Education is the ladder to development. No more a luxury, it’s a necessity in life. It is slowly becoming a basic need as every single person becomes aware of their right to become educated.
With such a huge population wanting to receive this fruit of life, it is necessary that the infrastructure and the quality of the education department in the country are up to standard. To ensure this, Commissioner, Collegiate Education & Technical Education at the Government of Telangana, Mr. Navin Mittal is bringing out new and exciting ways to make more people embrace the benefits of education. In an exclusive conversation with Indian Masterminds, he talks about the same.
NEED FOR REJUVENATION
The 1996 batch IAS officer handles both higher and technical education in the Government of Telangana. When he joined the department in 2018, he realized that the courses in the syllabus of degree colleges were outdated and not appropriate according to the time, due to which students were dropping out of colleges.
“I realized that the department required some serious rejuvenation. We made a proper plan for reorganizing and improving the courses. We also added optional courses which were not available to students initially. This resulted in a 43% hike in student admissions,” said Mr. Mittal.
FLEXIBILITY FOR STUDENTS
Mr. Mittal also gave flexibility to students in choosing their courses and subjects. He extended the choices to private schools and colleges as well.
“The net impact is that the student’s choices have dramatically improved. For example, earlier only 11 choices were available in a government college of Hyderabad but since last year, 53 combinations have been made available for them to choose from. The number has been growing further and has given us growth of 57%,” stated the officer.
EXTRA CURRICULAR ACTIVITIES
Mr. Mittal also came up with the idea to include extracurricular skills in the courses that would help the students become more ready to face the outside world. The curriculum has been revised to ensure that basic computer skills, communication skills, etc., are now available to the students to help them in their future endeavors.
‘DOST’
The officer has now bought in a common admission portal in the state called ‘DOST’ – Degree Online Services Telangana, which is a student-friendly portal, completely revamped to bring in facilities through which they will not have to go anywhere else to gain education-related services. Everything will be made available to them on their phone.
“We have added a face recognition software in it, through which students can authenticate themselves by just facing their phone. This has really helped students in taking admission in any college or course of their choice from their home only. It has also brought transparency in the admission process,” Mr. Mittal told Indian Masterminds.
Furthermore, the officer has also introduced an e-office in the department; this has led to everything getting digitalized and has made work easier for both administration and students.
ONLINE ACCOUNTING
To save students the hassle of carrying cash everywhere, Mr. Mittal has introduced e-payment methods and online accounting. Students can now pay their fees through online mode instead of bringing in cash.
“We are also developing a University Management System which is in process. In this, we will completely re-develop and re-integrate all the modules of the last two decades. We have also revamped our entire curriculum to make it more industry-friendly, with an increased focus on practicals so that students do well in their placements. The entire evaluation process has also been digitalized,” says the officer.
Mr. Mittal’s efforts to digitalize and rejuvenate the education department are proving to be quite fruitful for the students of Telangana.
