Today the student enrollment at the University of Hyderabad stands at a little under 5000. Over the past year or so, I have been discussing with the faculty in various departments as to how we can increase this number. One thing is clear- there are no quick-fixes: its going to take effort on all our parts, and that includes the students who are already here as well.
One such effort is to prepone our entrance examination schedule, shifting the entire written examination process to the month of February. Admissions for the year 2013 will therefore have their entrance exams in FEBRUARY 2013.
Reputations are as much built by word of mouth recommendations as they are by high impact publications. And word-of-mouth endorsements come in bulk from students either literally or by example. Anyhow, we need to cover several bases, and so there will be a press conference (my first, by the way) on Tuesday the 18th of December, at the Hotel NKM’s Grand (in Khairatabad) at noon.
All our entrance exams will be held between 21 and 26 February 2013. Tell all of those who may be interested. And even those who may not. And apropos of that, the India Education Review and the online magazine Digital Learning carry interviews with me, a small effort to get some more visibility for the UoH…
The reports, in the Times of India, The Hindu Business Line, The New Indian Express, The Hindu, INN, Full Hyderabad, Education One India and Zimbio.
Share the links, spread the word!
Hello Sir,
Thank you very much for the head’s up! I have been frequenting the UoH site for a while now, and I thought I had missed the admission notification !
I believe the notification for the Entrance Exam isn’t out yet. I’d like to know whether the UG Admissions would have only a written/objective entrance test only, or whether there would be an Interview. Also, are there reservations (domicile/nativity for students from Andhra Pradesh) which would put a cap on the total seats available ?
Regards.
That’s a welcome idea. Not only should the entrance exams be held early, but the admissions too should be completed around 2nd week of July. By doing so the University would attract students from across the country who want UOH as their first choice and not as the only available option. I also request that the answer keys, marks scored by the candidate and the cut offs of the entrance examination be made available online so that the entire admission process is transparent. I laud the efforts of the VC in making UOH more visible and a happening place.
The marks scored, the answer keys and the cut-off marks can be easily obtained with a Rs 10/- fee paid for RTI. Not a big deal at all in my opinion.
One good way to improve the admission process is to combine our entrance examination with others (e.g., JNU admission exams). We can reach further this way. Our goal is to identify and select “good” students.
There may be few courses where we may not be able to combine the exams but they are really few in numbers and we can set up our own question paper for these courses only. The ideal goal should be to have one entrance exam for all the central universities. All will benefit and the (individual) financial burden will go down. The quality of the test will also improve.
Of course this is not going to happen. We have bullet-proof egos.
The entrance questuion paper, answer keys, marks scored by the candidate and the cut-offs are meant to indicate the performance level of the student and the overall level and degree of difficulty of the paper. Such a disclosure will let the students know where they stand and also allow them to rectify their mistakes for the subsequent exams. Not every student will have the time and energy to take recourse to RTI. Infact JEE, AIEEE ,WBJEE and other state entrance examinations disclose this information. JEE even puts up the scanned copies of the ORS to give the student an opportunity to check if there has been an error in the evaluation(even though it is computerised and time tested). It is only being fair to the student who painstakingly prepares and goes through the examination.
Well said…
That’s a good idea and I support the decision of the Vice-Chancellor. I would say that the admissions should be closed by the end of June and should see that the classes for the freshers too commence concurrent to the ongoing students. I fully concur with the views expressed by Ms. Nandita Das that the marks scored by the students in written test as well as in interviews should be made available on the website of the University. This will infuse confidence in the minds of prospective candidates that the University of Hyderabad is committed towards not only academics but also maintaining utmost transparency in admissions too. I strongly feel that the semester registration aspect too need be streamlined. I hope the Vice-Chancellor will make his best efforts in this direction also.
It is a double distilled myth that our intake is small because we are not getting enough good students. I do not know the originator but this appears to be a well rehearshed argument that I keep on hearing. Our admission stops at the knee of the bell-shaped curve. Anyway, how can one explain then the so-many repeat, improvement, retake (have I forgotten something?) examinations being conducted again and again? How come we take the best students and turn out mediocre products?
Some subjects are so specialized (whatever that may mean) that there are very few applicants to start with. But when the course was proposed, approved and started it was boldly claimed that this (specialized course) is the need of the hour! In the school of Life Sciences, our standard excuse was that our lab space is limiting… Now that we are scheduled (but I do not know when) to move to a brand-new spacious building, are we going to double our intakes? I doubt very much! We shall certainly find new excuse.
In my personal opinion, a good university shoule be able to take an average student and transform him into a better product (no offense meant!) for the open marketplace. We have failed in that.
There are several draconian anti-student rules in our books: we need to repeal them. Now is the time. It is a double shame when the administration uses them.
Sir,
I am a final year M.Sc. student in the School of Chemistry, University of Hyderabad. I would like to point out that the Ph.D. entrance exams for both SINP and BARC are on 24th Feb, 2013 and hence, it would be convenient if the entrance exams for UoH can be scheduled accordingly so that those interested can appear for all three exams.
Sure Sreetama. If you inform the Dean, we will ensure that there is no date conflict.
hello sir, glad to know about this. I am swarna madhuri of Intermediate second year(b.p.c), i here by want to get into your notice that practicals of intermediate are 5th feb to 25th feb so please give us a confirm date of I.M.Sc ug 2013 entrance exam. thank you you can reply me also to smk1296@gmail.com
In which case we will try to schedule our exams appropriately
The “earlier entrance exam” was received with a lot of relief from students. Date conflict issues were sort of sorted out with this change. However, it is with every ounce of displeasure that I could have gathered that I write this. The results for “call of the interviews” of some of the departments and centres in the university have not been released still!
I cannot seem to have peace of mind over this for a long time now, more so, because they were supposed to be released on 30th of March itself !
Also, the news about the results for the other subjects which have been released already have not even been mentioned in the university’s official website either. It is only because some of us know where to look have even identified this.
So earlier entrance exam or not, the results seem to taking the usual olden day’s time to be released !
We are at it Syawallini- I understand it will be just a few more days from the controller of examinations.
Honorable Vice Chancellor
Let me congratulate for successfully completing the selection process of this year admissions. Everything was fine but I have few things in my mind which I want to share with you. You have also mentioned that Reputations are as much built by word of mouth in one of your blog.
Sir I would like to your Notice one example of admission process at UOH.A candidate who stood 2 nd in the merit list in Department of Management ,school of Management at Pondicherry University is not qualified in the interview at School of Management in University of Hyderabad. We can be give many reasons like the candidate may not have performed well in the interview, he is JRF not JRF etc. But sir I ask why Uoh cannot Display Marks list on the website instead of putting the final selection list. UoH conducts so many workshops on RTI, human rights etc. and a simple thing like displaying Marks scored in entrance and marks scored in interview cannot be displayed on UoH website. My Humble request to you sir kindly display the Marks scored in entrance and marks scored in interview on the website so that the candidate knows their weakness and strengths and can improve in the next or other entrance exams. By displaying the marks scored in interview and marks scored in entrance a sense of justice will prevail in the student community and make the system more transparent.
I would like also to state that I am not questioning the integrity of any professors or the system at UOH. Our heads always Bow for our beloved honorable professors at UOH. I know you always do justice but sometimes it’s important that Justice done should be seen and felt by all. I hope I conveyed the message.
Regards