1. Hemlata Chari PhD
University of Mumbai
1/12/2011

2. Introduction
This session is in Three Phases
Firstly a brief introduction on India and Higher
Education in India
Second Phase is on Maharashtra-Regional hub
Third phase walks through the University of
Mumbai Current trends and Challenges in ODL
IDOL-A department of University of Mumbai
and its present role in Implementing ODL-OER
for a M.A Education program

3. Theme: OER
M.A (Education) student’s training through
ODL : The University of Mumbai
Experience
Challenges and Achievements
Theme: OER , M.A Education
Sub Theme: Implementing Online learning
using OER & MOODLE

4. INDIA
India is a country of diversity
Present scenario of higher education is
overwhelming.
Second populous country of the world
Growing imbalance between the intake of
students and those seeking admissions
India follows a 10+2+3 pattern in Education

5. Historical Background of India
After 1947, the post-independent
state promoted education as an
instrument of social development.
As a result both the central and the
state governments encouraged the
establishment of universities and
colleges in their areas of
jurisdiction.

6. Contd---
Today there are around 300
universities and equivalent
institutions together with 13,000
colleges with 8.8 million students.
Though such an expansion has
democratized higher education, (40 per
cent of students are from low socio-
economic strata together with 35 per cent
being women).

7. This has increased the reservoir of
scientific and technical professionals, it
has given rise to numerous problems
including the most important of them all:
state dependence for funding.
India is the current hub for
technological growth
Higher Education at Crossroads

8. Implications for Higher Education
 Social entrepreneurship in education on the
rise
 Ground-up developments can impact
institutionalized, top-down processes
 New incentives necessary for established
players
– New qualifications?
– What of quality?

9. Globalization
Globalization has changed radically
the structure of higher education as
the trade in this service now
crosses national boundaries.
Earlier education encouraged the
movement of people across borders.
Thus in order to access quality
education, there was migration outside
underdeveloped regions such as India.

10. Now education migrates from its location
to new locations in search of partners for
collaboration.
This change affects not only the
organizational structure of institutions of
higher education, especially in countries
like India, but also the way institutions of
higher education perceive education, and
thus reorganize their authority structure.

11. In the case of India ONE should
consider the changes in the shift in
demand for applied education
especially in IT & Computer Science
areas as an opportunity .
Since globalization is inevitable , India
is looking to build on the existing
resources. IT thus has a positive
impact on a country like India wherein
education is limited to few.

12. Main Objective to enforce
Technology
It acts as a catalyst in expanding the
potential users of higher education,
because as a technology it has a potential
to make education truly democratic, and
give opportunity to students in remote
areas and from deprived communities to
have access to education.
Mobile is one such device that has
reached almost every house in India

13. Growth of Distance Education
Five Stages
Correspondence-print
Print + Audio+Television
Satellite based education
Computer -internet based education
Open Educational Resources- Using
various resources

14. Influence of Peters model in
India
Peter(1998) revisited his theory of
industrialization.
Peters looks at globalization
Peter asserts that there is a need to
balance the teaching-learning process
Hence a learner centered approach

15. Peters model of Industrialization suits
the Indian condition.
Currently India has 13 open
Universities plus one National Open
University-IGNOU
221 Distance Education Institutes,
Catering to mass population of
students who opt for distance
education

16. The Third Generation: the
freedom culture
Third Generation of Distance Education
refers to the Freedom Culture
Freedom to use
Freedom to study
Freedom to redistribute
Freedom to modify and reshape
Richard Stallman

17. Maharashtra
Total Population in Maharashtra— one
crore
One Open University -YCMOU
Mostly catering to the regional
population
Hence Dual Language of Delivery-
English and Marathi
Cities that contribute effectively in
Higher Education: Pune, Nashik,
Nagpur, Mumbai and Aurangabad

18. Maharashtra
Third largest state in India with about 1.2
Billion population.
Literacy ate-7.0%
Highly Industrialized state, Financial
capital of India
2/3RD is farming
Mumbai-State capital
Population-approximately one million
people

19. Mumbai
University of Mumbai-the
oldest 154 years old
SNDT Women’s University is a
women’s university
www.mu.ac.in

20. University of Mumbai
54 Departments in its fort and Kalina
campus
IDOL is a distance education institute
affiliated to the University of Mumbai
Our Vice Chancellor’s vision of integrating
Technology based teaching learning
Making the university a paperless
university

21. IDOL
14 PROGRAMS
APPROXIMATELY 80,000 STUDENTS
ONLY COMMERCE stream has AROUND 15,000
Challenges in dissemination , creating course
materials translation and evaluation/
assessment.
Started online admission and hope to conduct
online examination for few professional courses
Mismatch between the available full time
academic staff on campus with those of student’s
taking admissions

22. Implementing ODL in Teacher Education
IDOL
. Teacher education has seen tremendous transformation
in the use of Technology, specially with colleges offering
B.Ed programs in English.
This is supported by investment in ICT-projects supposed
to strengthen student teachers active learning
processes.
The off-campus-students face problems with
understanding the purpose of collaborating on-line with
students they met every day and also with participating in
learning activities in an asynchronous situation.
In Maharashtra the numbers of students registered for
Graduation program in regional Language is high

23. There is difficulty faced in getting the
course materials translated in Marathi the
regional language. The other major
concern is most of the international
reference books are in English; it is
difficult for them to enhance their skills
and understanding in the subject area.
SPECIALLY WITH REFERENCE TO
RESEARCH

24. IDOL (Institute of Distance and Open
Learning),University of Mumbai has
proposed to collaborate with IIT-Mumbai
to engage students actively a group of
students teachers actively by
incorporating spoken tutorials , OER &
MOODLE in the second year of their Post
graduation program in the area of Open
and Distance Learning.

25. ODL-OER,MOODLE
Recently IDOL have started training of
faculties using OER for development of
course materials.
Number of workshops and training
programs are held.
Implementing online teaching from Dec 7th
our M.A Education course goes online

26. Maintaining Quality in
implementing ODL-

27. Challenges faced
Infrastructure
Power in semi urban areas
Trained faculties
Technical support system
Students Issues and Concerns
Dual mode
Visit to main campus for getting hall
tickets, study materials—
Lack of materials in Marathi

28. Future/Vision
In a short time after taking over as Vice
Chancellor (VC), our current VC has taken
a number of effective steps in the
implementation of ODL.
He was earlier the VC of YCMOU-Nashik
where he has made tremendous change in
DE

29. Implementing Interdisciplinary subjects
Collaborations with foreign university one
major collaboration recently took place is
with China.
Open Educational Resources a major step
in the right direction

30. References
Chari & Haughey(2006) Administrative &
Implementations Issues at YCMOU-An Indian Open
University, pp 8-10
Peters O (1998) DE in a post industrial society. In
D.Keegan (Ed) :theoritical principles of de, London:
Routledge
www.mu.ac.in
www.mu.ac.in/idol
Eclipse.mu.ac.in
Magnum.mu.ac.in