NPTEL WORKSHOP

To create maximum awareness among faculty members about NPTEL and its various initiatives IIT Madras organized a National Program on Technology Enhanced Learning (NPTEL) awareness workshop for SPOC on 2nd July 2016 at IC & IR auditorium, IIT Madras. Ms. Ashu Khurana, Assistant Professor, CSE Department with Dr. Jyoti Anand, Assistant Professor, Applied Sciences & Humanities Department represented Dronacharya College of Engineering, Gurgaon at the workshop.

The objective of workshop was to take up the queries of the SPOCs and enlighten the new SPOCs who have joined the TEAM.

The National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning (NPTEL), a project funded by the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD), provides e-learning through online Web and Video courses in Engineering, Sciences, Technology, Management and Humanities. NPTEL is a curriculum building exercise and is directed towards providing learning materials in science and engineering by adhering to the syllabi of All India Council for Technical Education and the slightly modified curricula of major affiliating Universities. It’s lectures utilize a multitude of facilities of the video medium such as chalk-and-talk, tablet writing, power point, two and three dimensional animations, interactive codes, etc. Each course comprises approximately 40 video lectures of about 1 hour duration. An online discussion forum is incorporated wherein students can post and review questions. Wherever applicable, course assignments, handouts, self-evaluation tasks, etc. have been integrated. Workshops are routinely conducted for institutes, students, mentors, etc. under the auspices of NPTEL.

The session began with a welcome address by Prof. M. S. Ananth, NPTEL Coordinator, IIT Madras. He stated that the NPTEL courses are not limited to any particular branch or year of study. Courses are available for every person worldwide who is interested in studying. He discussed that participants were gathered for sharing problems which they had faced during the January 2016 online course so that we could find out the best way to solve those issues.

Then next session was conducted by Prof. Pratap Haridoss, IIT Madras. He discussed the NPTEL online courses. He said that the online courses had been offering open online courses along with certification since March 2014. This online portal is of 10 Hrs, 20 Hrs and 30 Hrs courses of 4, 8 and 12 weeks period respectively in various engineering disciplines, sciences that included relevant exposure to tools and technologies currently being offered by NPTEL. Then he explained the benefit these courses at different level like how participants can improve their skills and knowledge by receiving quality instructions. Industry can also use the courses to reduce training time, broaden and refreshing the skills set of their employees.

Prof. Andrew Thangaraj took over the session. He started with the appreciation for all the local chapters and the SPOCs and motivated them further to do the grooming of the students with the same perfection. He took over the audience with features of the exam and asserted the fact that it’s a proctored exam with the certificate directly from IIT and also verifiable through NASSCOM portal. He discussed the percentage required for the certification and also told about the weightage of assignments and proctored exam.

Moving further, he explained the types and duration of the courses available. He also shared the past statistics about the impact of these courses and the percentage attendance in the examinations. He also shared the best practices of different colleges/universities which have adapted the NPTEL certifications in their curriculum.

Prof. Thangaraj also elaborated the benefits of NPTEL certificates. He stated that these certificates are very useful in placements and internship. NPTEL is also thinking to invite the top scorers for the internship at IIT Madras. Moving on in the same line, he told the audience about the process of establishing the exam center in their city and how to send a request to them.

Later on the session was taken over by Ms. Bharati who is also an active member of the NPTEL TEAM. She advised the audience of all the administrative requirements to be met online for the portal.

Prof. Andrew Thangaraj then invited the SPOCs and Mentors to share their experiences who scored best in January course. He appreciated DCE, Gurgaon for securing the second position in top rankers list in January 2016. They also declared that if performance of the students will be good and consistent then they will get a chance to go to IIT Madras for training.

Besides the noble job being done by IIT faculty, they all appreciated the marvelous efforts being put in by NPTEL back-end team including Ms. Kamala, Ms.Bharathi, Ms. Gayathri and Ms. Krishnaveni.

Some Glimpses: