![]() ![]() Ashoka through its financial aid program has admitted a number of students from economically weaker sections, and from non-metropolitan areas within India. As a private university near Delhi with very high fees and the lack of caste-based reservation policy, Footnote 4 Ashoka’s student body overwhelmingly constitutes students from an elite, English-speaking background. The undergraduate cohort makes up the bulk of the student strength, and now postgraduate and graduate students are also part of the university. While traditional programs like Economics, Mathematics, History, English and Political Science have expanded, several new programs have been introduced including Media Studies, Visual Studies, Environment Studies, Biology and Physics. In the last couple of years, Ashoka has seen rapid expansion in the number of students and the number and the levels of courses. CWC played an important role in the pedagogical practices of developing critical thinking skills in students, principally through writing pedagogy. The classroom teaching of the ICT was supported by one-on-one sessions conducted by the CWC where the students can brainstorm ideas, discuss their drafts and improve their writing samples. The ICT is a writing course (taught in English) taken by all undergraduates at Ashoka in the very first semester of their undergraduate program, where close reading and critical analysis of content and learning to respond to it is introduced to students through writing exercises. Initially, CWC’s responsibility was to provide writing support to the Introduction to Critical Thinking (ICT) courses. It was envisaged as an integral part of Ashoka’s curriculum and pedagogy. The CWC was established in 2014 as the university welcomed its first undergraduate class. The Centre for Writing and Communication (CWC) at Ashoka is instrumental in providing close mentorship and learning support to students. Moreover, this approach is supported by good infrastructure and resources available to the students and the teachers, a good teacher–student ratio and close mentorship and learning support available to students. I got a great kick when I solved mathematical puzzles, but how do matrices shape the world we live it? How do they help me understand the real world?’ Footnote 3Īshoka’s pedagogical vision thus makes a departure from many existing institutions of higher education in India. However, she observes, ‘While I enjoyed solving these problems on paper, I can’t recognize the same concept when it appears in the real world. She was a good student, interested in these subjects and she recalls having enjoyed solving mathematical equations or problems based on conductors and resistances in a circuit diagram. ![]() A friend and fellow-academic whose research focuses on multilingual education remembers her own classes of science and mathematics at school. Footnote 2 Even those of us who had the benefit of a good quality education have not encountered this in our school experience. In most institutions, the case is overwhelmingly of the student being a passive receiver of knowledge with little idea of how the material present in the school textbook is relevant to the world. Perhaps only a handful of schools, colleges and universities can boast of an active engagement with pedagogy where the students have the opportunity to be participants in the teaching–learning process. Theoretically, this approach is not a recent one, Footnote 1 nevertheless, it is surprising how little it is practiced in schools and in institutions of higher education in India. ![]() Rather than producing rote-memorized content, the students are encouraged to be critical thinkers where they learn to appreciate, examine, discuss, critique and innovate on what they learn about the world. Ashoka’s pedagogy emphasizes on making the university a space for critical thinking and the teacher–student interaction involves pedagogical tools that focus on student participation in unpacking knowledge and creating it anew. Moreover, the students are not expected to be passive receivers of knowledge. For instance, one may major in History and do a minor in Visual Studies, or Media Studies, or opt for interdisciplinary majors like Economics and History. The undergraduate program offers students the flexibility to choose a combination of courses. Ashoka’s study programs draw upon a liberal arts model of education where students are introduced to a variety of disciplines and ways of knowing the world. Ashoka University is a private university established in 2014 in the north Indian state of Haryana on the outskirts of Delhi.
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