Top educational institutions to offer courses online

NEW DELHI: In a move to improve access to higher education, top institutions have been asked to submit applications by the month-end to offer courses online, including those leading to a degree, from the 2019-20 academic session with students required to show up only for exams at designated centres.

The University Grants Commission (UGC) has invited higher education institutions to apply for starting online courses from January 7 to 31, 2019. While delivery of the courses will be online, the students will have to sit for exams where they will undergo biometric authentication.



Institutions can enrol Indian and foreign students and only those institutions in the top 100 ranks of the National Institutional Ranking Framework for the past two years and who are also accredited by National Assessment and Accreditation Council with minimum score of 3.26 on a 4-point scale are eligible to offer online courses. The gazette notification of the UGC (online courses or programmes) regulations, 2018, was notified on July 4, 2018, as reported earlier by TOI.

Some key features of the online courses are, according to a senior HRD official, “admissions will take place twice a year and a higher education institution will offer the same course it has been offering under conventional mode or the open and distance learning (ODL) mode. However, the delivery will be online. But the quality remains same and the exams will be conducted at designated centres where the students will be identified through biometric data they need to submit at the time of enrolment.”

All courses which don’t have practical components and programmes are not permitted to offer courses online or ODL mode.