Two New Initiatives of Ministry of Human Resource Development

• 14 Nov 2018

Recently, the Ministry of Human Resource Development launched two new initiatives viz. Leadership for Academicians Programme (LEAP) and Annual Refresher Programme In Teaching (ARPIT).

Leadership for Academicians Programme (LEAP)

• It is a three weeks Flagship leadership development training programme (2 weeks domestic and one week foreign training) for second level academic functionaries in public funded higher education institutions.
• The main objective is to prepare second tier academic heads who are potentially likely to assume leadership roles in the future.
• The programme would provide senior faculty, with high academic credentials, the required leadership and managerial skills including skills of problem-solving, handling stress, team building work, conflict management, developing communication skills, understanding and coping with the complexity and challenges of governance in Higher Education Institutions (HEIs), financial & general administration.
• The implementation of LEAP Programme will be through 15 National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) top ranked Indian Institutions and foreign Universities within the top 100 in the world global rankings.

Annual Refresher Programme in Teaching (ARPIT)

• It is an initiative for online professional development of 15 lakh higher education faculty using the Massive open online courses (MOOCs) platform SWAYAM.

Massive Open Online Course (MOOC)

• MOOC is a free Web-based distance learning program that is designed for the participation of large numbers of geographically dispersed students.

SWAYAM

• SWAYAM is a programme initiated by Government of India and designed to achieve the three cardinal principles of Education Policy viz., access, equity and quality.
• The objective of this effort is to take the best teaching learning resources to all, including the most disadvantaged.
• SWAYAM seeks to bridge the digital divide for students who have hitherto remained untouched by the digital revolution and have not been able to join the mainstream of the knowledge economy.
• SWAYAM platform is indigenously developed by Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) and All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) with the help of Microsoft.

• For implementing ARPIT, 75 discipline-specific institutions have been identified and notified as National Resource Centres (NRCs).
• NRCs will prepare online training material with focus on latest developments in the discipline, new & emerging trends, pedagogical improvements and methodologies for transacting revised curriculum.
• NRCs are located in a mixed range of institutions such as, Central Universities, IISc, IUCAA, IITs, IISERs, NITs, State Universities.
• ARPIT will be an ongoing exercise so that every year NRCs will continuously develop new refresher module in their earmarked discipline each year.
• The training materials will be uploaded and made available through SWAYAM. NRC will also publish the list of the faculty who have been certified.