Every teacher in the colleges must do PhD to upgrade their knowledge: Dr.Arun Grover

Ludhiana, March 25, 2016: Every teacher in the colleges must do PhD to upgrade their knowledge and Panjab University Chandigarh is ready to provide them every possible help in this regard. The Principals of the Colleges and teachers who have PhD degrees at their credit must come forward with the proposals to start Course work programme for Pre-Phd along with their list of teachers so that college teachers can be given the authorization to supervise the doctoral work of the PhD students.
These were the views expressed by Dr.Arun Grover, Vice Chancellor of Panjab University Chandigarh while presenting the key-note address in the principal’s conference at SCD Government College Ludhiana today. As many as 100 principals along with some faculty members from different colleges of Panjab University were present in the conference.
Dr. Arun Grover was in the city to interact with the principals and faculty members to have first hand assessment of the problems of the colleges so that appropriate measures for the quality enhancement could be taken.
While welcoming the principals in the conference, Principal, Dr. Dharm Singh Sandhu presented the agenda of the meeting which include, Compulsory NAAC accreditation of the colleges, Starting of the Choice Based Credit system in the Colleges, Guidelines of the RUSA and Skill development programmes for the students.
On the side lines of the Conference, Punjab Government College Professors Association, General Secretary, Dr. Ashwani Bhalla raised the issue of approval of the college teachers as PhD supervisor in the subject of commerce and management and apprised the vice chancellor that faculty of University Business School, Panjab University Chandigarh and persons at the helm of affairs of UBS are becoming the road block in the journey of starting research work in the colleges. Vice Chancellor assured that he will take every possible step to look into the matter and teachers in the colleges must form a consortium and come with the proposals to start pre-PhD Course work in their institutions convenient for the students. He said that his administration will not come in the way of growth of college teachers. Vice Chancellor said that after the implementation of 6th pay commission report and UGC regulations , there is no difference in the college and university faculty and both are at par as per their status is concerned. He urge the college teachers to work pro-actively to get excellence. The Dean College development council Panjab University Chandigarh assured that those colleges where recommendations have been given by the NAAC to start new courses will be given additional time to apply so that these courses can be started from the next academic year.
Many Principals of the Colleges raised the issues regarding ensuring uniformity in the pass marks in B.A/BSc and B.Com with B.B.A programmes. The vice chancellor said that university has to improve the academic standards and the minimum pass percentage in all the courses have to be increased to 40% instead to lowering it. Most of the Principals agreed on this agenda and were ready to enhance the minimum pass percentage. Dean Development council , Dr. Naval Kishore said that matter has been sent to faculty of Business Management and Commerce, for discussion and appropriate decision will be taken in due course of time.
Many Principals raised the issues relating to affiliation process, examination reforms and academic standards. One of the Principal raised the issue that with the Implementation of API Score there is a race among the faculty members to get points where quality is sacrificed. The vice chancellor said that it is our joint responsibility to address these issues to raise quality standards in higher education.