Covid-19 leads to parallel modes of assessment in this university in Delhi

When the Delhi government on Saturday announced cancellation of exams for state universities, including Netaji Subhas University of Technology (NSUT), the order brought relief only to a section of students studying on the campus.

The reason: the university functioned as an institute under Delhi University till 2018.

This essentially means that exams were only cancelled for first-year students who were admitted to the state university after 2018. The rest — the second, third, and fourth year students — who were admitted under Netaji Subhas Institute of Technology (NSIT) will be evaluated on the basis of DU and University Grants Commission (UGC) guidelines.

Officials confirmed that students admitted before and during 2018-19 academic session will be under Delhi University. The rest, who were admitted in 2019-20 academic session, will appear for their first-year assessments this year, are under the state’s higher education department.

So, while NSUT is conducting time-bound home assignments for its 1500 first-year students, NSIT is slated to start discussion-based online evaluation for final-year students on July 22. DU’s Faculty of Technology is responsible for conducting NSIT exams for the approximately 800 final-year students.

Sachin Maheshwari, dean at DU’s Faculty of Technology, said, “The decision to evaluate final-year students was taken unanimously in a joint course committee meeting of all the departments of engineering courses. A panel of examiners will be conducting an online interaction with final-year students over video calls, or phone calls to evaluate them. The decision was taken while keeping the interest of students in mind while following UGC guidelines and existing infrastructure.”

Supporting the move for final-year exams, Archit Sahni, a final-year undergraduate student at NSIT, said, “Most students of our batch just want their degrees. Many of us who have their offer letters will not be able to join for work if we don’t have our final year degrees.”

Maheshwari explained that the decision was taken after consulting students, most of who were in favour of taking exams in this mode instead of pen and paper exam. Those facing internet issues on the day of the exams can also contact the committee set up by the institute requesting evaluation at another date.

For second and third year students, which are under DU, students are likely to be promoted on the basis of past performance and continuous assessments which have already been conducted throughout the semester. DU’s dean (Exams) Vinay Gupta said the varsity’s Faculty of Technology and NSUT officials have discussed details on the mode of evaluation and will announce it by Friday.

While NSUT had already started the process of conducting time-bound home assignments from its first year students from July 10, following deputy chief minister’s announcement of cancellation of exams and the call for “progressive modes of evaluation”, the varsity increased the time-limit of the exam from 2.5 hours to a day.

Sujata Sengar, Dean Academics at NSUT, said, “Since our end-semester exams are not taking place due to the Covid-situation, evaluations are being done on the 50-mark internal component which will be used for 100% weightage. In addition to home assignments, students will also be marked on attendance, assessments and classroom quizzes that were conducted before and during the lockdown.”