News Scan
`AICET will be fair and transparent'
Admissions to the medical, engineering and other technical courses under the management quota for 2004-05 would be done in a "fair and transparent" manner and students would be admitted only on the basis of their rank in the Common Entrance Tests (CET), a top official said in Chennai recently.
The admissions would be done only on the basis of merit as per the rank obtained in the CET, Justice S. Mohan, former Supreme Court Judge and Chairman of the All-India Common Entrance Tests (AICET) Committee, said.
All the infrastructure facilities for conducting the CET had been put in place and the examination would be held on July 10 and 11, he said adding that he would ensure that economically-backward and meritorious students would need to pay only Rs. 100 each for the application form and for the test.
Over 1,000 educational institutions had formed the All-India Medical and Engineering Colleges Association to ensure a coordinated approach and create a common platform for effective growth of higher education in the country.
The Supreme Court, in the T.M.A. Pai case, had categorically stated that private unaided self-financing institutions could conduct a common entrance test for the management quota.
The other members of the committee included the renowned cardiologist, K.M. Cherian, the former Dean of Thanjavur Medical College, V. Munirathnam, and G.V. K. Sinha of the Lingayat Institute of Management and Technology, Delhi.
Education loan interest
The United Bank of India has announced that it has reduced the interest rate on its education loan up to Rs 2 lakhs from 10 per cent to 9 per cent with effective from May 1.
The bank said in a release that the interest rate on loans above Rs. 2 lakh and up to Rs. 4 lakhs would be 9.50 per cent and for loans above Rs 4 lakhs, the interest rate would be 10 per cent as against the earlier 11 per cent.
There is a concession of 0.50 per cent if the interest rate was serviced during the study period, the release said.
Moreover, the Government of India has come out with a pilot scheme of 2 per cent interest subsidy on education loans up to a limit of Rs. 4 lakhs to bright and needy students for higher studies that came into effect from March 1.
The Bank of Baroda (BOB) has decided to provide a 2 per cent interest subsidy on educational loans up to Rs. 4 lakhs for higher studies.
With this subsidy, the effective interest rate stands reduced to 9.25 per cent, the bank said in a release.
The interest subsidy would be applicable to new accounts for a loan amount of Rs. 4 lakh and the period of subsidy would be the duration of the course plus five years, it said.
Students who have secured 60 per cent marks in the qualifying examination and whose parents' annual income does not exceed Rs. 2.5 lakhs would be eligible, the bank said adding the no collateral was required for such loans.
NIIT-Microsoft pact
The NIIT has joined hands with Microsoft to launch an IT skills enrichment program for faculty as well as students of engineering colleges and IT educational institutions.
Spread across 25 cities, the programme `Samridhi' will include interactive workshops with over 100 engineering colleges and IT institutes in which both teachers and students will get an overview of cutting-edge technologies like .Net, an NIIT statement said.
"This programme woul provide quality training to students and teachers in the top engineering colleges and educational institutions across the country," The Manager (Business Development), Microsoft Corporation India Private Limited, Punit Vanvaria, said.
The `free-of-cost' programme will help both the faculty and students to upgrade their current knowledge and basic development abilities, it said.
"With the lauch of Samridhi, we seek to synergise our efforts with NIIT under a formal skill-based learning programme," Vanvaria said.
Shortage of scientists and engineers in U.S.
The United States is facing a major shortage of scientists because very few Americans enter technical fields and because international competition is heating up for bright foreigners who in the past helped fill the gap, a Federal panel warned on Tuesday.
"I fear irreversible damage can be done,'' Robert C. Richardson, a Nobel laureate on the panel, told a news conference in Washington, adding that he found the personnel trends "quite disturbing.''
Warren M. Washington, chairman of the National Science Board, which released the report, said the United States was in "a long-distance race'' to maintain its edge in human scientific resources.
"For many years, we have benefited from minimal competition in the global science and engineering labour market,'' he said.
"But attractive and competitive alternatives are now expanding around the world.''
The solution, Washington added, is for the United States to work harder at developing its own scientific talent.
If left unchecked, the trends in technical employment will leave a dearth of scientists to meet the rising demand, the board said.
At best, it added, the number of U.S. citizens qualified for science and engineering jobs could remain level.
But interest in such careers is falling compared with elsewhere.
The 2004 Indicators say the United States now ranks 17th among nations surveyed in the share of its 18-to 24-year-olds who earn Natural Science and Engineering degrees, behind Taiwan and South Korea, Ireland and Italy. In 1975, it ranked third.
The new report shows that 38 percent of all the nation's scientists and engineers with doctorates are now foreign born.
But that inward flow is threatened, the board said, because of new limits on the entry of highly-educated foreigners into the country and increasingly intense global competition for their skills.
Visas granted to students, exchange visitors and other highly-skilled foreigners dropped from 7,87,000 in 2001 to 6,25,000 last year.
Visa applications have dropped as well.
At the same time, many other countries, especially in Europe and Asia, have realised that Science and Technology are key to economic growth and prosperity and are rapidly catching up to the United States in the pursuit of science excellence.
As a result, the numbers of foreigners who once came to the United States to do Science are expected to drop.
Printer friendly
page
Send this article to Friends by
E-Mail
Education Plus
Kerala
