Meeting peers offline better: 70% first-year IIT-Bombay students

Over 70% first-year students of the Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay (IIT-B) would have liked meeting their classmates in person instead of the online introductions, conducted owing to the Covid-19 pandemic

Over 70% first-year students of the Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay (IIT-B) would have liked meeting their classmates in person instead of the online introductions, conducted owing to the Covid-19 pandemic.

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A survey of 238 engineering students, who completed their first year in the online mode, was released as part of the Freshers’ Newsletter on Sunday. The survey found that 168 of the respondents said they wanted to meet their peers in person. Around 19% of the respondents said they feared they would not be as good at interpersonal interactions on text, according to the newsletter issued by the first-year students.

The IIT-B campus shut down completely on March 28 last year as the Covid-19 pandemic had raged in the city. An early summer vacation was announced on April 1. However, on June 25, the institute declared that the entire autumn semester will be conducted online in the interest of students’ safety. The new batch of engineering students was inducted online. Since then, almost all teaching and academic activities, barring research work, have been held online.

In the newsletter, first-year students wrote about their experiences of attending classes and extra-curricular activities online.

“First-year students always find it especially tough to navigate through the diverse and eventful world that is the campus at IITB. This is why we have multiple senior support systems to help the students find their place here. A crucial part of this support comes in informal interactions with seniors, something that has not been easy in the online mode. The writers of this article remain hopeful that the online mode will soon come to an end and that the juniors will be inducted into the campus and will begin to ask different questions,” read the newsletter.

While the chief editors of Insight, the student magazine that published the newsletter, refused to comment, they have issued their statement along with the newsletter.

“This newsletter is an attempt to look back and document some of what you guys [first-year students] uniquely experienced to give some perspective to all the readers, whether they be freshers or seniors. Although it was initially aimed at only the fresher batch, the final content has turned out to be relatable to every student that faced the online semesters and will stand as a fine testament to what all our batches faced in these trying times (sic),” the editors said in the statement.

Even as the institute gradually reopens its campus to researchers, engineering students, especially first and second years, will continue to attend classes online.

IIT-B’s deputy director S Sudarshan said, “There is no immediate plan for reopening the campus to undergraduate students. However, we will review the situation towards the middle of the semester.”