IIT-M shuts Facebook to free up bandwidth
CHENNAI : The Indian Institute of Technology Madras has blocked access to Facebook on campus so as to free bandwidth for better purposes.

Afaculty member said that the access to Facebook has been blocked around the hostels since last week.

IIT-M dean of students L S Ganesh said, “It’s been blocked for some time. The network was getting clogged badly because of too much traffic.” With increase in the number of seats, the institute is trying to make optimal use of the resources available. Freshers are asked to not get a personal computer or laptop in the first semester, so they can get to know the campus facilities and enjoy its beauty. In the second semester most get a laptop and usage crosses the internal bandwidth limit of the institution.

“You can build a six-way highway, but too many cars can make going slow even there. Then we are left with only two options – expand the highway or think about changing the traffic pattern. Usually the first option is not open. Our networks team is working diligently to see that the campus network works more efficiently,” professor Ganesh said.

But, you can’t keep students tied down for long. The tech-savvy students have found a way to bypass the block. “We can access it using a proxy website or by making a small change to the URL. The usage is not too excessive, so nobody seems to be experiencing withdrawal symptoms because the site has been blocked,” said a student.

With the institute’s annual cultural festival Saarang scheduled to begin on January 18 many students admitted to not being able to promote events on the social networking website, where it could get ‘Liked’ by many more people and catch more eyeballs in the target group than no advertisement can.
 

 Seminar on higher edu at Picasso college  

LUCKNOW : On January 10 an international seminar was organised on higher education by Iqbal Narain IGNOU Community College (INICC) at Picasso Animation College here.

A college press note said that a number of students from California State University Long Beach (CSULB) and Professors of INICC participated in the seminar and exchanged their views on “Development of modern higher education with reference to Community College and the Education system in USA and India and their Campus life”.

INICC Academic Council & Head of Public Administration Dept. Lucknow University Prof. Tim Kerin explained that "INICC & CSULB will work together in
developing effective curricular for community college system in U.P. in general and Lucknow in particular".

Participating in the seminar Dr. Arnold Kamisky of California State University Long Beach also shared his views on higher education system in India in
general. He was accompanied by others from the university.

Jaipur NIT holds its sixth convocation

JAIPUR : The lush green Malaviya National Institute of Technology (MNIT) campus was buzzing with excitement. It was the sixth convocation that was held here on December 17 where a total of 1,525 degrees were awarded to graduates, postgraduates and Ph.D. scholars of batches 2010 and 2011.

First position holders in all the disciplines were awarded gold medals.
Addressing the students Prof D P Agarwal, chairman of Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) encouraged students to start their business from a small unit which provides them an opportunity to harness their skills. “The small units act as an instrument of social, economic, technological and inclusive
development of the Indian economy,” he said.

Two former students were awarded Distinguished Alumni Awards for their outstanding contribution in the fields of engineering and technology - Sushil Kumar Agarwal, executive director of Power Grid Corporation Limited of India and Prahlad Swaroop Bhargava, executive director of Bharat Petroleum Corporation.

Prof I K Bhat, director of MNIT spoke about the institute’s achievements. He said, “Since 2009, 243 papers have been published in reputed national and
international journals. Besides this the faculty is involved in the many national and international projects.”

Dr Ashok Agarwal, head training and placement said that in the last three years all eligible students have been were wellplaced receiving an average salary package of Rs 4-5 lakh per annum in various multinational companies. “This year the salary packages in the range of Rs 10-26 lakh have been offered to a number of B.Tech students,” he said.

Prior to the ceremony, the chief guest inaugurated the boys’ hostel with a capacity 1,000 single-seater rooms, out of which 225 rooms are air-conditioned and girls’ hostel of 400 single-seater rooms.

Lucknow varsity's Public Admin journal upgraded

LUCKNOW : The Department of Public Administration of the University of Lucknow has upgraded its journal "Dynamics of Public Administration" and it is now a bi-annual refreed Journal. The journal has been allotted a ISBN number and has also been put online, according to the Head, Department of Public Administration, Dr Manoj Dixit.

"We now bring out both online and print versions of the journal", he said.

The journal endeavours to look into different dimensions of Public Administration theory and practice and also issues related to policy-making, interventions, evaluations, researches and academics.

The Journal invites interesting papers on different aspects of administration and governance and the papers need not be technical but should add to the existing body of knowledge or present a different perspective, Dr Dixit said.

Explaining the spirit of the content he said that "readability and sustaining reader’s interest is an important criterion."

Research based articles are strongly encouraged but focus is on analysis and recommendations cutting down on technical aspects. Policy papers, best practices and case studies, creative concepts and applications, book reviews, commentaries, interviews and other thought provoking manuscripts form the basis of the journal, he added.

Particularly welcome are future oriented manuscripts that offer small businesses and start-ups a vision of business in twenty first century and practical road maps for getting there. Manuscripts that address interdisciplinary topics or approach “traditional” topics from interdisciplinary perspective are preferred. "We encourage success stories of policy implementation at a macro level as also best practices and creative solutions at organizational level", he added.

For details contact manojdixit23@gmail.com