50% seats under convenor quota, rest for colleges

VIJAYAWADA:  The State government on Monday decided to allocate 50 per cent seats under convener quota and 50 per cent seats under college quota for higher education, with government stipulated fees only applicable to convener quota seats. As students from poor families get seats under convener quota, fee reimbursement from the State government will be applicable to them.

A decision to this effect was taken in a review meeting on higher education chaired by Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy.  The Chief Minister said education should be for the development and no student should suffer due to pressure to perform. He asked the officials to prepare an action plan for the implementation of Vidya Deevena and Vasathi Deevena schemes, which are meant to extend financial assistance to the students pursuing higher education. 

Officials apprised the Chief Minister of the reforms being implemented in higher education and their progress. In the current academic year, the classes could not be held physically in the colleges due to Covid pandemic, hence the classes were held online under ‘Anytime - Anywhere Learning’.  A total five lakh online classes were conducted so far. During the meeting, standards in the private universities, licensing systems and regulation were discussed at length. The Chief Minister said people opt for private universities assuming that they have better facilities and teaching standards.

“Officials have to check if standards are there or not and take stern action, if there are any discrepancies,” he said and emphasised the need for the private universities to obtain accreditation from the NBA and NAAC. Officials informed the Chief Minister about the progress of the construction activities for IIT Tirupati, IISER Tirupati, IIM Visakhapatnam, NIT Tadepalligudem campuses. The Chief Minister directed them to ensure there are no problems with regard to physical infrastructure including roads, drains, sanitation and power connectivity. He was also apprised of the progress in Central University in Anantapur. 

Technical edu
Taking stock of technical education, the officials were told to introduce new courses in polytechnics and pay special attention to the courses, which have more demand. Stressing the need for integration of different courses, the Chief Minister asked them to prepare guidelines for integrating courses in engineering, veterinary and agriculture courses. “All these courses should be job-oriented and polytechnics should be developed as job facilitating centres. The new courses should be introduced on a need basis,” he said. He said to improve skills among the youth, Skill Development Centres will be set up in every Parliament constituency, where those who completed their engineering, polytechnic can upgrade their skills further.