COVID-19: UGC to form expert committees for examinations & online education

To ensure that students don’t face any academic loss, UGC decided to constitute two expert committees.

The University Grants Commission (UGC), the higher education regulator in the country, directed the academic community to make productive use of the lockdown period in the wake of the COVID-19 outbreak. To ensure that students don’t face any academic loss, UGC decided to constitute two expert committees. While talking to the media recently, the UGC Chairman, DP Singh stated that the commission formed two committees to look after the whole education fallout that students are facing due to the spread of the contagious virus spread in the country.

Elaborating about the committees, the Chairman further added the two committees are set for examinations & online education. One committee will look at the aspects related to examinations & academic calendar. On the basis of recommendations of the committee, the Commission will issue guidelines for universities. 

With suspended classes, postponed examinations, and closed campuses, the education system of India came to a standstill due to the imposed lockdown for the containment of the virus spread. While fresh schedules of university exams are yet to be decided, schools are promoting students without exams. The learning process of the students is at stake. The first committee will analyses these challenges and come up with a strategy for UGC to work on.

Talking about the second committee, Mr Singh stated that the other committee related is to students, teachers and the education system as a whole. It is to promote online education which is need of the hour, as we need to maintain social distancing.

As we all know that various state governments are suggesting a further extension of the lockdown. The future is uncertain and no one is aware of the time the containment of the COVID-19 virus is going to take. Under this situation exploring different modes of online education is the need of the hour. The second committee will work closely on finding ways of creating interactive learning experiences online for students and continue the teaching-learning process through different ways such as social media, learning platforms, e-classrooms and more.

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