New India Manifesto –  Chapter 9: Degree Restraint Transformation and Open Access Education

Term Explanation

Degree restraint transformation refers to the process of converting premium educational courses with a narrow passage, restricted access and large fee structure to economic and open-access education. The course curriculum will be more challenging, and the course will be longer than regular students to ensure the quality is enhanced and is better than traditional students. All courses that remove restraint are considered to be part of open-access education.

Class Timings

The students enrolling in such degrees must be allotted to different classes according to their convenience and options availability. Therefore, the classes are organized only for critical areas and practical subjects. The timings for these special classes will be as follows.

1. Night class
2. Early morning class
3. Weekend class

Students taking open-access courses should be ready to attend at any time for practical classes. The schedule of classes will be provided early. For example, if classes start at 5 am, they should be available at that time. Since there are only minimal classes skipping these classes would not be allowed.

Classroom classes must be avoided at maximum and converted to online classes. Students should be expected to be present only at practical lessons, assignments, and exam periods. The timings should be scheduled appropriately beforehand, and it cannot be a random decision to hold practical classes and exams.

College Availability

All existing colleges can earn more money by joining open-access education. They will get a part of the fees collected under open-access education. Open-access education functions outside of regular working hours and does not affect regular students in any manner. The total economic potential of a college is utilized by turning the college into a 24X7 learning facility.

In case existing private colleges are unwilling to join, public colleges can be used to run open-access education. In addition, new colleges built under Limitless Collegiate Education can also come under this open-access education.

No Entrance System

Under open access, the individual with a minimum qualification, such as plus two, should be allowed to join this, and there should be no limitation in joining the degree course. There should be no entrance system for the courses. However, if a humanities or commerce student joins for a science course, there will be an equivalent exam for the course for which there will be a minimum pass mark, and there will be no current model of the entrance system. Individuals with a minimum pass of that equivalent exam will be eligible to join the course and not a select few from the highest cut-off.

Duration and Curriculum

Additional course duration and at least 25 per cent added curriculum than regular students is essential for all open access courses. For example, Pharm. D is a six-year course and should be a seven-year course under open-access education. In the case of pilot programmes, combined courses with larger duration, such as seven years, can be created exclusively by merging aviation courses.

Fees

Since there is no accommodation, hostel fees and regular class tuition fees, the semester fees are minimal. The fees are mainly for practical classes, community programmes participation fees, evaluation of assignments and conducting examinations. If any external institution support is required, payment will be directed accordingly. Courses that require a course fee of 50 lakhs can be completed for less than five lakhs rupees.

Difficulty Level

The answer paper evaluation should be strict, and the curriculum should be more challenging than regular students. This will ensure that anyone who clears open-access courses is better than regular students in terms of academic knowledge.

Internship

Specific courses require an internship; for such courses, individuals must undergo an internship compulsorily.

Which Courses Will Come Under This?

Every course restricted today to entrance exams, such as MBBS, Engineering, and LLB, are the courses that will come under open access system. In addition to that, existing open courses and new courses will be added to open-access education.

Scheduling Examination

Students with an additional payment of fees can schedule an examination in case the student misses the exam.

Cross Stream Access

Humanities and commerce students are excluded from science-based courses all over India. Open access provides an opportunity for students from different streams without discrimination.

COVID Factor

A section will attempt to portray degree restraint transformation as an injustice to classroom education that affects the quality of premium courses. In that case, they need to look back to the COVID period, where students have more online classes than regular classes for the three years COVID period. All this time, premium education was accessible to the wealthy via online access. Open access courses will ensure that the poorest section can learn the most priced courses in India at affordable fees. In addition, the course quality and the strict examination system are upgraded for open-access courses.

Time Limiting Feature

If a person fails continuously, it is impossible to provide retests indefinitely, especially in premium courses such as MBBS. Such a low-quality doctor is a danger to society. So specific premium courses will be time-limited, whereby the person has to clear all subjects within two years after the course duration. Within this duration, the person can have four retests for such courses. The retest rules and completion period for regular courses already under open access can continue to be liberal.

What are the Additional Benefits for the Public Under This System?

1. No reservation system – This is open to every individual in the nation. To end the reservation system, open access education is essential. Once everyone can access everything, then there is no purpose for reservation. Lower caste communities will be the largest beneficiary under this system as they are economically backward and can access premium courses at affordable fees.
2. No upper age limit – No age-based discrimination is applicable for admission. However, if all regular students adopt this after school, it will be a disaster for the educational economy of colleges. So minimum age can be increased to 21 to ensure that students directly from schools do not join open-access premium courses. There is no upper age limit for any courses.
3. Economical – Every course will be many times more affordable than regular students.
4. No gender discrimination – Women who are ready to achieve in society can break the barriers of gender discrimination. Since all courses are available at the doorstep, every woman who wants to learn can join open-access courses.
5. Continue working – People can continue doing their jobs and learn along with their jobs.
6. No entrance system – The entrance process limits and categorizes individuals and discards the remaining.
7. Humanities students can learn science subjects.
8. Choice of Location – Currently, under the MBBS entrance examination, a person from Kashmir may be admitted to a Tamil Nadu college. This does not happen under open-access education. The nearest college of the person is available to that individual, and the person needs to travel only a limited distance to attend exams and practical classes.

GST

All services in India should come under the GST system, even if imposed for namesake purposes. Taxes can be made minimal for certain services to ensure the least burden. However, not collecting taxes from certain services should not be allowed. Open Access Education should come under a 10 per cent service tax.

Education Validation Portals

Since many fake degree holders can pop up by faking their degrees due to easy access to education under open access education, the education validation portals are essential.

In collaboration with all universities in India, the central government will develop education validation portals in which a particular course will have one specific website. A person who clears that programme will have his name, photo, and permanent id number related to that course uploaded to a website accessible to the public. This will ensure that there will be no fake lawyers or doctors, as their disguises can easily be unmasked using this website.

Special Note: This is the ninth chapter of the book New India Manifesto by Blessen T. Sam. The concepts introduced in this book are unique, and referencing the book and the author is appreciated. Support the hard work of the author to modernise India by purchasing a print copy of the book from Amazon or Flipkart.