MCA news: A survey and some reflections

The survey

After the completion of the admission process and the conduct of a well planned Orientation programme, the MCA Dept started classes in right earnest for the newly admitted students of the Dept in the online mode on 4 October 2021. The first non-academic activity that the Dept takes up after the commencement of classes for the freshers is to conduct a survey of the basic computer skills of the newly admitted students of the Dept. This the Dept has been doing for the last several years. The Dept carried out such a survey this year also with a slightly altered format. As in the previous years, the intention was figure out the gaps in the basic computer skills and to devise appropriate remedial actions. In the previous years there used to be students who had not even touched a computer system before they joined the MCA programme in Vidya! Of late, with the spread of IT education in schools, the Dept has not been getting students with such backgrounds! Here is a typical response:

Reflections

However, since the eligibility criteria for admissions to MCA programme are so wide that the educational background of the students show great variation. For example, there are students who had no chance to learn anything about computers after they completed their tenth standard in schools. This was very much reflected in the survey. There are a few students who have reported that they have not sent an email till date! The general proficiency of majority of students in the basic computer skills like the usage of the Office packages, image editing and cloud storage is unacceptably low. The faculty of the MCA Dept considers this not as a reflection of the educational attainments or the intellectual caliber of the students but as a reflection of the the educational experience they had been subjected to during their studies in colleges and schools.

Challenge and opportunity: “Catch-up Course”

The Dept is looking upon this both as a challenge and an opportunity. The challenge is to provide the necessary help to the admitted students to upgrade their skills to acceptable levels and the opportunity is to open up the facilities in the Dept to students of other colleges trapped in similar situations to help them acquire the necessary skills. To this end, the Dept is in the process developing a syllabus for a “Catch-up Course” for the students of the Dept and a similar course for students of other colleges.