The Hindu

Mangalore, Sep 29: The State Government has approved the Mangalore University’s proposal to introduce “choice-based credit semester scheme” for its postgraduate courses. It will help students to study inter-disciplinary subjects.

However, the university will be implementing the scheme from the next academic year as the classes for this year’s postgraduate courses have already begun.

The Government approved the draft statute governing the implementation of the scheme four days ago, K.M. Kaveriappa, Vice-Chancellor of the university, told The Hindu. A notification for implementing the scheme from the next academic year would be issued shortly, he added.

At present, a student of postgraduate course in Kannada cannot simultaneously study Economics. But it will be possible to study two subjects in the proposed scheme, subject to certain conditions.

The mobility is allowed within a particular stream. Arts students will not be able to choose a science or commerce subject under the new scheme. Similarly, a student studying Biology will not be allowed to study Journalism. The inter-stream mobility may also be allowed as and when the university adopts “virtual cafeteria type” of the choice-based semester system. When this is done, an M.A. (Kannada) student will be able to opt for one subject from science or commerce stream as well.

The university wants to ensure that a student acquires at least 70 per cent knowledge of the primary subject and the rest of 30 per cent knowledge would be left for the choice of the student, within the stream in which he is studying.

The university will simultaneously introduce credit-based system for postgraduate courses. At present, postgraduate courses are under semester scheme.

They are neither credit-based nor choice-based as of now. Sources in the university said that credits represented the weightage of a course. The weightage is assessed based on the student’s attendance, marks scored, and participation in co-curricular and extra-curricular activities.