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Abstract
Knowledge Consortium of Gujarat (KCG) has been established by the Government of Gujarat in the year 2009, looking forward to provide a platform for reforms in the higher education. The aim of KCG is to design and implement various academic initiatives for achieving excellence in education, educational management and policy framing in the segment of state higher education. The broad vision of KCG is to achieve this objective through five different dimensions namely, (i) Education, (ii) Training and Capability Building, (iii) Research and Innovations, (iv) Extension and (v) Quality Assurance. To execute the vision, the governing body has been constituted which comprises of Principle Secretary, Higher and Technical Education (as the CEO of KCG), Joint CEO & Directors, and the coordinator. At advisory level, the committee of the consortium has included minister of education, directors of various national and state universities including IIMA and NID, industry experts including president of FICCI and other renowned academicians.
The present paper intends to study and analyze the KCG model, initiatives taken to achieve excellence and outcome achieved over the period of its first five years of establishment. The analysis will be carried out by contacting team of KCG executives and other available secondary sources of data.
Keywords: KCG, Higher Education.
Introduction
National Knowledge Commission's report (2007) under the chairmanship of Mr. Sam Pitroda, has emphasized on problems in Higher education of India in terms of much resistance observed at various levels in the government, to new ideas, experimentation, process, re-engineering, external interventions, transparency and accountability. As a result, there is a big challenge in terms of reformative innovations with new regulatory frameworks, new delivery systems, new processes etc. This can be achieved by collaborative models either through Public-Private-Partnerships or Academia- Industry Partnerships or through Academia- Research laboratories etc. And such model needs to be the one which works in collaboration rather than working in separate compartments. This can be done in a most effective way by launching focused missions on education in variety of areas, with appropriate leadership, autonomy, flexibility, accountability, tangible deliverables, measurable milestones and well defined specific goals.
Higher Education in Gujarat
Presently there are total 49 Universities, 13 research institutes and 8 institutes of National importance, 72 government colleges, 357 grant in...