the ideas are feasible,’’ said Ryan Lemos of Akamai Technologies, whose ideation of a software to convert a written story into a full length movie, could well be under production, with a little help from private equity investors. As Navin Shenoy, V-P, Asia Pacific at Intel noted: “We had asked for the most wackiest of ideas, and were pleasantly surprised at the overwhelming response.’’ Over a threemonth period, the ‘Innovators of Tomorrow’ campaign received 22,000 entries from across the country.

From home-makers to IT professionals—even an IIT Kanpur aspirant—contenders came from every walk of life. Rather than classify them as “fit for the loony bin for their out-of-this-world crazy idea’’, 10 of them were shortlisted and felicitated as inventors. As Prakash Bagri, marketing director, Intel added, “Innovation is not quick or simple, nor easy to come by. We wanted to communicate the ‘science’ behind innovation, which is core to any firm’s long-term success. And since the idea was to fire the passion of an imaginative mind, the contenders turned out to be superstars in their own right.’’

Winners of the ‘Innovators of Tomorrow’ contest organised by Intel and The Times of India

THE HEAT IS ON

UN endorses India on climate change

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

New Delhi: For the first time, a UN agency has endorsed India and developing countries on the climate change front. In its World Economic and Social Survey Report 2009, the UN said rich countries had consumed more than their fair share of carbon space and needed to take deep emission cuts if the new climate agreement was to be equitable.

The survey said investments in energy infrastructure would have to be doubled from the existing $500 billion per year to $1 trillion and there was a need to spend approximately $20 trillion by 2030 to move the world to a low carbon growth path.

The report, released on Wednesday by Sunita Narain, director of Centre for Science and Environment, warned that industrialised countries had already emitted 209 gigatonnes of carbon. If the rise in global temperatures was to be kept below 2°C, industrialised countries would have to reduce their emissions by more than 100% below 1990 levels by 2050.

At present, industrialised countries have not agreed to reduce their emissions by even 40% below 1990 levels by 2030 and 80% by 2050.

Releasing the report, Narain said: “The report makes it clear that to avert climate catastrophe, industrialised countries have to take deep emission cuts and the developing countries have to participate. But in this new global deal, the participation has to be conditional on transfer of technology and funding.”

The report, coming months before the critical UN negotiations lead to an agreement in December at Copenhagen, could provide another weapon in the Indian arsenal when it asks the rich nations to bear the burden of their ‘historic responsibility’ in emitting greenhouse gases.

The UN survey pointed out that in a fair deal, industrialised countries should only occupy 21% of the global carbon budget. But it added that even under the most ambitious proposal from the rich nations, they would end up consuming 48% of the budget, at the cost of the poorer nations.

The report also recommended a global clean energy fund, a better carbon trading mechanism and a forestrelated financing mechanism.