Difficult Dialogues 2019 ends on a high note

The fourth edition of Difficult Dialogues 2019 ended on a high note here with the platform witnessing a series of discussions on education and its myriad facets. International experts, academics, leading thinkers and policy makers talked on the crucial factors affecting education in contemporary times during the final session on Saturday.

New threats to academic freedom, curriculum and pedagogy and role of technology in reshaping the education system were some of the topics taken up on the last day of the two-day annual conference. "While there is freedom in matters like choice of courses and papers to publish, the biggest threat is the stifling of freedom of expression to voice opinions that are not popular with the government authorities. Unfortunately, such incidences are on the rise," the panellists said.

The panel was represented by UGC Vice Chairman Bhushan Patwardhan, Dean, O P Jindal Global University R Sudarshan, Paul Flather from the University of Oxford, UK and others. It also suggested to start critical thinking and freedom of expression modules in schools itself, free speech memorials on campuses and encourage media to celebrate academics who are brave enough to raise their voices against the stifling of freedom of expression.

The panel on 'Curriculum and Pedagogy' underlined the need to "create curriculum material in local languages, resist politicisation of text books and the involvement of specialist institutions to develop such books". On the role of technology in reshaping the education system in India, the panel headed by Prof Rajive Kumar (Advisor, AICTE), G P Phondke (former director, NISCAIR), Ashoka Misra (former director, IIT Bombay), among others said teachers and students in certain pockets still resit technology when it comes to teaching and learning.

"The biggest problem facing the education system is the ever-growing population which is making the teacher-student ratio skewed. The transformation of the education sector is a must for which technology is an essential requisite. The challenge is to use technology that benefits the masses instead of creating elite pockets of excellence," they said. It was also argued that often knowledge was available, but educators were not equipped or ready to use technology to their benefit.

"Long distance internet-based learning programs like flipped classrooms i.e. learning from videoboard lectures by eminent professors have been launched. These need to be popularised across disciplines. They should also be translated so that those studying in regional languages can be benefitted from such a step," the panellists added.

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