Introspection Series - 1
Introspection Series – 1
Yes today they ended. The day I have been waiting since long. I got rid of classes. Why was I waiting so much for them to be over? Was this what for I slogged IIT JEE. Let’s have a look at my journey from the first year when I entered IIT after cracking IIT JEE. Those were the days of ecstasy.
But the day you enter IIT the dents in this ecstasy start appearing. You begin with a long queue for registration. You raise a very valid question? Does this premier institute of technology can’t find a technology to save us from standing in such long queues after hours of journey while coming back from home? I seriously feel the problem could have been solved in one or two BTPs of students.
You have to stand in queues for security card, then for library card, then for bank account, then for hall card. Can’t all these departments cooperate amongst themselves and give us the same when we register for the first semester? Can’t we have a single smart card system? Doesn’t everyone need at least a security, library and a hall card? Then what’s the point in going everywhere separately and waste the energy of more than 600 students for the sake of a little bit of cooperation between these departments. This is for an Institute which has a staff of 3 per student. So, the institute can’t even complain they have a scarcity of staff.
Then you get shocked with the awesome mess food we have. I will talk about it later as this is a long topic and it would take another post to cover.
When you start attending classes another dream shatters. After attending classes I always had a question whether IITs get their IITJEE papers outsourced from somewhere else. The Programming and Data Structure course they had assumed that we all have completed a basic course in C. What resulted is, people who had some background in C managed to cruise away peacefully through the course and the rest struggled throughout the course to catch something from air in the classes. I agree there are time constraints. But what could have been a great initiative are, “catch up” classes for people who don’t come with a background in C programming. This happens in a lot of MBA Institutes where people who don’t come with a mathematics background are given a beginners course at the start of the course.
Then the world-class electronics classes in which, nobody could catch up with what the prof was teaching. About the electronics lab, I can definitely say that still 25% of my batch doesn’t know how to use oscilloscope properly.
Am I expecting too much? Yes, the IITs are pretty good when you compare with other engineering colleges in the country. But, when you see the quality of teaching at other US Institutes we lag far far behind. .
The courseware is clearly defined and up to date with the current industry practices in top foreign universities which is not so with many departments at IIT.
All the handouts and assignments are given on the course website. No need to take down the notes in the class. You don’t have to run to catch up with the professor and in the meanwhile loose something which you could never guess at the time of exams.
The courses focus on application not on the theory. In a world where everything from definition to the formula is available on Google why unnecessarily psyche people into mugging definitions and lengthy correlations. Instead isn’t it better to test people on the applications of the concepts taught on the classrooms. Most of the courses as you can see in US universities have open book exams. At IIT, very few of the professors who have done this, are considered to be the most appreciated and rigorous courses.
What really is more disappointing is some professors even repeat a lot of their questions in the exams which defeats the purpose of making people think originally.
Communication Skills of the professors at IITs definitely need some brushing. Yes, you may argue they are researchers, you do not expect them to be the best communicators. But certainly, they are professionals. If really somebody is really cared about it, it’s not that difficult, especially when most of them don’t take more than 6 contact hours.
The result is no. of people interested in engineering is dropping down. The Institute which gets a better UG intake then MIT, Stanford lags so much in producing innovative research. In a country like India, where the resources are really scarce, the returns that we produce on investments at IIT are abysmally less.
The whole system of teaching is so disappointing that many of us loose their real interest in engineering in a few days after we join IIT. Some become a part of the system and maximize their scores by going with the flow. Some leave the race and make themselves busy in other activities – constructive or time-pass. And this is very easy at a place where you have so many things to choose from. Everybody finally is at ease with himself and the Institute but what gets a setback is the T of IITs.
To be continued….
Yes today they ended. The day I have been waiting since long. I got rid of classes. Why was I waiting so much for them to be over? Was this what for I slogged IIT JEE. Let’s have a look at my journey from the first year when I entered IIT after cracking IIT JEE. Those were the days of ecstasy.
But the day you enter IIT the dents in this ecstasy start appearing. You begin with a long queue for registration. You raise a very valid question? Does this premier institute of technology can’t find a technology to save us from standing in such long queues after hours of journey while coming back from home? I seriously feel the problem could have been solved in one or two BTPs of students.
You have to stand in queues for security card, then for library card, then for bank account, then for hall card. Can’t all these departments cooperate amongst themselves and give us the same when we register for the first semester? Can’t we have a single smart card system? Doesn’t everyone need at least a security, library and a hall card? Then what’s the point in going everywhere separately and waste the energy of more than 600 students for the sake of a little bit of cooperation between these departments. This is for an Institute which has a staff of 3 per student. So, the institute can’t even complain they have a scarcity of staff.
Then you get shocked with the awesome mess food we have. I will talk about it later as this is a long topic and it would take another post to cover.
When you start attending classes another dream shatters. After attending classes I always had a question whether IITs get their IITJEE papers outsourced from somewhere else. The Programming and Data Structure course they had assumed that we all have completed a basic course in C. What resulted is, people who had some background in C managed to cruise away peacefully through the course and the rest struggled throughout the course to catch something from air in the classes. I agree there are time constraints. But what could have been a great initiative are, “catch up” classes for people who don’t come with a background in C programming. This happens in a lot of MBA Institutes where people who don’t come with a mathematics background are given a beginners course at the start of the course.
Then the world-class electronics classes in which, nobody could catch up with what the prof was teaching. About the electronics lab, I can definitely say that still 25% of my batch doesn’t know how to use oscilloscope properly.
Am I expecting too much? Yes, the IITs are pretty good when you compare with other engineering colleges in the country. But, when you see the quality of teaching at other US Institutes we lag far far behind. .
The courseware is clearly defined and up to date with the current industry practices in top foreign universities which is not so with many departments at IIT.
All the handouts and assignments are given on the course website. No need to take down the notes in the class. You don’t have to run to catch up with the professor and in the meanwhile loose something which you could never guess at the time of exams.
The courses focus on application not on the theory. In a world where everything from definition to the formula is available on Google why unnecessarily psyche people into mugging definitions and lengthy correlations. Instead isn’t it better to test people on the applications of the concepts taught on the classrooms. Most of the courses as you can see in US universities have open book exams. At IIT, very few of the professors who have done this, are considered to be the most appreciated and rigorous courses.
What really is more disappointing is some professors even repeat a lot of their questions in the exams which defeats the purpose of making people think originally.
Communication Skills of the professors at IITs definitely need some brushing. Yes, you may argue they are researchers, you do not expect them to be the best communicators. But certainly, they are professionals. If really somebody is really cared about it, it’s not that difficult, especially when most of them don’t take more than 6 contact hours.
The result is no. of people interested in engineering is dropping down. The Institute which gets a better UG intake then MIT, Stanford lags so much in producing innovative research. In a country like India, where the resources are really scarce, the returns that we produce on investments at IIT are abysmally less.
The whole system of teaching is so disappointing that many of us loose their real interest in engineering in a few days after we join IIT. Some become a part of the system and maximize their scores by going with the flow. Some leave the race and make themselves busy in other activities – constructive or time-pass. And this is very easy at a place where you have so many things to choose from. Everybody finally is at ease with himself and the Institute but what gets a setback is the T of IITs.
To be continued….
posted by ritesh at
2:47 PM
9 Comments:
good one.... continue......
nice post...and a much needed one i guess... wud like to read sthng on mess and on Prof' and the grading system a bit more
Everything needs time to improve,so be patient to see a US type institute in BENGAL(:))...but u remember all these thing starting from first yr,shows tht u are good at mugging....
waiting for ur continued part......
dude, kuch likhe hain ap.
i want to tell you one example.
In sonali sengupta class since she was teaching very fast i dint write notes i went to her room after class that please givme today's class notes..guess what she said..
i have worked hard to make my class notes, how can i give it to u for xeroxing u read books and make your own notes. LOL. jaise koi competition ho mere aur uske bech mein..
this kind of professors IIT system have. they SUCK bigtime.
Good researcher to duur ki baat hai..
pure IIT mein 5 honge bahut fight marke.
haan i am sure abt the fact that
in every department except 2-3 profs everyone else {prof} is an ASSHOLE.
unka communication..subhanallah
one prof of our department says..
WE WILL SALVE THEES PROBLEM FART BY FART...ha ha ha ha
Yeah Ritesh.. A lot to ponder over indeed as we've come to the end of the road.. I used to think a lot on similar lines uptil 2nd yr..
Eventually, it dawned that its best to take things in your hand.. If the Profs don't teach us, well, we just have to do it ourselves! The trouble is that most of the smart IITians either dun wanna be Profs, or are Profs in the US.. So, basically, Profs paida to nahi ho sakte.. Its eventually one (or many) of us who'll have to come back to this place and do the upliftment part.. So, for me, it might be easy to say, "Arre Profs kitne ghatiya hain", but I should have no reason to crib if I myself am unwilling to take the responsibility in my own hands. Right? [:)]
Aptly written down all our woes, and since you're in my batch, you might be remembering the "feedback" students gave for Basic Electronics.
Anyways, I guess we're right in school when we would say the T in IIT stands for torture and not Technology. While profs wonder how we got through JEE, we wonder how IIT still survives with its lack of technology. Or maybe, they just want toughen us up, making us run around in circiles for paltry things.
As for profs, its a broad spectrum ranging from some utterly horrible ones to the best ones, boring to cool, it varies.
Nice blog and waiting for more :)
@vivek - thx. a lot
@vergi - load mat le sab pe aayenge [:)]
@amit - btw r u amit arora? I am in no way good at mugging.
@sudhanshu - I have myself felt that she feels insecured.
@Chintan - I think a lot can be done without IITians as well. A lot of existing professors can do the handful if they are really willing to work in this direction. I have seen many people who don't have IIT background and they are fabolous teachers. Yes maybe for quality research, improvements can be made by collaborating with industries and other leading academic institutes.
that's the price u pay being an elite..... :))
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