Osmania University CET 2014 Results, OUCET 2014 Results

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Infosys become first Indian IT company to generate own power

BANGALORE: In 2006, soaring hotel costs and traffic snarls led Infosys to build Le Terrace, a four-star hotel with 500 rooms for its employees and overseas clients in its campus in Bangalore's Electronics City.

Eight years on, the software industry posterchild is about to embark on generating its own power, in the process saving costs, getting clean reliable power for its operations and fulfilling its broader obligations to society.

Infosys has proposed a 50 mw solar park in Karnataka, becoming the first software company in India to think of generating its own power that will meet a bulk of the electricity needs of its offices in Bangalore, Mysore and Mangalore.

Karnataka's energy minister DK Shivakumar told ET on Monday that Infosys had held one round of talks with the state government in which it had expressed keenness to build the solar power facility.

"The company will buy land on its own," he said. Infosys confirmed the intent and said it will submit a formal proposal to the government once they finalise the land.

"We hope to commission the park in about a year," said Infosys Executive Vice President Ramadas Kamath told ET. Asked why Infosys is entering captive generation, he said that his company wanted to be self-sufficient in energy.

"We want to promote use of clean energy and reduce carbon emission. Solar is the best option. Several parts of Karnataka have good solar intensity. We now have solar technologies wherein you recover your investment in eight years. It has less of maintenance hassle, and easy to build," said Kamath, who heads facilities, administration, security and sustainability at Infosys.

Kamath said the idea to build a solar park had been mooted a year ago by Infosys' head of Green Initiative Rohan Parekh, and had won the support of the company's board of directors. "Narayana Murthy and the Board have been very keen that we do this," Kamath said.

The company has already started looking for some 300 acres of land in regions of Karnataka where solar intensity is high.

The company expects project cost, including land, to be about Rs 360-380 crore, small change for a company that is sitting on a cash pile of Rs 30,000 crore. Infosys estimates that it would require about five acres of land to generate one megawatt of solar power and excluding land costs, each MW of capacity will require its shell out around Rs 6.5 crore.

All the Infosys offices in Karnataka, which between them have around 65,000 seats, consume about 95 million units a year. The pro- posed 50 MW will generate about 84 million units, nearly 90% of Infosys present energy needs.

1 MW capacity equals 1000 kilowatts or 1.67 million units of energy a year and is enough to light up anywhere between 300 and 350 homes in cities such as Delhi, Mumbai or Bangalore.

"We will buy the balance from the grid," Kamath said, adding that the company would consider scaling up its generation capacity based on its experience with the 50 MW initially planned. Grid power presently costs the company, which has managed to halve its per capita consumption of power between 2007 and 2013, about Rs 5.65 per unit, while its own solar power would cost about Rs 3 per unit after factoring in depreciation.

Barring a few states, grid power is unreliable in most parts of India, forcing companies to also have diesel-operated generators for back-up power and raising their overall power costs.

Companies such as Infosys, which carry out mission-critical operations for mostly overseas clients, need uninterrupted power and its solar experiment, if successful, could lead to other firms to think along similar lines.

(Courtesy : timesofindia)

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How Nokia will help its former employees in India

CHENNAI: Nokia India is implementing what it calls a 'Bridge' programme for former employees who lost their jobs, providing vital help during a difficult period and earning goodwill among those who worked at its Chennai plant. 

The Finnish mobile phone maker's India manufacturing unit was at one time a marquee investment and a symbol of India's importance for Nokia. But the company quickly fell into troubled times. It has shed thousands of jobs at the Chennai factory but in a rare example of corporate social responsibility, it is trying to help its former employees cope with their reversal in fortunes. 
Among those benefitting is K Thyagarajan, 27, a former Nokia India worker who like most others suddenly lost his job and was clueless about what he would do next. He had opted for the voluntary retirement scheme and the exit had left him at a crossroads. "We were like a family, nearly 7,000 employees at the factory. I was extremely sad when they announced the VRS," said Thyagarajan. And just as he was trying to recover from the job loss, he received a letter from Nokia India requesting him to attend some interactive sessions. Thyagarajan initially ignored the letter, but then decided to give in to the persuasion. 

Thyagarajan became a part of Nokia's Bridge programme, which conducts awareness and training sessions for employees to help them secure a new job or start a new venture. It is aimed at those who have worked with the company for at least five years. Apart from structured financial assistance, the programme offers beauty treatment courses, MS Office/Tally accounting courses, training for commissioning of solar units, desktop publishing modules and garment-making. In all, there are about 30 modules being conducted in around 40 locations in TN. 

According to company statistics, over 60% of the outgoing employees have attended the awareness sessions and almost all have opted for the training sessions that have commenced in a few centres. 

Ajit Isaac, the chairman and managing director of Ikya Human Capital Solutions, said that initiatives such as these help employees gain new skills and provide them the confidence to seek opportunities outside. Industry experts are of the view that helping employees to get another job in a difficult situation is new in the Indian context whereas globally many organisations do so.

"These programmes would be based on the opportunities available in the market. This is a welcome move. Any corporate which does this, they have the long-term interests of their employees in mind," said K Purushothaman, a regional director of software industry grouping Nasscom. 

Nokia's factory was excluded from a Microsoft's recent acquisition of Nokia's devices and services units. The Chennai plant was left out of the deal because it is entangled in a legal dispute with tax authorities in New Delhi and Chennai, and the assets of this division has been frozen as a result of the dispute. 

The factory, located at Sriperumbudur, about 40 km from Chennai, is now operating as a contract manufacturer for Microsoft. Although the timeframe of this arrangement with Microsoft is unclear, Nokia India began cutting its workforce by announcing an early retirement scheme. A month after concluding the VRS programme, Nokia India came up with the Bridge programme. It has tied up with TVS Training and Services and Ace Skill Development to design and implement the programme. 

A Nokia India spokeswoman says the company has invested "tens of millions of euros" to run the Bridge program globally in which around 18,000 employees have participated. She claims the program has been successful where it "has resulted in the creation of 1,000 new companies across 19 cities/sites worldwide" and "more than 90% of those companies are still active". 

The company declined to provide specific information on investments in the programme in India. 

P Chitra, 27, who worked at Nokia India's factory for eight years, has now registered a partnership firm with other four ex-employees to export fancy jewellery. The group of five was already pursuing this as a hobby before deciding to take it up as a full-time business opportunity. The initial investment for the business came from the Bridge compensation and the VRS amounts of these five former Nokia employees. 

"We are aiming to earn a profit of Rs 1 lakh per person per month," said a confident Chitra.

(Courtesy : timesofindia)

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SAP brings cloud-based learning to university students

SAP today announced a cloud-based offering designed for students to incorporate the study of SAP solutions into university coursework. The student edition of SAP Learning Hub offers a comprehensive library of electronic content that universities can provide to students for self-study covering close to 150 SAP solutions. It also includes access to e-learning courses, handbooks and other training materials from the SAP Education organization tailored for students’ needs. Through the student edition of SAP Learning Hub, students can prepare for future employment on their chosen career path or prepare for SAP certification exams. This is the latest edition of the new and expanded version of the cloud-based SAP Learning Hub site announced earlier this year.  

Universities can purchase access to the student edition of SAP Learning Hub on behalf of students who then receive access to the site. With a wide range of high-quality content and optional live access to training systems from SAP, students will be set up to train when and where they choose. Students can also access social learning rooms to collaborate with peers and interact with SAP subject-matter experts. The student edition is offered at a lower entry price point for the academic sector, with optional access to live SAP training systems for select courses.

“The generation currently enrolled in universities around the world represents the workforce of the future and both SAP and our ecosystem stand to gain from this impending influx of talent,” said Markus Schwarz, senior vice president and global head of SAP Education. “With social collaboration features and interactive learning rooms, the student edition of SAP Learning Hub meets the learning needs and habits of today’s students and gives them a firm foundation for pursuing an SAP certification, thereby opening up additional career paths.”

“With the student edition of SAP Learning Hub, we can bring young people a blended learning approach that expands their access to SAP innovations,” said Ann Rosenberg, Vice President and Global Head of SAP University 

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Careers in Journalism

Pen is mightier than the sword. Even today, the younger generation is attracted to journalism. Everyday, there are several events happening across the world - political, cultural, religious, educational, social and natural events, etc. We come to know about these events sitting in our houses. How is that possible? Through mass communication, providing information to a large crowd at the same time. But, for this, someone has to collect the information as well as present it. This is the main aim of journalism. Journalism includes investigating, analysing and reporting local as well as world events, trends, current affairs, and so on.

Qualification
Journalism courses are offered at graduation and postgraduation levels. To become a journalism , one can complete a Bachelor's in mass communication/ mass media/journalism after +2. After completion in a related graduation field, one may complete a Master's in journalism or mass communication. A graduate (who has a flair for writing) from any other field can also opt for a postgraduate course in journalism.

Also required is command over language, confidence, enthusiasm, patience and perseverance, ability to differentiate between fact and fiction, adhering to deadlines, team cohesiveness, sensitivity to different views and lifestyles, in-depth knowledge about various fields such as politics, culture, religion, social and current affairs. The most important fact is that people generally feel that journalism is all about writing. It is. However, it is also about reading and most importantly, the ability to express one's thoughts on varied topics. Journalism is for people who are ready to explore various opportunities 24/7, without the constraints of cultural upbringing, gender, and are also ready to go beyond geographical boundaries.

Job prospects
There are different categories in which the media industry can be divided - print and electronic. As the name suggests, everything that is printed comes under print media, which includes newspapers, magazines, journals, tabloids, dailies and books. On the other hand, electronic media includes content on television, radio and the internet. With changes in the society, even this field has undergone a radical change. A journalist has to cover stories/ features on various aspects of life i.e. political, financial, leisure, crime, sports, entertainment, spiritual, educational, infrastructure, technological, medical, and so on. Not to forget, along with the newspapers, there has been an increase in the number of magazines too. Specialised magazines are available in the field of fashion, beauty, family, for youth, travel, medical, technological, lifestyle, education, sports, etc. They can be in many languages.

Some of the work opportunities are in the areas of advertising agencies; educational institutes, magazines, news papers, portals/websites of publications, publishing houses, radio channels as well as television channels. While there are opportunities in this field, it is a competitive field. Therefore, one has to perform at the highest level and be able to work under difficult situations. However, if one persists with hard work and passion, a career in journalism can be a fulfilling and lucrative option.

Skills required• Inquisitive and investigative mind 
• Alertness 
• Adaptive and tolerant of changing and difficult situations 
• Good communication skills

(Courtesy : educationtimes)

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IIT Bombay launches its first MOOCs

Further to its collaboration with EdX, a massive open online course (MOOC) platform, last year, IIT Bombay (IIT-B) recently launched its first three MOOCs.

While sessions for two of the courses – Introduction to Computer Programming (part one) and Thermodynamics – will commence this July, the third course – Introduction to Computer Programming (part two) – will begin in September.

Informs Deepak Phatak, professor, Department of Computer Science and Engineering, IIT Bombay, “The quality and content offered online will be same as that offered on our campus. The only difference being the MOOCs will allow the students to learn anytime, from anywhere and at a convenient speed. Students can revisit study material as and when required and skip familiar topics.”

The courses can be pursued by anyone and will be delivered through sessions grouped into several themes or topics. Each session will be made up of two to four 15-20 minute ‘episodes’. Each episode will consist of a video recorded lecture of about 8-10 minutes, followed by some practice problems/ quizzes.

There will be additional reading material/ references, which the participants can use for greater clarity, if required. Regular interactive sessions through discussion forums, video conferencing and other such technologies are also being planned.

Students can register for an honour code certificate or for audit free of cost for the initial offerings. For students who wish to get a verified certificate of achievement at the end of the course, a charge of about Rs 1,500 will be levied.

(Courtesy : educationtimes)

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Unusual career options for commerce graduates

Commerce graduates are increasingly opting for non-traditional careers. Here’s a list of five offbeat career options that are gaining popularity among them

With a large number of Indian companies setting up global facilities, employment opportunities for professionals across sectors have increased massively. This has impacted the career choices of young graduates from all streams – arts, science and commerce. While jobs in banking, company secretary and chartered accountancy remain popular among commerce graduates, many freshers are opting for unique professions in the fields of medical transcription, library science, social work, image consulting, food stylist, travel and tourism, entrepreneurship, healthcare management, sports management, etc.  

Some of the unusual career options for commerce graduates in India are:

TRAVEL AND TOURISM
Being the largest revenue generating industry, travel and tourism is a promising career choice for commerce graduates, who can opt for logistics related jobs. Graduates can apply their business and commerce skills and understand client relationship from the business perspective. Travel consultant or travel advisors are the leading roles in this space.
Skills required: Aspirants should possess good communication skills and be open to travelling
Salary: Rs 4-6 lakh

MEDICAL TRANSCRIPTION
Medical transcription, an allied health profession, deals with the process of transcription or converting voice-recorded reports, dictated by physicians or other healthcare professionals, into text format. Foreign countries are increasingly outsourcing their medical transcription jobs to Indian companies. 
Some of the leading industries hiring medical transcriptionists are healthcare, education, pharma/biotechnology, etc.
Skills required: Candidates must be good with spellings, be good listeners, have knowledge of foreign phonetics and punctuations, adequate research skills, a knack for different languages/accents, above average typing skills and be competent in picking up new medical transcription software.
Salary:  Rs 12,000-40,000 per month (based on performance, productivity and quality) 

E-COMMERCE AND FMCG
With the boom in online shopping, there are a number of options for commerce graduates in fields like liquidation, post-sales, logistics management, etc. 
Skills required: Aspirants should be pros in finance and accounting 
Salary: Rs 3-5 lakh per annum

SOCIAL WORK
The growth in the social sector and the emerging NGO scene in India, have opened up options for commerce graduates to join the fundraising department and effectively utilise their economic and business skills. 
There are ample self-employment opportunities available in the field of social work. Some industries hiring social workers are IT, healthcare, education, consulting services, etc.
Skills: Problem solving, communication and time management skills are a must
Salary: Rs 5,000 per month (starting level for a social worker in an NGO); Rs 7,000 per month (starting level for personnel and labour welfare officer)

LIBRARY SCIENCE
Library science is the study of how to operate a library. The field is made up of several branches:
Public services: Circulation and reference librarians assist patrons to find information and check out books
Technical services: Books and other forms of media are catalogued according to the Dewey or Library of Congress call numbers, processed into the library’s online card catalogue system and readied for the shelves.
Administration: Library directors or administrators study the field of library science extensively to keep library operations running smoothly.
Skills: Candidates must possess various soft skills along with technical skills. These include good communication, interpersonal, leadership, project management, presentation and teaching skills. The essential technical skills include know-how of electronic resources, understanding and proficiency in research tools and devices applicable to a library and understanding computer operating systems
Salary: Rs 10,000-25,000 per month

(Inputs from Srikanth Rengarajan, executive director and president, ManpowerGroup India; Rashi Thakur founder and director, MentorMpact; Sunil Goel, MD GlobalHunt)
Source: TimesJobs.com Bureau

( Courtesy : educationtimes )

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Over 2,000 foreign applications flood Delhi University

New Delhi: The Foreign Students' Registry has received 2,098 applications from abroad with as many as 1,259 for the four-year undergraduate programme. 

 

"This is unprecedented as in previous years, the number of applicants would be much higher for post-graduate courses," says a senior official from DU. There is a considerable number of applications for the master's programme as well - 607 - and 107 for PhD. 

 

The registry has further received 36 applications for MPhil, 56 for certificate, 26 for diploma and five for advanced diploma courses. A large number of applications have come from Korea (59) followed by Iran (56) and Mauritius (49). There are 22 applicants from the United States, 24 from Japan, 36 from Fiji, 29 from Kenya and 20 from Thailand. 

 

The admission process for foreign applicants was over even before the regular DU admission process began. Degrees and certificates and recognition-status of institutes that issued them are verified before applications are forwarded to individual departments. 

 

By 5pm on Friday, over 3.5 lakh had registered online and bought forms offline. The total number of online registrations was 2,10,872; of these, 1,23,806 have paid. The university sold 1,44,755 forms offline and received 1,02,677 completed applications. Over 25,000 have registered to write the test for bachelor in management studies and 16,084 have paid.

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Compulsory Tamil puts students in fix

Chennai: Despite taking a pledge to compulsorily teach Tamil as main language in 2006, several private schools in Tamil Nadu continued to teach other languages keeping the students in the dark.

Officials in the directorate of matriculation schools say  they have already informed the schools and even got the declaration form signed by school authorities that they would comply with the norms.

The Tamil Nadu Tamil learning Act (2006) made Tamil a compulsory language to be taught in schools starting from 2006-07 academic year. And students who joined class 1 in 2006 academic year had to take up Tamil as a mandatory subject. Schools, which failed to follow the norm, have put the students at risk now. On condition of anonymity, a senior school education department official told DC that it was a gross violation by schools, which have not taught Tamil as main language. “The government had informed them and asked them to send the declaration form. We have copies of several schools who have signed the forms,” said the official.

Speaking to DC, S. Arumainathan, state president, Tamil Nadu students parents welfare association, said, “The private schools have approached the high court only to save themselves from parents.

The schools cannot claim to be ignorant of the Act. They have given in writing that they would oblige the norm laid by the government. It is now the responsibility of schools to answer the parents.”

He added that these schools are worried about answering the parents as the students who studied other languages would not be allowed to take class 10 exams in the next academic year, 2015-16.

Sukumar Jaisingh, member of the Association of Matriculation Schools and Managements in TN and Pudhucherry, the association which moved the court against teaching Tamil as compulsory language,  said, "We are not against teaching Tamil. But considering the inconvenience of students we are forced to teach the language, which they are comfortable with. Moeover, we did not receive any letter from the school education department in 2006 making  Tamil a compulsory language."

( Courtesy : DC )

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11 new management development programmes launched in IIM Ahmedabad

Ahmedabad: Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad (IIM-A) has launched 11 new Management Development Programmes (MDPs) for the academic session beginning 2014 - 2015.

 

Currently, IIM Ahmedabad offers the following courses: Fellow Programme in Management (FPM), Post-Graduate Programme in Management (PGP), Post Graduate Programme in Agribusiness Management (PGP-ABM), One Year Post-Graduate Programme in Management for Executives (PGPX), Faculty Development Programme (FDP) and Armed Forces Programme (AFP).

 

"A total of 77 open enrolment Management Development Programmes (MDPs) are being offered for 2014-15. Eleven new MDPs have been announced for the year 2014-15," the institute said in a statement here.

 

One of the new programmes on offer is 'Business Dispute Resolution: International and Domestic Arbitration', likely to be coordinated by Anurag K Agarwal.

 

'Doing Business Abroad' and 'Family Business: Organisation, Strategies, Internationalization and Succession' will be coordinated by Ajeet Mathur.

 

'Employee Engagement : A 3D Approach', 'Strategic Transformational Training Methodology' and 'Industrial Relations: Changes, Challenges and Responses' would be coordinated by Jerome Joseph.

 

'Business Turnaround and Organisational Transformation' and 'Managing People for Excellence in Healthcare' will be coordinated by Sunil Maheswari.

 

'Designing Systems for Developing Internal Talent' and 'Leadership Pipeline' would be coordinated by Biju Varkkey.

 

'Psychological Assessment and Psycho- Metrics' will be coordinated by Promila Agarwal and 'Enhancing Service Quality in Healthcare' by Rajeshkumar Chandwani.

 

Talking to PTI, IIM-A director Ashish Nanda said, "To realise our vision, the institute is following a three-pronged approach of Connect, Nurture and Grow."

 

Ten new faculty members joined IIM-A since September 2013, the institute said.

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Bill on foreign universities to be brought back

New Delhi: The Union human resources development ministry led by Smriti Irani is working hard to bring back one of the UPA government’s pet projects, the Foreign Universities Bill, that will allow foreign universities to open branches in India. Sources said the proposed Bill is likely to draw heavily on the original legislation proposed during the UPA-2 government.

The proposal, mooted by then former HRD minister Kapil Sibal in UPA-II’s early days, had faced stiff opposition from the Left parties and even some BJP MPs who had objected to foreign players entering the education market. The earlier Bill had also drawn criticism in some quarters as it was felt by a section of the political leadership that it could spawn the growth of substandard
“teaching shops” in the country once the education sector was opened up.

The proposal was sent for detailed study by the parliamentary committee attached to the HRD ministry. The new Foreign Universities Bill is expected to be high on the priority list of the Modi government.

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Osmania University Various Exam Results 2014

1) APSET 2013 Results  : Click Here

2) B.Pharmacy 2013 Results : Click Here

3) B.Ed Suppl Dec-2013 Results  :  Click Here

4) B.Ed Suppl Dec-2013 Results : Click Here 

5) M.Sc(IS) Dec-2014 Results : Click Here

6) BCA Nov-2014 Results : Click Here 

7) M.Pharmacy Nov-2013 Results : Click Here

8) B.E Nov-2013 Results : Click Here

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Foreign scholars keen to join Nalanda University: Official

A large number of foreign scholars and teachers are keen to join the upcoming Nalanda University in Bihar as its faculty members, an official said on Thursday. 

The process of appointing faculty for the varsity has begun and 500 applications have been received for the 20 posts that will initially be filled. 

"Around 22 per cent of the applicants for faculty posts, including professors, assistant professors, are foreign scholars and teachers," vice chancellor Gopa Sabharwal said. 

The university plans to start with two schools — School of Historical Sciences and the School of Environment and Ecology — by August-September. 

"The recruitment is for 20 faculty members posts — 10 in each school," she said. 

Sabharwal said the recruitment process will be complete by March-end or early April. 

The university will then advertise for student enrolments. 

"Initially, only 15 to 20 students will be enrolled in each school," she said. 

The university is set to come up on 446 acres in Rajgir, 10 km from the site of the ancient university in Nalanda, about 100 km southeast of Patna. 

The university will be fully residential, like the ancient Nalanda university. It will offer courses in science, philosophy and spiritualism and social sciences.

(Courtesy : Times of India)

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IIM aspirants cry foul over CAT, move court

CHENNAI: Alleging large-scale irregularities in the manner in which the Common Admission Test (CAT) for admission to 13 Indian Institutes of Management (IIM) was conducted, a petition by eight candidates in Madras high court has sought a stay on the entire admission process this year.

Justice R Subbiah, before whom the petition filed by the eight IIM aspirants from Chennai came up for admission on Thursday, directed the Union human resources development ministry and IIM-Indore, which conducted the CAT 2013, to reserve one seat each to all petitioners who moved the court.

CAT is the first step for joining any of the 13 IIMs, and some other top management institutions too use the scores for their admissions. After a 20-day exercise beginning October 16 last year at 40 centres, the CAT results were published on January 14.

The petitioners assailed the examination format and said: "The computerised format of CAT 2013 was conducted over a period of 20 days and the obvious consequence of it is varying standards of difficulty. The level of difficulty was different for each slot of the testing period. The method of 'equating', 'scaling' and 'normalisation' used by the authorities to normalise the scores is unlawful and erroneous."

The process of equating and scaling, which is otherwise known as normalisation of scores, has caused grave irregularities in the scores obtained by students, the petition said.

"It has been proved that candidates who have not attempted even a single question have been awarded a percentile of 55.46 and this, in turn, implies that more than 50% of the 1.7 lakh candidates who appeared for CAT scored zero or even less."

The entire registration process, setting up test centres, compilation of questions, evaluating answers and calculation and publication of results have all been outsourced to a Gurgaon-based company, Prometric Testing Pvt Ltd.

Describing the January 14 results as shocking and illogical, the petitioners said the normalised scores of several thousand candidates were not in consonance with the number of questions attempted by them.

Citing the case of a faculty member of a coaching centre who writes CAT every year, the petition said he did not attempt any question, but had scored 165 out of 450 marks and had an overall percentile of 55.46. Alleging lack of transparency in the evaluation, they wanted the court to stay the process of admission to IIMs as well as other institutions based on CAT. They also wanted the court to quash the entire CAT 2013 held between October 16, 2013 and November 1, 2013.

(Courtesy : Times of India)

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Career as Gemmologist

The gem and jewellery industry is one of the fastest growing industries in the country. India is the diamond manufacturing centre of the world — an estimated 14 out of 15 diamonds are processed here. The domestic demand for diamond jewellery too has been growing at an impressive 30-35 per cent. South India has always been recognised for its demand for high-quality diamonds, with cities like Chennai and Bangalore being established consumer markets. All this presents exciting career opportunities.

Diamonds are mainly mined in Africa, Australia, Canada and Russia, traded in Belgium, processed in India and sold in every corner of the world. The global nature of the industry opens doors to those seeking an international career.

These diverse career paths are part of a technical field, so it’s important to pursue a specialised education in diamonds. Whether you are looking at a career in manufacturing, trading, sales, appraisal or design, an understanding of the 4Cs of diamond quality is necessary. The 4Cs (Cut, Clarity, Colour and Carat weight) is a universal standard developed by Gemological Institute of India (GIA) in the 1950s that virtually every professional jeweller in the world uses to describe a diamond. They are the basis for determining a diamond’s quality, and in turn its value.

Skills and specialisation

A gemmologist is someone who specialises in identifying gemstones, including diamonds. The need for trained gemmologists who can accurately identify stones is greater than ever in part due to the increase in gemstone treatments and synthetics. Professional credentials can open the doors to diverse job opportunities such as a buyer, trader or laboratory and research professional. Diamond manufacturers, jewellers, jewellery retail chains and gemmological laboratories worldwide are consistently seeking newly trained talent for their businesses. Each of these careers demands an eye for detail and a dedication to quality.

For a well-rounded and comprehensive education, be sure to choose a globally recognised institute. If you’re interested in diamonds, sign up for a course that exposes you to a variety of actual stones and teaches you to identify treatments, simulants and synthetics through technical concepts and hands-on training. Choosing an intensive course like those offered by the GIA will provide holistic training in the field. These programmes utilise the latest gemmological equipment, including microscopes and refractometers and focus on smaller class sizes.

Another important parameter for choosing a course is personalised attention. A campus tour of the institute will provide clarity on the staff, facilities and course curriculum. Opt for a programme that develops a deep understanding of the diamond industry through research-backed theory and hands-on learning.

Consider your overall development in the vast field of diamonds. For instance, does the programme conduct field trips to manufacturing facilities to demonstrate how diamonds are cut and polished? Does it invite industry leaders to share their experiences and knowledge with students? Does it provide language assistance to understand complex technical concepts? Does it offer networking opportunities at industry events and trade shows? For a newcomer to the industry, these features enhance the overall learning experience.

(Courtesy : The Hindu)

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Google launches online education tool Oppia

Google announced a new educational tool canned Oppia, which is an open-source project to make it easy for anyone to create online interactive activities for others to learn from. The NextWeb reported that with this tool, called explorations, activities can be built and contributed to by multiple people from around the globe using a simple web interface. Users don’t need any programming whatsoever.  

The tool does this by modeling a mentor who puts up queries for the student to answer. Based on the student’s responses, the mentor can decide what question he or she will ask next, feedbacks, and more. One can think of it as a smart feedback system.

Oppia is a free and open-source software released under the Apache License 2.0. Below are a few of its features:

• Learners receive personalized, customizable feedback after submitting answers.
• Explorations are embeddable in any webpage
• An online analytics dashboard that allows explorations to be improved easily over time.
• A full online editor GUI
• A comprehensive extension framework allowing straightforward integration of new interactions and classification rules
• Parameters can be associated with a learner in order to create a richer interactive experience.
• Collaborative creation and editing of explorations with version control
• (in progress) Responsive UI for mobile devices

A disclaimer on the bottom of the Google blog states that Oppia is not a Google product, which puts a question of the amount of resources Google plans to dedicate to Oppia. This could suggest the company is hoping that a community forms and takes the project ahead.

The NextWeb further added that Google’s reasoning Oppia’s existence was fairly simple. Google believes that online education can be conveyed by more than just video, audio or text. Feedback is the main key in learning. Google stated that “one does not learn to play the piano by watching videos of many virtuoso performances.”

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6 Andhra Pradesh varsities on defaulters’ list

Six universities from Andhra Pradesh are among 77 universities across the country which figure in the ‘NAAC certificate defaulters’ list’ released by the University Grants Commission. The National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) is the country’s accreditation body for higher education.

Two Central universities, namely the University of Hyderabad (UoH) and the English and Foreign Languages University (Eflu), besides state universities — Osmania University, Andhra University and JNTU-Hyderabad — and Rashtriya Sanskrit Vidyapeeth, Tirupati, the lone deemed university, figure in the list. The UGC has declared that their accreditation status is “invalid” since they failed to seek renewal of accreditation within the stipulated deadline.

Students opting for admissions in top institutions, especially in foreign countries, would be at a disadvantage if the universities are not accredited.

The accreditation of Andhra University had expired in September 2013, JNTU-Hyderabad in May 2009, OU in February 2013, Rashtriya Sanskrit Vidyapeeth in September 2008, Eflu in January 2006 and UoH in March 2013.

Though the state has 43 universities, only 12 varsities have ‘valid’ accreditation. Of them, state universities Acharya Nagarjuna University-Guntur, Kakatiya University-Warangal, Telugu University-Hyderabad, Sri Krishna-devaraya University-Anantapur, Sri Padmavathi Mahila University-Tirupati and Sri Ven-kateshwara University-Tirupati, deemed universities, namely, GITAM-Vizag, ICFAI-Hyderabad and Koneru Laxmaiah-Guntur, Sri Sathya Sai Institute of Higher Learning-Anantapur — and Maulana Azad National Urdu University-Hyderabad have ‘valid’ accreditation.

The UGC had recently issued a gazette notification making accreditation mandatory for all the universities and colleges. It has threatened to stop grants from 2015 if the universities fail to seek recognition within a year.

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