XV
Challenges Facing Higher Education in India
Sumita Dawra
India has one of the world’s largest youth dividends, with about 140 million individuals in the eighteen to twenty-three year age group eligible for higher education (2011 GoI census). If this youth is not equipped with formal education and employable skills, India faces the risk of rendering them a liability rather than an asset for the nation. As a large proportion of this youth is increasingly going overseas to pursue higher education, so the nation now faces the policy dilemma of how to reform domestic higher education systems to compete with foreign universities and retain this domestic human capital. Towards this end, initiatives are being taken to overcome the various academic, administrative, financial, logistical and outreach challenges that the sector faces. Hence, the focus of the government is on equipping higher education institutes with trained and motivated faculty, industry-relevant curricula, merit-based leadership, centres of excellence, better budgeting practices, alternative sources of funding, and partnership with foreign universities and industry. Setting benchmarks through the National Institute Ranking Framework (NIRF) and policy reform to integrate multiple regulatory bodies into the Higher Education Empowerment Regulation Agency (HEERA) will also go a long way towards creating global standards in higher education. To summarize, in order to transform its higher education sector India needs to overcome the following challenges: encouraging research and innovation, attracting government and private investment, bridging the gaps between innovation policy and mentorship, and facilitating a quantum jump in the quality of higher education through curriculum upgrading, all of which need to be addressed by policymakers and practitioners.
Large Higher Education Sector
India’s higher education sector is one of the largest in the world, with a total enrolment estimated at 34.6 million. There are twenty-eight colleges on average for every 100,000 eligible people (i.e. in the age group of eighteen to twenty-three). With 799 universities, 39,071 colleges and 11,923 standalone institutions, not to mention an estimated 1.5 million teachers, India’s higher education network is indeed impressive. Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER) in the eighteen to twenty-three age group stands at about 25 per cent, with almost 80 per cent of students enrolled in undergraduate programmes.1
System Bypasses Large Number of Eligible Youth
However, despite strides made in setting up a massive number of higher education institutions, including premier national institutes, the improvement over the years in GER and the increasing participation of the private sector in higher education, the fact remains that a large number of youth in the country are outside the fold of the higher education system. Of the nearly 140 million young eligible population in the eighteen to twenty-three age group (2011 census), large numbers are excluded from the higher education system. This is not to say that they are undergoing vocational skill training either.
Funding Constraints, Infrastructure Gaps and Huge Variations in Funding
Funding is low and budgetary allocation for higher education at 3.6 per cent against the global average of 6 per cent leaves much to be desired. Most universities find it a challenge to fund basic infrastructure, such as big classrooms, laboratory facilities, journals and computers, leave alone building smart campuses with Internet access for all students. Similarly, funds availability remains a challenge with either no funds or delays in release of monies. This results in the universities not being able to operate and maintain facilities such as research labs or libraries in a timely fashion, and impacts the development of research and educational standards. Also, all over the country, there are huge variations in the availability of infrastructure and funding amongst the higher educational institutions. Premier institutions such as the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs), Indian Institutes of Information Technology (IIITs), Indian Institute of Science (IISc) and so on have developed multiple sources of income through research consultancies, research grants, industry research contracts, alumni and CSR funding, which allow them more liberal funding than most other institutions.2 At the same time, many universities in the state sector pay millions of rupees as pensions to retired faculty, but do not utilize the services of many of these retired faculty members who would be willing to take up teaching assignments on an outsourced basis, which would help fill huge gaps in faculty vacancies.
Unable to Self-Finance Beyond a Point
Universities receive grants from the University Grants Commission (UGC), state-budgeted funding and also regular fees from affiliated colleges on various accounts, such as examination fees. In view of increasing demands for funds from educational institutions and constraints on the state’s ability to fund the universities beyond a point, higher educational institutions are being encouraged to raise their own funds. However, few have got down to formulating the means to do so, through focused executive education programmes, for instance, or evolving PPP models for infrastructure development, industry collaboration for research or establishing centres of excellence by accessing funding under corporate social responsibility (CSR) and so on.
Indian universities can learn a lot in this regard through examples from the US. Since public funding to higher education institutes has declined significantly over the years, universities have adopted alternative sources of funding such as investments in endowment funds and online courses. This makes it possible for universities to raise their own funds and be self-sufficient. At the University of California at Berkeley only 13 per cent of the total budget comes from the state; till a few decades ago the share of state funds in their total budget used to 50 per cent.3
Quality of Education
Despite the size of the higher education system in India, the quality of education leaves much to be desired. There is no Indian institution of higher education (and this includes the heavily funded IITs) in the top 100 ranked institutes in the world. There are thirty Indian higher education institutes featuring in the top 1000 of the Times Higher Education Ranking, with the Indian Institute of Science being the topmost ranked Indian institute in the bracket 201–50. If we look at China, it has fared much better with sixty of its universities featuring in the top 1000 and its highest ranked institute, Peking University, at rank twenty-seven.4 While one recognizes that there are variations in quality, with premier institutes setting the benchmarks for the country, most institutes face challenges in terms of quality and motivation levels of teaching faculty and interference from local politicians. The people at the helm of affairs in these universities are not sometimes occupying their positions strictly on merit but on several extraneous factors.
Students’ gross employability ratio after graduation is woefully low at 7 per cent,5 while career counselling centres, attempts to institutionalize student internships with industry, or building a choice-based credit system (CBCS) and a semester system, which gives flexibility to students to pursue job-oriented courses, or gives credits for skills, is still not emphasized by most state governments. Curricula need to be updated to match the skill requirements of industry, markets and the service sector. For instance, the syllabus in information technology courses is not up to date with requirements of artificial intelligence, robotics, Internet of Things (IoT), automation, and so on.
In addition to the poor quality of teachers and infrastructure in many of the privately-run institutions, they simultaneously also tend to have poor oversight over their functioning. Review committees are often aware of private institutions failing to meet benchmark standards in their legal precondition assessment as required by regulatory bodies. Yet, there are instances of individual members of these committees being lured to lean in with their clearances for such institutions. Further, there are allegations of corruption in many universities, where PhD candidates are treated differently depending on how well the faculty guide is ‘taken care of’.
Leadership in Higher Education Institutions
Leadership qualities are seen lacking among the heads of many of the state-run institutions, and team building between colleagues for the holistic development of the institution remains a challenge for leaders who may feel insecure when surrounded by their academic equals or perhaps superiors. Besides, the transfer system among government college faculty remains a draconian measure to bring them in line, and they are shifted from one institution to another every few years, preventing any loyalty and attachment to any one particular institution. Even as teachers race to complete syllabi, there is an acute shortage of faculty, with vacant teaching posts estimated at 40 per cent of the total sanctioned faculty strength of colleges and universities.6 While massive online teaching courses are currently being encouraged, developing e-content and bringing students to use the Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), with creative use of flipped classrooms, they remain a challenge for both teachers and students.
Yet, all is not dismal as a high quality of education is imparted in premier institutes such as the IITs, the IISc, the IIIT, the IIMs, and the NIT, with some of the reputed universities also beginning to appear in international rankings.
Gaps in Innovation and Mentoring
In a world of innovations and start-ups, there are gaping holes in policymaking to build an integrated, institutionalized system of encouraging and incentivizing innovative ideas, providing mentorship through sustained involvement of industry and safeguarding IPRs. The leaders who run the institutions of higher education have enough autonomy to reform curricula, to go in for CBCS and the semester system, take up platforms of e-learning through building relevant parameters for faculty review, introduce peer review of teachers and other reforms. Yet, they stand guilty of not doing enough to deliver a qualitative system of higher education due to lack of mechanisms holding them accountable and answerable. There are, however, efforts being made to put in place such accountability measures. In Andhra Pradesh, several Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) have been identified for higher education institutes, the data for which are updated monthly on the CM dashboard. The ongoing process of evaluation of performance through these indicators means that the university leaders are held accountable to improve their KPIs. While efforts are being made to better streamline the process, a step in the direction to establish accountability for university leaders has already been taken.
Attracting Investments into Higher Education
Smart classrooms, which link institutes of excellence within the country and abroad, have become an important requirement for a system groaning under the scarcity of qualitative faculty. A limited number of quality institutions and teachers, and the absence of diverse course content has been resulting in large outflows of Indian students and is unlikely to stop unless India is able to transform its higher education.
Two quick ways of doing so are by inviting private and foreign investments into the higher education sector. State universities can explore opportunities for collaboration through joint programmes, dual degree programmes, collaborative research and other forms of partnerships to combine strengths from both institutions while at the same time sharing best practices to enhance the quality of state universities. Options like inviting foreign universities to set up branch campuses or research institutes here can also be exercised. This often raises questions of the impact on state universities and access for the less privileged students. Such anxieties, however, cannot be allowed to hinder progress towards higher education reform.
Andhra Pradesh Attracting Private Investments in Higher Education
Similar questions were raised when the Andhra Pradesh Private Universities Act was notified in January 2016. Care was taken by the state government to simultaneously strengthen state universities through means such as a government order to fill up long-standing faculty vacancies, propagation of online education, industry-relevant curriculum upgradation and introduction of choice-based credit and semester systems. At the same time, four state universities applied for and received the prestigious Times Higher Education (THE) and Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) world university rankings for the first time, boosting their brand value.
Premier national institutions of higher education sanctioned by the Government of India at the time of the state’s bifurcation in 2014 were expeditiously established with effect from the academic year 2015–16. Consequently, IIM at Visakhapatnam, IIT at Tirupati, NIT at West Godavari, IIIT at Kurnool and Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research (IISER) at Tirupati became functional. This established the state’s credibility in the implementation of a vision in higher education to transform itself into an education hub and benefit its youth.
In this environment that strengthened the public sector institutes of higher learning, the ball was set rolling to simultaneously attract private investments into higher education. This was initiated with a new act hailed as the most progressive private universities act in the country. The legislation allows for a lot of autonomy for Greenfield private universities, while defining strict timelines for the government to complete the process of permissions to private investors. Within ten months of the enactment, eight Greenfield university proposals were accepted, which are expected to bring in investments of USD 14 million over the next eight to ten years. The initiative will also encourage best practices through a network of academic and industry partnerships, infrastructure of global standards and autonomy to the universities, while ensuring accountability through a higher education regulatory authority. To ensure access for less privileged students, the authority shall ensure that the fee charged by the private universities is reasonable. Also, it is open for private universities and the state government to offer scholarships to meritorious students from less privileged backgrounds.
More examples emerge in India of the coexistence of private and state universities. Gujarat passed the Private Universities Act in 2009. Earlier this year, the Gujarat state assembly passed bills that have allowed four new private universities and two new government universities to come up in the state.7 The case study from Andhra Pradesh, where the Private Universities Act was passed in 2016, too, demonstrates how private and state universities can coexist and thrive. In addition, applying the twin strategies of resource-sharing of faculty, lab and research facilities, besides utilizing the large number of retired faculty members, would yield mutually beneficial results, and improve the supply side of the higher education sector.
Foreign Universities in India
Legislation regarding foreign universities that enables a ‘win-win’ situation for both Indian and foreign universities can see the emergence of higher education as a strong service sector segment that will attract larger numbers of students from Asia and Africa. This will result in forex earnings, more jobs in teaching and benefits to local economies. The Bay Area with Stanford and Berkeley and Boston city with Harvard and MIT in the US demonstrate the effect world-class universities can have on local economies. However, there has been a lot of resistance to foreign investment in higher education in India for fear that it will benefit only a small elite section. At the same time, the requirement for universities to be ‘not for profit’ institutions limits the scope for foreign investment in the country.8
As such, the question of keeping education affordable should not trouble the public as state universities can continue to be strengthened, and attracting offshore campuses of premier international universities to India will only provide boost to a possible ‘Study in India’ campaign, and to the economy at large.
Identifying Key Universities to Develop as World-Class Institutes
The time has come to identify key universities in India, facilitate generous funding (perhaps through CSR) and enable them to establish themselves as world-class universities. Such universities should also be allowed greater levels of foreign collaboration than possible under present regulations. This would ensure these universities emerge as institutions of high repute with strong links to socioeconomic research, serve the needs of local economic development, and design academic disciplines to benefit local area needs.
In this context, the Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research (IISERs) come to mind, which seek to utilize scientific research with the social sciences and humanities, to find solutions to socioeconomic issues. However, each university and college, and institute of higher education needs to adopt a similar approach, make themselves more relevant to local economies and foster innovations for local issues. That will create a unique body of research and innovations in these institutes, make them more relevant to the economy and help them strengthen funding as well, while improving the quality of teaching and learning and their own rankings.
Challenges in the Current Scenario
The current scenario in the higher education sector shows an improvement in GER, an impressive increase in the number of higher education institutions (at the rate of 9.6 per cent per annum during the Eleventh Plan Period) and increasing private sector participation (at the rate of 10 per cent during the Eleventh Plan Period).9 However, the challenge remains to take GER from its current levels of 24 per cent to 50 per cent by 2050. This will require a massive increase in investments in infrastructure, faculty recruitment, training of faculty, reforms in curriculum, and so on.
Other positive trends are seen in the increase in accredited institutions to 67 per cent as an impact of funding under the national programme of Rashtriya Uchchattar Shiksha Abhiyan (RUSA). Universities and professional colleges in India are being supported under the National Mission on Education for enhanced connectivity, content and access devices to educational institutions. Almost 400 universities and more than 18,000 colleges have received broadband connectivity under the programme.
Various programmes have been launched to strengthen research and development activity in higher education institutions. Grants to improve infrastructure, fellowships for doctoral and post-doctoral work, schemes for faculty development and promotion of research have been taken up by the regulatory body of the University Grants Commission. The Government of India also launched the GIAN programme for engagement of an international pool of academicians with institutes of learning in India to augment existing resources and raise the quality of teaching inputs. Initiatives have been taken under a newly developed National Institute Ranking Framework (NIRF) for infusing a competitive spirit among institutions of higher education while identifying weaknesses in the institutions, with a view to bring transparency and accountability in the system. A National Digital Library has been developed to increase the reach of books to millions of students for learning on the Internet. In addition to the above initiatives, the Government of India has also launched SWAYAM, which is a portal for free online education. Programmes like IMPRINT are aimed at addressing challenges in teaching science and technology.
Reforms for Qualitative Improvement in Higher Education
Reforms in the quality of education require interventions like reducing the number of affiliated colleges with each university, giving more autonomy to colleges, improving research and citations in universities and colleges, and building partnerships with private institutions that enable easy sharing of resources, whether pertaining to faculty or research-related infrastructure. Besides, financing models for universities will have to be fixed and regulated for access to greater funding from governments, multilateral bodies or industry. RUSA support may actually be focused more on institutions in remote areas that need the support rather than those that qualify on parameters of quality.
Further, public institutions need to focus on improving the standards of education imparted. This can be achieved through curriculum upgradation, adoption of CBCS and the semester system, regular teacher trainings, leadership and motivation workshops for teachers, foreign collaborations in research and teaching, adoption of massive online teaching with links to academic inputs from premier institutions within the country and abroad, getting industry experts to teach in universities and colleges, encouraging non-resident Indian (NRI) academicians to take up semester-wise teaching in India as visiting faculty or through online courses, encouraging visiting professors from foreign universities and so on.
Internationalization of Higher Education
Emphasis on internationalization of higher education through a curriculum that matches the best global standards, flexible faculty exchange programmes, collaborations with foreign universities, attracting foreign students to courses that are relevant, and setting up dedicated hostels, with good standards of accommodation and food, for foreign students would go a long way. For building new knowledge in Indian institutions, regular and relevant upgrading of curricula is extremely important as is targeting skills being demanded by an increasingly changing industrial and technological scenario. Encouraging institutes and students to involve themselves in local problems and build innovative solutions will encourage industry to come forward to support research and innovation in these institutes.
Good Governance in Higher Education
India needs to raise the educational standards right from schools, improve governance and introduce a professional approach in educational systems. It needs to have a national-level, data management system for enrolments and monitoring of results, outputs and outcomes. There is a recent policy announcement on integration of regulatory bodies like All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) and UGC into a single regulatory body, doing away with multiple agencies, and giving clarity to new institutions in higher education. HEERA is a legislation that is awaited for establishing an independent body setting global standards for the sector.