JU favours exams, KU decides mass promotion

JAMMU: Amid the Covid pandemic which has put the routine academic activity out of order, the University of Jammu is of the view of conducting all examinations as against mass promotion based on internal assessment adopted by the University of Kashmir.
The Jammu University authorities have decided to put all postgraduate students, who were due to take exams, on a Multiple Choice Question (MCQ) format with Optical Mark Recognition (OMR) sheet. However, in case of the undergraduate students at the affiliated Colleges, a committee constituted by the government has submitted its report on Wednesday evening favouring examinations. The University is set to announce a formal plan of action tomorrow.
Recasting its cope up approach in view of ongoing pandemic, the University of Jammu has issued a revised academic calendar which considers the lockdown period as summer vacations. Depending upon the evolving situation, the Jammu University plans to initiate the examination process by middle of July and complete the process before end of August.
Meanwhile, the Kashmir University will not conduct the end-term examinations for the current and previous semesters this year and would promote the students based on continuous internal assessment in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.
"In a significant decision, the University of Kashmir, in view of COVID-19 pandemic, has decided that there will be no end-term exams for the current semester and the previous semesters where exams were due during the lockdown period," a spokesman of the varsity said.
He said the students will be promoted to the next semester based on internal assessment in tune with the University Grants Commission guidelines.
"The Heads of Departments in consultation with their respective Departmental Committees will decide the mode of internal assessment with a transparent and well-defined scale," he said.
The spokesman said the decision was taken in a special meeting of the advisory-cum-monitoring committee, constituted by the vice chancellor under the chairmanship of the Dean Academic Affairs.
The university had constituted the committee to assess and monitor the conduct of online classes, devise a strategy or a road map for the conduct of the examinations, devise the academic calendar under the prevalent conditions and formulate a plan for admission to various courses for the academic session 2020.
The varsity has decided to continue the online classes of the current semesters till August 15, 2020, and the teachers have been asked to take online classes on regular basis and also carry the internal assessment during the semester in tune with the strategy devised by their respective departments, the spokesman sad.
Addressing the meeting, Vice Chancellor Prof Talat Ahmad advised all the teachers to make best use of available communication technology for teaching and learning process.
"This is the time to turn the pandemic situation to our advantage by developing capacity for online teaching learning and assessment for the better future of our university and the students.
"We need not to lag behind when everyone is going online. Our motto should be to meet the deadlines and ensure degrees are awarded in time. We need to follow the examples of the best institutions of the country like IIT-Kanpur," he said.
The spokesman said for the examination of undergraduate courses like BA, BSc, BCOM, being taught at various government colleges, the Dean College Development Council in consultation with the Higher Education Department, college principals and the controller of exams would make the recommendations.
In another major decision, the spokesman said, the vice chancellor advised the departments to procure smartphones and notepads and make them available to the needy students who cannot afford these devices.
The devices can be issued to the needy students and collected back after use, he added.