There are a host of support services required for students in a typical technical institute. This presentation highlights importance of such services at IIT Delhi

1. Student Support and
Progression: IIT Practice
Dr S G Deshmukh
27 June 2008
ISTE Conference on “Engineering Education” (ISTE-Con-2008 Coimbatore)
Residency Hotel, Coimbatore
Organized by ISTE Delhi and Anna University , Coimbatore

2. Outline
• Need for Student
Support System
• Implications for
Quality Assurance
• Various mechanisms
at IITD
• Experience sharing
• Concluding Remarks

3. TEACHING &
LEARNING
PROCESS
Curriculum
Teacher
Material
Facilities
Learning –
Methodology
Students
Learned graduates
Qualified graduates
Leaders, managers
A Simplified Education
System

4. TEACHING
&
LEARNING
PROCESS
Curriculum
Teacher
Material
Facilities
Learning –
Methodology
Students
Learned
Graduates
Qualified
Graduates
Leaders,
Managers
E
Quality Control in
Education
DROPOUTS

5. Mini-education system
IITs
Students/
Student bodies
Faculty
Administrators
Council/
Board
Govt.
Regulations
Curriculum
Facilities

6. Micro-education system
Students
Faculty
Curriculum
Facilities

7. Role of QA
• IIT system : High quality raw material through
JEE
• Value addition : Through Teaching-learning
process
• Instead of QC, why not QA?
• Role of students , faculty and administration
• Student as : Product of quality system or as
customer ?
• Students perceived as co-producers !

8. Why bother?
• Because we want superior performance from
students
• To enhance teacher-student relationship
• To improve quality of education
• For competitive advantage of our industry
• For an energized committed technical
manpower
• To manage change through our ambassadors
• Because we recognize interdependence
between students and teachers !!

9. Need ?
• Highly competitive breed as inputs
• Students coming from diverse backgrounds
• Coming out-of-shell first time !
• Before the course- Adjusting to hostel and
academic life –beset with Interpersonal ,
communication and cultural problems
• During the course- Handling of Peer pressure
• After the course- Role of alumni !

10. Philosophy
• Flexible curriculum
• Progression at appropriate pace
• Various stakeholders in the process
• Involvement of Dean (student), Dean
(UG/PG), Wardens, Student bodies and
alumni
• Need for counselling

11. Support Mechanisms
Formal Mechanisms
– Student Counseling Cell (SCC)
– Board of Student Welfare (BSW)
– National Resource Centre for Value
Education in Engineering (NRCVEE)
Informal Mechanisms
• Hostels/Clubs
• Societies (Dept, Professional, Cultural)

12. Support Services:
Student Counseling Cell(SCC)
• SCC of IIT Delhi stands at the interface
between the academic and non-academic lives
of the student community.
• SCC has befriended them,
– helped them understand themselves and their
surroundings better,
– enabled them to face up to their problems and work
towards the solutions so as to improve quality of life
on the campus
• Based on the tenets: Understanding & Care

13. SCC
• SCC is a comprehensive, professionally
staffed service which seeks to help
students effectively manage
– developmental tasks, situational crises and
personal problems that may interfere with
academic, personal and career goals.
– Cell offers short term counseling, crisis
intervention, and consultation

14. SCC: Background
• The need for evolving a mechanism that would offer personalized
care to students was perceived almost as soon as the Institute was
established.
• At IITD, an institutional mechanism to take care of the special
needs of the student community in the most crucial years of their
life. The special needs of the student community seen as falling
within the purview of the SCC include the following:
– Challenges of initial adjustment to an alien environment
– Demands of a rigorous academic programme in a highly
competitive atmosphere
– Pressures of graduating into adulthood and apprehensions about
the life ahead of them.
– Professional challenges

15. Role of mentors
• Mentors are experienced students (3 , 4 or
5 years) and look upon mentors as:
• advisors, who have career experience and share
their knowledge
• supporters, who give emotional and moral
encouragement
• models of identity, who serve as academic role
models
• help the student to seek help from the
faculty/counselor depending on the situation

16. Why student come for
counseling
• Low self-confidence
• Finding, helping, or losing a relationship
• Getting along with peers
• Puzzling or distressing emotional states
• Self-defeating behaviors
• Controlling use of alcohol and drugs
• Studying more effectively
• Life purpose and direction
• Making better decisions

17. Counseling service
• While helping the students come to terms with the challenges of
growing up, intellectually and emotionally, it also inculcates in them
the spirit of self help and, in the long run, self sufficiency.
• Senior students have a major share in the responsibilities of the
SCC. Apart from the fact that they can empathize more easily with
the fellow students, being an active part of the SCC offers them an
opportunity to grow in one more direction.
• Counseling Team
• SCC functions with the implicit support of the Institute: the students,
the faculty and indeed the entire campus community.
• Two wings: the UG and the PG wings, each headed by two Student
Coordinators who are assisted by Assistant Coordinators and
Student Guides.
– Each Student Guide has a Faculty Counsellor of his choice attached to him. The
academic monitoring is done by the Departmental Faculty Counsellors.
– They look after the students of their respective Departments who have been
identified as academically deficient by the Senate.
– The much needed parental touch is provided by the Counsellor and the Faculty
Incharge /Head of the SCC.

18. Action
• Ensure for the new entrants, a smooth transition
from home to an impersonal hostel life.
• The preparations for the new session begin
soon after the end of the second semester every
year.
• An Orientation Programme is organized for the
fresh entrants
• Rigorous "introductory sessions", as they are
euphemistically called, generally conducted after
midnight by the senior IITians. SCC plays a
monitoring role at such sessions.

19. Salient features of these initiatives
• Participatory and inclusive approach
• Encouraging role of senior students
• Collaborative efforts of faculty and
students
• Being residential campus, lots of
opportunities for interaction !

20. Rigor of IIT academic system
• About 180 credits to be earned for B Tech
degree : considerable load !!
• From “Coaching environment “ to “Self-
driven” and competitive environment
• Peer and societal pressure
• Flexible system : Accelerated
Load/Reduced load/Summer term/Self-
study/

21. Help rendered
• Academic Counseling
SCC monitors the academic performance of those students who are not able to meet
the adequate academic requirements. Every concerned course instructor participates
in this process by highlighting the scores (grades) and attendance data of the
aforesaid students. These students are extended additional assistance whenever
they indicate the need for it. The Service also provides guidance to students
regarding the Slow Pace Programme.
• SRC: Student Review Committee (meets twice a semester) to review the cases of
academically weak students. It consists of Head of the Dept, and Faculty members
•
Emotional Counseling
The Service provides assistance to help students sort out their problems, be it of
personal or emotional nature or related to adjustment in a different environment here.
The faculty counsellors and the student volunteers have themselves experienced
some of the problems at some point in their life; therefore have an idea about how to
tackle them. Approaching them can be the point where a profound shift for the better
begins. For students facing serious emotional difficulties, the Service arranges
professional counsel and personalized psychiatric assistance. Strict confidentiality is
maintained here at the Counselling Service.

22. Help rendered (contd)
• Financial Assistance
The Service arranges for financial assistance to the needy students in the
form of loans and scholarships from the Students' Benevolence Fund (SBF).
English Conversation Classes
The Counselling Service also arranges for the English Conversation
Classes for the students facing problems in conversing or expressing in
English, at a very nominal fee. The problem is acute especailly studnets
coming from Hindi belt such as Rajasthan, MP, UP etc.
•
Orientation programme
An Orientation Programme for the freshmen is arranged at the beginning of
the session to acquaint them with the facilities, services, personnel, rules
and regulations of the Institute. The Student mentors , the student
volunteers attached to the Counselling Service, help the newcomers on
campus to settle in the new environment. Faculty Counsellors are also
assigned and act as local guardians for the students to share and discuss
their academic and other interests, aspirations and problems and make
them feel at home.
• Special needs of PG students

23. Support Mechanism 2:
Role of BSW
• Board of Student Welfare
– Elected representatives from students
– Faculty acting as coordinator
– Off line and online services available
• BSW Online Counseling/Feedback Form.
• Dear Student you can use this facility to send your
any problem to us.
• Problems related to Academics, Hostel, Health
Finance etc are welcomed. Students are also
requested to give their name and hostel along with
the message.

24. • National Resource Centre for Value Education (NRCVE) at IITD
• Rapid progress in science and technology has been accompanied
by alarming increase in value degradation
– ecological imbalance,
– increase in inequity, crime and violence.
It has, therefore, become imperative to sensitize the youth,
specially those in IITs towards these issues.
This need gets further strengthened by the strong linkages between
the nature of technological developments and the value orientation
of a society.
Consequently, on one hand they invariably contribute to
strengthening of the materialistic worldview, with all its ill effects,
and on the other hand their own personal development remain
stunted.
Support Mechanism 3
Role of NRCVE

25. Mission of NRCVE
• To identify, develop and disseminate
techniques by which engineering
students and practicing engineers can
be motivated to imbibe human values
and appreciate their impact on
technology development, professional
ethics and human welfare.

26. Mandate of NRCVE
To create an awareness in the technical community that skills and
human values are essentially complimentary; and to integrate the
training in technical skills seamlessly with education in human
values, in the process paving the way for reorientation of
technological developments for catering to humanistic needs rather
than materialistic greed.
• From 2004-05, many steps were taken by the institute management,
some of them jointly with NRCVE to curtail unhealthy interaction and
promote a healthy one.
• Subsequently each hostel was asked to make a presentation of their
feedback as well as suggestions for further improvement. This has
become a part of on-going series of Workshops on “Fresher-
Senior Interaction”
• Such workshops in collaboration with SCC and at the hostel level

27. Looking Ahead
• It is heartening to see that the SCC and BSW continues
to attract the best of students volunteering to work for it.
This is our hope for the future.
• However, it is also true that the faculty participation in
the SCC activities has come down noticeably over the
years.
• Of late, complaints have also been heard about the
students not being as forthcoming as they used to be.
The increase in student intake in the near future is not
going to make matters easier either.
• There is a need to invigorate the SCC/BSW to prepare it
for the future challenges.
• The first step towards this goal is to recognize that we
are all a part of the counseling team.

28. Sprit of support services
–I'm just a fellow mortal who makes you
realize
–That you have the key to all your
problems.

29. Remarks..
• Participatory and “student centric”
approach
• Involvement of students and elected
bodies
• Support from top
• Multifaceted role of Teacher : Guide,
Philosopher, Friend, Coach, Counselor
• Enabled by TECHNOLOGY

30. Quality assurance…
–Watch their feet , not their lips”

31. Thanks for your patience
deshmukh.sg@gmail.com