Distance education, for years, has come to the rescue of working professionals wanting to pursue higher education. The growing demand for newer courses has finally made way for courses like Masters in Business Administration (MBA) too to be pursued on the distance mode.
The Institute of Distance and Open Learning (IDOL), the distance education wing of the University of Mumbai (MU) recently started registrations for admissions to the 2021-22 batch, and for the first time ever, IDOL will hold an entrance exam for their newly launched MBA/MMS (Master of Management Studies) program.
“IDOL has got permission for MBA/MMS in the distance mode from All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) as well as the University Grants Commission (UGC), with approval for 720 seats. This is the first time the University of Mumbai has received recognition for its MBA course and we plan to declare dates for the entrance exam very soon,” said Vinod Malale, deputy registrar (public relations), MU.
This is the first year of three new approved courses, Bachelor of Science (B Sc) Computer Science, Masters in Art (MA) Geography and MBA/MMS and officials at IDOL are seeing this as a positive trend. “We are already receiving inquiries for the new courses. For years IDOL was opted by working professionals, but like every other education institute which was hit by Covid, IDOL too faced a decline in admissions. We hope to attract maximum applications this time around,” added Malale.
IDOL completed its admission for the July session of 2020-21 academic year and witnessed a drop in admissions from 67,000 students enrolled in the 2019-20 academic year to 64,000 admissions confirmed in the 2020-21 academic year. Officials and experts attributed this decline to the job losses and economic trouble faced by many, due to the pandemic induced lockdown. “The job market is looking better and we hope to attract more students than ever this time around,” he said.
{{/usCountry}}IDOL completed its admission for the July session of 2020-21 academic year and witnessed a drop in admissions from 67,000 students enrolled in the 2019-20 academic year to 64,000 admissions confirmed in the 2020-21 academic year. Officials and experts attributed this decline to the job losses and economic trouble faced by many, due to the pandemic induced lockdown. “The job market is looking better and we hope to attract more students than ever this time around,” he said.
{{/usCountry}}Last week, IDOL kicked off admissions for its 17 undergraduate and postgraduate courses. Despite Covid-19 hampering routine work, IDOL managed to register admissions of nearly 64,000 students across 14 courses in 2021-20, but with the launch of three new courses, officials are looking forward to a better admissions session.
“MMS course will be a two-year program divided into four semesters. The syllabus of MMS offered through regular college and IDOL will be the same. We are thrilled to offer such interesting courses to students,” said a senior official for IDOL. He added that the course material was discussed on several occasions by the academic council and finally a proposal was sent to the UGC. The final approval came through from the Distance Education Bureau (DEB) of the UGC.
Other than these new courses, IDOL has also been planning to offer popular undergraduate courses like BMS (Bachelor in Management Studies), BMM (Bachelor in Mass Media) and BAF (BCom in Accounting and Finance) in physical as well as online mode.
Apart from the degree courses, IDOL is also planning to offer a host of certificate programs, including a few courses in collaboration with the Bombay Stock Exchange and MU’s department of journalism. For a certificate course in radio jockeying, IDOL is in the process of reviving the university’s campus radio channel which had gone off the air a few years ago.
“The idea is to make education more accessible for everyone. Now that education is already being impacted online, the gap between interested students and available courses has reduced and this makes the entire process easier for students as well as universities,” said the senior official.
The last date for filling out the admission form is November 20, 2021. Interested students can log on to https://old.mu.ac.in/distance-open-learning/ for further information.
BOX:
Admissions at IDOL:
2018-19 : 67,138
2019-20 : 67,237 + 900 in January 2020 Session for five courses
2020-21 : 59,010 + 5,000 (in January 2021)
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