The semester will be further divided into trimesters (Express Photo by Kamleshwar Singh/ Representational)The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Ropar will hold the next semester entirely online due to the COVID-19 pandemic. While announcing the move, the institute said, “There is no compromise on the safety and wellbeing of students or the academics”.
All undergraduate and postgraduate students at the institutes including freshers will be attending the classes remotely for the upcoming semester. The decision has been taken by the senate – the governing body which decides matters on academic affairs of the Institute.
Registration of new BTech batch students will start from November 11. Induction programme for these undergraduate students and department orientation will be held from November 12 to 17 in the online mode. The online classes will be from November 18. The semester will be divided into two trimesters — the first trimester will end on January 29. The second trimester will begin on January 30 and will end on April 23 with online exams and evaluations, said the IIT.
Students have been asked to ensure that they have broadband or a 4G connection for streaming lecture videos and live discussion classes.
For online courses, the content will be sent to students in form of recorded lectures, content hosting, and content archiving. All evaluations will be conducted by the course instructors using online exams, term papers and presentations, in video assignments, pop-quizzes, take-home assignments and online viva-voce.
Material for all lectures will be sent at least one week in advance to students. For each lecture, faculty will also create audio or video content along with the written notes to be shared with the class on this platform. A web guide has also been prepared for the faculty to understand the initial preparation required for online classes.
The online semester will also give importance to continuous assessment in the evaluation process. The exact weightage for each component would be decided by the faculty and shared with the students right at the start of the semester, the IIT said in an official statement.