Science gets an extra thrust

Starting this academic year in July, all science courses, barring BSc (H) Mathematics and BSc Chemical Sciences, which will adopt the semester system will also have tutorials.

Starting this academic year in July, all science courses, barring BSc (H) Mathematics and BSc Chemical Sciences, which will adopt the semester system will also have tutorials.

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Vice Chancellor Deepak Pental said that the students opting for these courses will get extra help from teachers through tutorials, which have been introduced in the science courses for the first time in the varsity.

“It was a long-standing demand of the science departments to have tutorials and the decision was passed in the Academic Council meeting held on May 13,” said Pental. These “doubt-clearing” sessions, where classes are broken into small groups and students are given personalised attention, are already in place in Arts and Commerce courses.

The Academic Council has approved tutorials for 12 BSc courses that will now be taught under the semester system. However, teachers are divided on how useful these classes will be.

“Science teachers have been demanding for tutorials for a long time and the decision to introduce them from the coming session is going to be of great help to the students. But it should have been introduced in the annual system only, the semester system was not needed to implement it,” said Abha Dev Habib, who teaches at Miranda House.

Yet others feel that the science tutorials are not going to make much of a difference. “The science students already have close interaction with the teachers due to practicals. If and when they have doubts they clarify it in the classes, so one doesn’t really see any point in having the classes,” said a Zoology teacher who teaches in one of the varsity colleges.

Some felt that the tutorials classes, which are already in place in Arts and Commerce departments, have been ineffective due to lack of infrastructure. “What is the point of having these classes on paper if the colleges do not have proper classrooms to hold them?” asked another Physics teacher.

The infrastructure in the varsity colleges have failed to match up with the expansion in number of seats due to implementation of OBC quota added the teacher.