UGC panel recommends academic sessions in colleges & varsities to start from September

April 25: The nationwide lockdown augmented by the outbreak of coronavirus pandemic has brought life to a standstill. Along with all other establishments, educational institutions throughout the country are also shut from the mid of March 2020. Amidst such a situation, University Grants Commission (UGC) appointed panel has recommended that the next academic year in colleges and universities should be pushed to September, instead of the traditional mid-July start for higher education.

Infact, the UGC constituted two committees to look into the issues of academic loss and online education in the wake of the lockdown in the country due to the coronavirus pandemic. As per sources, one panel has recommended that the academic session be started from September than July. The second panel has suggested that universities should conduct online exams if they have the infrastructure and means or wait for the lockdown to get over and then decide a date for pen-and-paper examinations.

A committee set up by the UGC and headed by Nageshwar Rao, Vice-Chancellor of the Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU), to look at online education has advised against mandatory online examination by universities, citing the “diversity, local environment, composition of students and preparedness of the learners, current infrastructure and technology support”.

Apart from the delay in the new semester, the report said that the panel has recommended taking the year-end or the semester-end exams, that could not take place due to the lockdown, in July. The UGC is expected to frame some guidelines on university examinations as well as the new academic calendar as per the report submitted by the committee. The guidelines are likely to lay down “the outer time limit” and the government will expect the universities to start the new academic year by then, as per a report by the Financial Express.