GNDU Conducted One-Day Principals Meet
A “One-Day Principals’ Meet” was conducted at the UGC-Human Resource Development Centre, GNDU, Amritsar. As many as 60 Principals of colleges affiliated to the University as well as its constituted colleges participated in it.
Prof. R.S. Bawa, Vice-Chancellor, Chandigarh University, Chandigarh presided over the inaugural session. Prof. Bawa in his inaugural address enlightened the audience about the challenges being posed by the advancement of information technology to the teaching fraternity as a whole, particularly, to the heads of the academic institutions.
Laying emphasis on imparting the ICT skills to the teachers of today, he opined that it is a prerequisite to satisfactorily meet the expectations of today’s generation, which is becoming more and more techno-friendly in comparison with the older generation. In such an emerging situation it is becoming imperative to bridge the widening gap between the requirements of the students and the competence of the teachers. The possible remedy for it is to introduce the short term courses in the ICT for the teachers of all the disciplines in order to make them competent in this domain in addition to the existing refresher courses in the various disciplines, he opined. Another challenge, which he identified, was the changing teacher-taught relationships in the present era thanks to the unprecedented advancements in the ICT.
Expressing his deep concern over the declining reading habits amongst the younger generation, he counseled to introduce ‘book reading competition’, in the educational institutes to inculcate the habit of book reading. The SWOT analysis is a must not only for any institute, but also for an individual to scale newer heights, he concluded. Prof. T.S. Banipal, Dean College Development Council and the Coordinator briefly shared the theme of the Meet, which is, he described as to provide a single platform to them to deliberate on the current issues related to the higher education. Prof. Jatinder Singh, Director of the Centre made them aware about the establishment of Faculty Development Centre in the University and its aims and objectives. Earlier Prof. R.S. Bawa was accorded a formal welcome.
