One out of every two engineering students in the State either drops out of the course or fails to clear all the papers. G. KRISHNAKUMAR goes into a study report.

Admissions to the B.Tech. programme in colleges in Kerala may have grown steadily over the past few years, but the actual number of engineers coming out of those campuses is a sorry figure.

A study has found that the out-turn rate, or the percentage of students graduating from among those enrolled, from engineering colleges, which was almost 90 per cent for the 1991 intake, has been coming down and currently stands at about 55 per cent — so one of every two students either drops out of the course or fails in the examinations.

A study by Sunil Mani, Professor, Planning Commission Chair at the Centre for Development Studies in Thiruvananthapuram, and Arun M., who did his M.Phil. at the centre, reveals that liberalisation of education has not brought in the expected benefits for Kerala.

The study, titled “Liberalisation of technical education in Kerala: Has a significant increase in enrolment translated into increase in supply of engineers?,” says the intake has increased at an annual average rate of 17 per cent, while the out-turn has increased only at 15 per cent a year from 1995 through 2007.

Despite sharp increases in intake since 2004, the out-turn has been on a declining mode since 2006. In 2007, for instance, when the intake was 24,000 students, the actual number of engineers graduating was only 9,300, the study says.

Stating that there is a tendency among policymakers and industrialists to use intake or enrolment figures to speak about actual supply of engineers, Prof. Mani told The Hindu-EducationPlus that this was fallacious.

“Privatisation of engineering education, although increasing enrolments, has actually led to a deterioration in the quality of engineering education as indicated by lower out-turns. However, in all fairness, this deterioration has actually started in the 1990s, when the provision of engineering education was still in the government sector,” he said. Engineering colleges affiliated to the University of Kerala were considered to analyse the intake and out-turn rates as part of the study. Investigations found that the data from the university showed the same pattern seen in the State-level data in terms of capacity and out-turn rates. “The intake and out-turn for three cohorts of students from 2004 to 2006 shows that while the intake has grown fast, the out-turn rate has not increased at the same pace. The results for the 2006 cohort show a substantial reduction in the out-turn rate at 35 per cent. Even the absolute number of out-turn for the 2006 cohort is actually less than the absolute level of out-turn for the 2004 cohort,” the study says.

-The Hindu

The varying pass percentages of different colleges

A study by Sunil Mani, Professor, Planning Commission Chair at the Centre for Development Studies in Thiruvananthapuram, and Arun M, who did his M.Phil at the centre, has found that government-funded and government-aided colleges have better pass percentages than self-financing colleges between 2006 and 2010. While there is a drop in the pass percentage across all groups of colleges, it is much higher in the case of self-financing colleges. The difference between the pass percentage of self-financing and government and aided colleges widened between 2006 and 2010 and reached a stable level during the past three years.

Pointing out that there has been a significant drop in the pass percentages since 2008 (2004 cohort), Prof. Mani told The Hindu-EducationPlus that the government had admitted candidates for a lower fee in 50 per cent of the seats before 2004. “As fee increased and control of admission went to managements of self-financing colleges, many students with capability came to be excluded from self-financing colleges. This is reflected in the lower pass percentage from 2008. Either the students who gained seats in self-financing educational institutions did not meet the basic requirement for technical education, or the newly formed institutions did not have the ability to train the students suitably,” he said.

Explaining that the decline in quality of instruction and aptitude and capability of the students were the main reasons for the fall in out-turn rates, the researchers said that a faculty qualification index was designed to quantify the effect of faculty qualification on results obtained based on data from a sample of colleges under the University of Kerala.

“The faculty qualification index is defined as the weighted average of scores obtained based on the level of qualification (a score of 1 for just being a graduate teacher, a score of 2 in the case of a postgraduate qualification and finally a score of 3 for having a doctoral degree). The index will range from 1 to 3 and the closer it is to 3, the better it is. Only one government, and one aided college is able to cross the index of 2. Except for the two colleges from self-financing sector which could get a score of 1.9, all others are close to 1.5. As the quality of teachers being an important factor that affects the results of students, we hypothesised a positive correlation between the index and the pass rates of colleges in the sense that colleges having a score closer to three have a higher pass rate and so on,” they said.

The study found that the problem with the entrance examination is that students may obtain a high rank in it even after scoring very low marks (even negative) in mathematics. A random check on the actual marks obtained by candidates in one of the recent entrance examinations revealed that students with very little mathematical capability are able to get into engineering, which can also affect their subsequent performance. New self-financing institutions have made the selection process even worse. They allow students who can afford the fees to join engineering courses even if their rank is low.

Prof. Mani said that the minimum mark for the qualifying exam became the only important criterion to ensure that students with the right ability for technical education were selected. “Unfortunately, this requirement is set at such a low base, that candidates who lack the required basic knowledge also enrol for technical education. Conflict between the managements of these institutions and the government has led to a situation where different sets of criteria are used for selection by different institutions every year. Some even conduct their own entrance tests. In short, there is no good mechanism to ensure that only meritorious candidates gain admission for technical education,” he said.

The study found that many students who gained admission to engineering colleges did not have the basic capability, which could be built only by improving school education. Long-term public investment in schools and in higher education was the only solution to the problem. “Many students opt for technical education without considering their ability and aptitude,” it said.

-The Hindu