Eflu cuts down intake of foreign students

Updated on: Wednesday, September 14, 2011

English and Foreign Languages University (Eflu), one of the first institutions in the state to take in foreign students, has cut down its intake under this category drastically this year. The number of foreign students this year has come down to 75 from a total of 300 last year, as the institution for the first time set Toefl and IELTS scores as an admission criterion. The university also introduced an entrance test for these students to restrict their numbers.

The decision to reduce the intake of foreign students came about as the university administration felt that it did not have enough teachers to guide them. While earlier, most of the foreign students, who applied for admissions used to get seats, this year, the university left just 75 seats vacant in BA, MA, M Phil and Ph D sections for them. It is believed that such a decision was taken as the institution is going through an administrative breakdown following which several projects have come to a sudden halt.

Right now a Toefl or IELTS score of 5.5 and 6.6 for BA and MA students respectively has been made mandatory for students. Several teachers from the institution are miffed about the new administration decision, sources said. "It is ridiculous that we introduced such an intake criteria for foreign students as they are joining the university to get basic training in English language. Besides, we have been training such students in the past. Eflu is quite popular in many countries for this reason alone," said a source. A chunk of students who come to Eflu for higher education and research are from Middle East, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal. While earlier foreign students used to be around 16.6% of the total number of students, now the percentage has dropped to 4.1.

However, officials of Eflu said that the restrictions in the intake of foreign students were introduced as a small group of faculty members were not interested in training them. "Most students who come to Eflu require remedial courses in English language and till the last year the university was ready to offer the same. But this year, this was considered as an extra burden and hence the intake was reduced," said an Eflu official.

According to sources, the university is suffering a major financial loss due to sudden reduction in the number of students. Each of the foreign students is expected to pay about $ 1,000 towards fee for a year. "Earlier the fee collected from foreign students was added to the corpus fund using which the university funded the education of regular students from the country who are from poor economic and social backgrounds. Now this project is also in doldrums," an official said. Besides, two hostels, that were constructed for foreign students, are now lying partly vacant, officials said. Meanwhile, students and faculty members of the university went on a hunger strike on Monday, demanding MHRD to appoint a new vice-chancellor.

Times of India

Eflu cuts down intake of foreign students

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