Higher education reforms to boost AP's Innovation & Start-up Policy: CM

Newdelhi, April 5: Aiming to build entrepreneurs locally and create a culture of innovation, the Joint Working Group for revamping AP's Higher Education Reforms met to usher in reforms.

The Group consists of education experts and industry leaders such as B.V. Mohan Reddy, Chairman, Cyient Technologies, Dr. Krishna Tanuku, Executive Director-ISB, Dr. Sandhya Chintala, Vice-President, NASSCOM and Srini Koppula, Chairman, Hyderabad Angels.

The Joint Working Group aims to drive a series of reforms to bring out innovators and technology entrepreneurs among students.

'I believe that the reforms will take Andhra Pradesh closer to the dream of creating an enabling environment to have at least one home grown billion-dollar technology startup in the next five years.'

The Chief Minister added that the reforms will also give a major boost to the Andhra Pradesh Innovation and Startup Policy and help the state 'create a world-class technology start-up ecosystem by fostering entrepreneurship and culture of innovation, which contribute to increased knowledge, wealth and employment in the state.'

He said that the state is in the process of inviting global accelerators/incubators, providing world class shared infrastructure and funding access to budding entrepreneurs.

Under the chairmanship of Sumita Dawra, Secretary for Higher Education, Government of Andhra Pradesh, the Group reflected upon the following points:

' Curriculum upgradation to be taken up to make the course content industry-relevant. A Core Committee meeting will be held by 30th April to finalize and approve the changes suggested by the Universities

' Industry collaboration: A formal mechanism at University level has to be set-up for the industry to closely work with the academia.

' Smart campuses: All the universities to have wi-fi across the campus with a 1 GBPS to 10 GBPS internet speeds, and state will have 30 smart campuses and 100 smart classrooms. Along with high speed wifi, cyber security guidelines are being set-up to ensure safe and secure access.

' Credits to MOOCs & e-learning: Standardized content, and mechanism is being worked to deliver the MOOCs as electives.

' 7 Centers of Excellences (CoE): Universities to host CoE in areas such as Social Media, Mobility, Analytics, Cloud Computing, Internet of Things, 3D printing, and Automation of Knowledge

' Online exams to be conducted at least for one subject starting next academic year.

' Gap Year ' concept of Student Entrepreneur in Residence: Universities will introduce the concept of Student Entrepreneur in Residence. Outstanding students who wish to pursue entrepreneurship can take a one year's break, after the first year, to pursue entrepreneurship full time. This may be extended to two years at the most and these two years would not be counted for the time for the maximum time for graduation. Parents will also be sensitized.

' Mandatory apprenticeship: All educational institutions offering under-graduate courses shall implement a mandatory internship/ apprenticeship in the last year of the course in association with the industry. This may be waived off for students who are setting up their own Start-ups with incubator support. Universities to set-up an internal team responsible to dive the initiative.

' Credits to be given for research & innovation projects, and social projects done by the students. For the social work, attaching the students to smart villages to be explored.

' Communication and Soft skills: TISS is developing coursework. Courses will be delivered as part of the Choice Based Credit System

' Courses on Entrepreneurship: Courses on entrepreneurship and innovation will be introduced. Few courses taken for 3-4 years can be considered for awarding a minor degree parallel to the regular degree.

' Incubation centers in all Universities and colleges: Boot-camps to be set-up initially to start encouraging startups from within Universities/Colleges and incubators to be set-up in a phased manner

The state government will form sub-committees to implement these reforms and continuously update the progress to the Joint Working Committee.

Ms. Dawra said that these reforms are only the first set of reforms initiated by Higher Education Department to drive the Innovation and Start-up Policy of Andhra Pradesh.