Why foreign institutes dig Indian market

For foreign universities, which haven't yet recovered fully from the aftershocks of the worldwide recession, India presents, to quote a word re-introduced into the English vocabulary by Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland , a 'frabjous' opportunity.

More than 100,000 students leave Indian shores annually to study at universities abroad. Their presence has made foreign universities wake up to the incontrovertible fact that there's another 'creamy layer' below these students abroad whose families are prepared to pay upwards of Rs 2.5 lakh a year for quality education.

Profs debate Foreign Univ Bill

What foreign universities Bill can't do

International students are the economic mainstay of foreign universities, but these institutions are not in a position to meet the demand for the education they provide on their own campuses back home. This untapped market makes the business of overseas campuses that much more lucrative.

For over a decade, foreign universities have been lobbying hard for the passage of the Foreign Education Providers Bill, which has been a pet project of HRD minister Kapil Sibal. The most recent of these exploratory visits was that of Robert A. Brown, president of Boston University, who was in the Capital in January to plan collaborations with leading universities here.

He said there was an insatiable appetite for quality education in India and collaborations would mutually benefit both countries. US's Georgia Institute of Technology announced its plan to set up campuses in Hyderabad and Visakhapatnam as soon as the Bill gets Parliament nod.

Central Michigan University, meanwhile, has taken another route to plant its flag in India. It has been offering a collaborative MBA programme with the Jawaharlal Nehru Institute of Technology, Hyderabad, for the past five years.

Experts associated with these universities explain the economic logic of their plans for India: the proliferation of private institutions in the country-especially in engineering, medicine, management and law - that charged fees upwards of Rs 2.5 lakh a year was evidence of the vast market waiting to be tapped.

These institutions attract the second layer of the country's higher education market. These are students whose families can't afford foreign education (upwards of Rs 15 lakh a year), but want to be in the top four favourite streams.

India, according the now-defunct National Knowledge Commission, needs 1,500 universities, compared with about 350 now, to raise the enrollment numbers from 7 per cent of the population aged 18-25 to developed country averages.

But even before the Bill got the cabinet's nod, Indian universities had initiated the process of collaborating with their international peers to offer degrees or diplomas. A National University of Educational Planning and Administration (NEPA) report in 2008 pegged the number of these institutions at more than 130.

For Bangalore University vice- chancellor A. N. Prabhu Deva, collaboration is the way forward.

"It will help a higher education institution rise to the standards of its foreign partner," he says. But for this collaboration to become meaningful, says R. Govinda, NEPA V-C, teaching must go hand in hand with research. "Only then will quality education and foreign collaborations be meaningful," he says.

Either way, for foreign universities, this is a winwin situation. Narayanan Ramaswamy, executive director of the management consultancy KPMG, points to the "massive demand supply gap" driving the international higher education market.

Thanks for : Reproduced From Mail Today. Copyright 2010. MTNPL. All rights reserved.

Ways to avoid getting duped at a petrol station

Fuel prices are getting dearer by the day but are we getting every drop of fuel paid for? Well, if the outpouring of woes online is any indicator, then no, we have a long way to go to prevent being cheated at fuel stations.

These are some who have realized the bluff, though may not have taken the outlet to task - but there are many others who aren't aware of such nefarious deeds. Hence the possibility of them getting duped is even more likely, and often repeatedly.

So as customers, how can we ensure we aren't at the receiving end of this trickery? What are the precautions that need to be taken and how do we get our grievances addressed? Here's more-

Precautions

• Keep a keen eye on YOUR fuel pump - especially in the beginning and just before the end of the fill. Avoid all distractions - it's indeed a blessing that cell phones aren't allowed in fuel stations. Other distractions like your car stereo or balancing your 2-wheeher can be avoided too.

• Make sure the fuel attendant has heard the amount right. To be doubly sure, ask the attendant to repeat, just as you in restaurants, though this should be a lot easier for him.

• Pay the amount ONLY AFTER the filling is complete. In most cases, either due to our overzealousness or simply being told by the attendant, we often end-up fiddling our pockets or wallets, in the process neglecting the fill.

• Keep track of your fuel indicator during every refill, for this reading can be good source of verification. If your 2-wheeler fuel indicator takes that little longer to reflect, do wait by the side until it shows up. You really wouldn't want to find out being duped in the middle of traffic.

• Also, it's a misplaced notion that meters in fuel pumps are tamper-proof. While meter tampering is a grave issue, it can only be checked by specialists. However, this can be checked by informing the concerned fuel company.

In spite of these precautions, if you still get duped, it's best to file a complaint. Take my word, the process isn't as cumbersome as one may imagine, in fact it is a lot more effective than creating a ruckus at the petrol station.

You can share your complaint at the 'Indian Consumer Complaints Forum' or even better - register it directly with the respective fuel company. Their websites have contact details of various regional offices that you can directly walk-in to as well as an online complaint form and even a toll-free number.

And if you're wondering if they do ever respond, well, in our case the field-officer from one of the regional offices promptly called to enquire, and ensured that the grievance was addressed. Nevertheless, we could have avoided all this, had we practiced what we just preached :)

Drug from bananas to prevent HIV infection

A potent new drug derived from bananas may open the door to new ways to prevent sexual transmission of HIV. Scientists have found that lectins - a set of naturally occurring chemicals in plants - can halt the chain of reaction that leads to a variety of infections.

In lab tests, BanLec, the lectin found in bananas, was found to be as potent as two current anti-HIV drugs. It may become a less expensive new component of applied vaginal microbicides, according to new findings published in the Journal of Biological Chemistry . Scientists have been looking for new ways of stopping the spread of HIV. The rate of new infections is outpacing the rate of new individuals getting anti-retroviral drugs, scientists said. It appears an effective vaccine could still be years away.

Although condom use is effective, they are most successful in preventing infection if used consistently and correctly, which is often not the case. "In settings where women have limited control over sexual matters, a long lasting, self-applied microbicide can be very attractive," said David Marvovitz of the University of Michigan Medical School and lead author of the paper.

Some of the most promising compounds for inhibiting vaginal and rectal HIV transmission are agents that block HIV prior to integration into its target cell.

The new research describes the complex actions of lectins and their ability to outsmart HIV. Lectins are sugar- binding proteins and can identify foreign invaders, like a virus, and attach themselves to the pathogen, thus blocking its entry into the human body. The team has developed a way to isolate BanLec from bananas.

Youth will drive Indian growth story

Harvard prof David Bloom says only proper policies will yield demographic dividend youth power that translates to wealth. The greater the number of earning youth, more the savings, faster the economic growth, higher the per capita income and quicker the reduction of poverty, said David Bloom, professor of economics and demography at Harvard University.

Speaking at the India Today Conclave 2010, he said the lessons learnt from the Chinese and East Asian - Taiwan, Singapore, Hong Kong and South Korea - success stories could become the mantra for India's economic growth provided its youth power was properly harnessed.

He told the audience, which included a very attentive Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi, that India's growing population, always considered a bane, can be the engine for economic growth that could last a good 30 years.

The Bloom formula to achieve this is to equip the enormous pool of workers - the population in the age group of 15 to 65 - available in India, by providing them employment to 'catalyse growth'. In addition, India had to dramatically improve education and rural healthcare to ensure the kind of growth East Asia saw in the last three decades.

Bloom is the originator of the term 'demographic dividend', used to denote a rise in the rate of economic growth of a country resulting from a large share of working - age people in the population.

Based on this demographic dividend theory, India is considered to be on the threshold of a great opportunity to have extraordinarily high economic growth, as the country has one of the youngest populations in the world. In fact, the average age of the Indian in 2020 is likely to be 29, as against 37 for China and the US, and 48 for Japan.

Bloom predicted, "India is reaping a high demographic dividend. India will reach higher than East Asia's three - decade growth rate if the country's fertility rates are low or medium and be about on par if the fertility rates are high." The theory is that with a higher working - age population and fewer dependents - those who are aged below 15 or above 65 and are not earning - there will be bigger savings and more income per household to power higher economic growth.

Currently, India's dependency ratio - of non-workers vs workers in a household - is 0.6. According to reports, the number of workers in India is 67.2 crore against 40.8 crore non - workers in a total population of 108 crore. India is moving from higher fertility and high mortality to low fertility and low mortality, the Harvard professor said. This is a transitional phase.

Studies show that India's fertility rate, which is the average number of children a woman expects to have, was 3.8 in 1990. It has fallen to 2.7, according to Bloom.

"The extent of growth and reaping of this demographic dividend is not set in stone. It can be magnified in several ways. The number of kids per woman can come down from 2.7 to 2.1 through expansion of family planning and better healthcare through the National Rural Health Mission," he said.

Bloom, however, warned that there was potential for this burgeoning youth population to turn into either a dividend or a disaster.

Against the backdrop of a low mortality rate combined with a baby boom, India had to make sure that its children were healthy and educated and went on to add to India's economic growth.

As Rahul Gandhi listened intently, Bloom stressed the need for policies to improve public health. This would mean vaccination for children, better rural life and education aimed especially at the girl child, to turn this young population into a dividend.

Quoting IT czar Nandan Nilekani, the Harvard professor said India had a great opportunity and should not 'mess it up'.

"Growth depends on an economy's ability to absorb the demographic dividend. Pure demographics suggest that the next three decades will be catch - up time for India (with East Asia) with high per capita incomes," he said.

Bloom explained why those above 65 years should be looked after as well. He said that by 2050, this section of the population would number over 22 crore. The private family networks would not be able to provide them the kind of care they needed. "India will have to evolve pension and healthcare policies for them," he suggested.

He pointed out that 90 per cent do not receive pension and less than 10 per cent have medical insurance. Bloom explained the demographic dividend with the figurative use of 'a pig in a python' concept.

If a python swallows a pig, the bulge in the python's body is taken to represent the population in a particular age group.

The bulge starts at children, moves along the python's body and when the bulge is biggest at the working-age people, that marks the highest period of economic growth for the country.

"The dependency ratio in East Asia of working people vs nonworkers is more than 2.3: 1, while in sub-Saharan Africa, it is 1.2: 1. So in East Asia, there is an extra member in each family for every non-worker, which translates into larger income per household," he explained.

India has reached the stage of reaping the demographic dividend as a result of several factors, according to Bloom. "Since the 1950s, India has seen a 70 per cent decline in infant mortality, added a quite extraordinary 25 years -four - and - a - half years per decade - to life expectancy, reduced fertility from six kids per woman to 2.7, while death and birth rates are on a decline," he said.

India will reach higher than East Asia's three decade growth rate.

TOEFL: 10 tips to take you to the top

The TOEFL test is the most widely accepted English-language assessment used at more than 7,300 institutions in 130 countries including the UK, US and Canada [ Images ]. The test is divided into four sections -- Reading, Writing, Listening and Speaking.

Here are some pointers and resources to help you get on your way to score well for the test.

Find something interesting to read and listen to, then practice speaking and writing about it.
Listen to Podcasts, recorded lectures -- check the website of your favourite university. Go to news websites. Read up on your favourite subjects on popular websites such aswikipedia.org. Tell a friend or family member about what you learned.

Work with a speaking partner, preferably with a native speaker of English or try an online video chat! The more opportunity you have to speak the language, the more familiar you will become.

Take on the role of a great journalist: Take good notes and use them to make summaries.

Make vocabulary flash cards and pretend you are a contestant on a vocabulary quiz show. Carry the flash cards with you. They are a great way to make a bus ride go by quickly.

Visit TOEFL-TV (youtube.com/TOEFLtv) for resources and tips from English-language instructors and students that have taken the TOEFL test.

Reading tips
Practice summarising and paraphrasing texts. Use charts and outlines to organise the ideas in a text. Practice speed reading techniques. Practice reading (and answering questions) on a computer screen. Expand your vocabulary with daily-use vocabulary cards.

Listening tips
i. Listen for basic information -- did you comprehend the main idea, major points and important details?

ii. Listen for "pragmatic" understanding -- can you recognise a speaker's attitude? What is the purpose of the speech? What is their role? Are they an authority or are they a passive part of the conversation?

iii. Listen for connecting and synthesising -- can you understand the relationship between ideas? Compare and contrast. Determine the cause and effect.

Speaking tips
Read aloud a short article from a newspaper, campus newspaper, magazine, textbook, or the internet. Write down 2-3 questions about the article.

With a speaking partner, answer the questions. Outline the main points of the article. Give a one-minute oral summary of the article. Express your opinion about it. If there is a problem discussed, give the solution.

More tips:

• Work on your pronunciation
• Speak in s-l-o-w motion. You could imitate American or British intonation and rhythm patterns. You could also work on problematic sounds, such as:
• [ t ] and [ d ] - uncurl your tongue
• [ p ], [ t ], and [ k ] - add some air!
• [ p ] and [ b] - close your lips
• [ f ] and [ v ] - lower lip to teeth
• Find an accent reduction coach
• Your pronunciation doesn't have to be perfect, but native speakers should be able to understand you.

Writing tips
Find a writing buddy who can give you feedback. Read an article and find listening material on the same topic. Write a summary of each. Explain the ways they are similar and the ways they are different.

Combine all your skills!
Find listening and reading materials on the same topic from the library or internet (eg news websites). Take notes or create outlines on each. Give a one-minute oral summary of each.

Explain how the two relate in a short written response (150-225 words). Take notes or create outlines on each. Give a one-minute speech about the same.