NPTEL ties up with Glass Industry to reach out to budding civil engineers, architects on efficient use of glass in Construction
-Navneet Kumar Gupta
IIT Madras to provide content for course, which is first-of-its-kind to be offered as a MOOCs in an open learning mode in India.
NPTEL (National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning) is a joint initiative of the IITs and IISc. Through this initiative, we offer online courses and certification in various topics.
%20Prof%20R.Nagarajan,%20Dean%20(International%20&%20Alumni%20Relations),%20IIT%20Madras,%20C.N.%20Raghavendran,%20Chairman%20of%20Glass%20Academy%20Advisory%20Board,%20Prof%20Bhaskar%20Ramamurthi,%20Director,%20IIT%20Madras%20&%20Prof%20Andre.webp)
The National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning (NPTEL) has tied up with the glass Industry to reach out to budding architects and civil engineers with the objective of creating awareness on efficient use of glass in construction sector. Judicious and appropriate usage of glass is crucial to achieve energy efficiency in any building.
Being taken up with the involvement of Indian Institute of Technology Madras, NPTEL aims to take this course to 1,600 colleges and educational institutions in the country. The initiative will provide the industry perspective and practical use of glass in the market. The course taps into a niche area, uncommon in academic circles as in spite of advancements in ‘glass’ space, there are few, if any, formal academic courses that educate budding civil engineers and architects on efficient use of glass.
NPTEL, IIT Madras, entered into an MoU with Glass Academy Foundation on 20th February 2018. The MoU was signed by Prof Bhaskar Ramamurthi, Director, IIT Madras, and Padma Shree Awardee C. N. Raghavendran, Chairman of Glass Academy Advisory Board, in the presence of Prof R. Nagarajan, Dean (International and Alumni Relations), IIT Madras.
[post_ads]
Along with other IITs, IIT Madras will provide content for this course, which will be first of its kind to be offered as a MOOCs in an open learning mode in India.
Speaking about the MoU, Prof. Andrew Thangaraj, NPTEL coordinator at IIT Madras, said, “Collaborating with the industry is the next step for NPTEL to bridge the gap between academia and industry and make college graduates more job ready.”
The first joint activity would be to co-offer an online certification courses in the July-Dec 2018 Semester, targeted towards Architecture and Civil Engineering students. The possibility of offering internships and job opportunities to top performers of the course(s) are also being actively explored.
Highlighting the importance of the tie-up, Mr. Raghavendran said, “Traditional materials have been the subject of study and training for decades. However, modern day glass as a material in construction is yet to become a subject of study and training in academic institutions. Our association with NPTEL will strengthen further by co-offering and co-certifying our courses as an elective to Architecture and Civil Engineering students.”
NPTEL is one of the most successful inter-institute collaborative educational efforts in India today. Funded by the MHRD, it has been offering Online Certification Courses since 2014. The current semester has 227 courses on offer with a learner enrolment base of over 9.8 lakh.
Glass Academy Foundation, a not-for-profit company, works to be an industry-professional-academia-interface to impart knowledge and skills amongst the various stakeholders in the glass eco-system.
NPTEL is trying to widen the breadth and variety of courses offered, where this will be the first step towards including industrial perspective and inputs along with academic content from faculty in the IITs.
NPTEL as a project originated from many deliberations between IITs, Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) and Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) during the years 1999-2003. A proposal was jointly put forward by five IITs (Bombay, Delhi, Kanpur, Kharagpur and Madras) and IISc for creating contents for 100 courses as web based supplements and 100 complete video courses, for forty hours of duration per course. Web supplements were expected to cover materials that could be delivered in approximately forty hours. Five engineering branches (Civil, Computer Science, Electrical, Electronics and Communication and Mechanical) and core science programmes that all engineering students are required to take in their undergraduate engineering programme in India were chosen initially. Contents for the above courses were based on the model curriculum suggested by All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) and the syllabi of major affiliating Universities in India.
------------------
Navneet Kumar Gupta is a science communicator working as a Project Officer (Edusat) in Vigyan Prasar-National institute of Science communication under the Department. of Science & Technology. Govt. Of India. He has deep interest in popular science writing for general public through Print and electronic media. Besides his twelve books, he has written more than 200 popular science articles. He has edited/authored/co-authored more than 10 books. He have been awarded six National Awards including Rajbhasha Award, Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India He has had a long stint as Associate Editor, VIPNET news - a popular science magazine. You may contact him at - ngupta@vigyanprasar.gov.in