AU gearing up for ISO team visit

Updated on: Monday, February 22, 2010

With the ISO team scheduled to visit Andhra University campus during March to evaluate the university's performance for an extension of its certification, Vice-Chancellor B. Satyanarayana got into the act. Being on schedule as far as the academic calendar is concerned is the main reason for the university getting the ISO certification and Prof. Satyanarayana is keen to continue with the record. The teachers have been asked not to avail the on-duty leave (of 10 days which they use for attending seminar, workshops and other academic work) and complete the syllabus by April 20. AU is also keen to declare the results of examinations within 15 days after conducting the last examination.

Prof. Satyanarayana is also keen to make the campus ready for the National Assessment and Accreditation Council's assessment from now because though AU is due to face the evaluation by the NAAC Peer Team during 2012, good preparations are needed from this year itself to improve its grading.

Seminar on woman empowerment

Andhra University's Dr. Durgabai Deshmuk's Centre for Women's Studies organised a round table conference on journey of woman empowerment: dimensions and challenges, and the participants came up with interesting observations and suggestions to improve the lot of women.

Former Union Secretary E.A.S. Sarma, during the inaugural session, felt that reservation for women was not a charity but their right. For overall development of women, the health indicators must be checked from the grass root level and literacy level should be increased.

Gender budgeting, land assets, employment, legislative bodies, Acts for women and woman police stations are the areas to be addressed to ensure empowerment of women, said Dr. Sarma.

Prof. Satyanarayana, in his inaugural address found that women were going ahead in the educational field but were far behind in employment, entrepreneurship and science and technological development areas.

While Principal of AU College of Arts and Commerce L.K. Mohana Rao presided, Director of the Centre B. Ratna Kumari introduced the theme of the programme. The centre is opening gender sensitisation clubs in all affiliated colleges, she announced.

HoD of Journalism and Mass Communication P. Bobby Vardhan was moderator of the round table discussion. Representatives of NGOs, women's organisations and women's colleges participated.

Lecture on social sciences

Social sciences, like economics, sociology, politics, philosophy, etc., are losing their sheen and there is much concern about it. A special lecture by a faculty of IIM, Bangalore T. Krishna Kumar by the UGC Academic Staff College revelaed some important aspects of the social sciences.

Prof. Krishna Kumar said that the social sciences can become hard sciences, like physical and biological sciences, earth sciences, etc. if measurement is given importance. Social scientists are now busy measuring the human poverty, happiness, good governance, etc. He felt that there should be a scientific experiment to measure the performance of students based on eco-behavioural approach.

An experiment in the US on a small community revealed that there was wide variation across social backgrounds at the lower level of education but the variation narrowed down at the higher levels of education. Thus percentage of reservation should be reduced at the higher level of education. India's policy of education is on a wrong footing, he felt.

Director of ASC G. Ramachandrudu, who presided said that there is growing importance to social sciences in the advanced countries unlike in the developing countries.

Mega blood camp

NSS unit of Andhra University organised a mega blood donation camp in the campus, jointly with the Lions Clubs of Waltair and Vaisahki. More than 600 NSS volunteers from various colleges donated blood. The camp was inaugurated by wife of VC, Padmavathi. NSS Coordinator P. Ramachandra Rao presided. Doctors from KGH and Red Cross collected blood.

Ph.Ds. awarded

Andhra University awarded Ph.D. in organic chemistry to Voosala Christopher for his thesis on “synthesis and characterisation of new push-pull anthracene dyes and heterocyclic compounds and study of their properties”. Former Rector U. Viplava Prasad and HoD Y.L.N. Murthy were his research guides.

Ph.D. was awarded to J. Prakash in human resource management, for his thesis on “human resource development climate-a study of Visakhapatnam Port Trust (with special reference to executives and supervisors)”.

Inertia 2K10 at AITAM

Aditya Institute of Technology and Management (AITAM), Tekkali, organised a two-day national level technical symposium Inertia 2k 10, recently. The symposium was organised by the mechanical department of the college. It was inaugurated by the Project Director of East Coast Power Plant D. S. R. Raju. The symposium included paper presentation, poster presentation, model exhibition, general quiz and other competitions. Prof. V. V. Nageswara Rao, Director of the college and Secretary L.L. Naidu were present.

Seminar on network securities

Aditya Institute of Technology and Management (AITAM), Tekkali, hosted a two-week seminar on network securities and applications in association with AICTE.

The seminar was attended by the Director of Industry Institution Partnership Cell (IIPC), Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University (JNTU), Kakinada, K. Padma Raju, Senior Scientist in innovation lab at TCS Natarajan Vijaya Rangan, Chairman of the college K. Someswara Rao, Director V.V. Nageswara Rao and other faculty members.

Seminar on chemistry

The Department of Organic and Analytical Chemistry of Dr. L. Bullayya College organised a two-day national seminar on ‘Analytical and synthetic strategies in chemistry' from Thursday. Senior scientists from reputed organisations and professors from various universities participated in the seminar. Papers were presented on various topics like analytical techniques, synthetic strategies, green chemistry and environmental chemistry. Director Academics of the college K. Bhaskara Reddy and convenor of the seminar G. Lokeswara Reddy were present.

AU gearing up for ISO team visit

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