INVC NEWS
An eminent panel of academics, industry captains and social activists, today called for an urgent need to integrate industry and academia, while at the same time taking care to incorporate ethical aspects into course curricula, in order to ensure the development of quality human capital. At the fourth ISBF & LSE Annual Teachers Symposium held in the capital, the panel consisting of Dr. James Abdey, Associate Director, International Programmes, UoL and progenitor of the Data Science courses at LSE; Dr. Pronab Sen, former Chief Statistician of India and former Economic Advisor to the Government of India and Planning Commission; Vimlendu Jha, selected by CNN International as one of the six worldwide Change Makers and Nilay Arun, who was awarded the ET Youth Entrepreneur of the Year 2018, deliberated on the subject, “Deeper Industry-Academia Integration – a Pre-requisite for Quality Human Capital”.
The ISBF & LSE Symposiums, a collaborative effort between The London School of Economics & Political Science (LSE) and their Featured Teaching Institution, the New Delhi based Indian School of Business & Finance (ISBF), was organised around the overarching theme of “Empowering Post-Millennials by Future Proofing Learning & Counseling”.
The panel, which was a highlight of the Symposium, enthralled a 100-strong audience of eminent educators from across the city as well as other parts of the country. While Dr. Abdey stressed on the fact that there are certain disciplines that are more prone to academia-industry partnership when compared to others, Dr. Sen elaborated that this interface requirement was more pronounced for the Liberal Arts.
Nilay Arun, Managing Partner, Alaavo Ventures, who is himself a graduate of the University of London programmes, brought in-depth industry perspective into the human capital challenges faced in everyday business, while renowned environmental activist Vimlendu Jha focused on the need to localize and contextualize education to cater to the imperative needs of the community. Mr. Jha also stressed on taking such discussions to smaller cities across India.
The morning session saw a welcome address delivered by Dr. G.L. Tayal, Dean Academics, ISBF. Dr. James Abdey delivered the keynote address on creating future-proof graduates. Among other things, he said, “The future of higher education is highly dependent on keeping abreast with technological developments and more so their nuances in applications in order to inculcate quality skill in human resource.”
Dr. Jitin Chadha, Founder & Director of ISBF said, “The learned panel has drawn our attention to the ever increasing importance of deepening the connect between educational institutions and corporate firms, which will help build quality human capital.” Talking about the interface between LSE and ISBF and its importance with reference to Indian students, Dr. Chadha said, “LSE, being one of the leading Social Science research institutions of the world, provides one of the most updated academic curricula in the world, which benefits from LSE and its academics’ deep integration with industry. This proves a boon for Indian students, as they get access to this rigorous and application-oriented academic direction of LSE.”
Education directors, counselors, and academic coordinators from prominent institutions like Delhi Public School, Manav Rachna International School, Genesis Global School, GD Goenka Public School, Shiv Nadar School, among others, participated in the discussion.
The morning breakaway sessions had Pervin Malhotra, Director Career Guidance India (CARING) deliberating on psychological and career choice-related challenges faced by post-millenials, while Dr. Abdey put forward his views on embedding employability skills in classroom pedagogy. These were followed by the panel discussion, and then two more breakaway discussions led by ISBF and Dr. Abdey, on creating autonomous teaching, learning and assessment environments for students, and future-proofing careers in Economics, Finance, Management and Data Science.
The day ended with Dr. Chadha outlining ISBF’s pedagogical innovations towards inculcating and fostering a spirit of enquiry among students, along the lines of the LSE motto “to understand the causes of things”.
