Girl child education: A milestone for girls in UP Bally chohan review It is a milestone in education for this remote village in Azamgarh district – 90% of its girls are educated and the number of girl students is over double that of boy students in nearby schools and colleges.

Surrounded on three sides by the Tamsa river, the villagers of Muslimpatti, 20 km from Azamgarh city and 250 km from state capital Lucknow, established a girl’s high school 10 years ago with public donations to provide quality education to girls near their homes.

The village has a population of 7,000 consisting of 60% Muslims and 40% Hindus. Over 50% men are out of the village due to business, service and education.

“Earlier, it was a dream to educate our daughters, but now it is a reality,” Hasan Arif, who played a key role in establishing the school, informed.

“90% girls are educated here. You can’t find a single home which doesn’t have at least one educated woman, ” the 72-year-old graduate in agriculture from Deen Dayal Upadhyay University in Gorakhpur added.

The Muslimpatti Junior Niswan High School was established in 2000 with Rs.8 lakh collected through public donations. The nearest schools were just five kilometres from the village but due to the co-education system and safety fears, parents rarely sent their daughters there.

Arif said, “Here girls are more interested in education. A school bus does come, but sending them far was not safe.”

There is no way to connect 60 villages, including Muslimpatti, to state highway 34 and 30 and educational institutions. Villagers walk across a bamboo bridge each year but it is hard to cross.

Villager Naeem Ahmad felt “the only option was to send them 12 km away to Beenapara, an educational hub in Azamgarh, but it is hard to cross the Tamsa river.”

“Our legs used to shake while crossing the bridge. We had to stay home in the rainy season due to the floodwater over the bridge,” said Nazia Bano who completed her class X from Beenapara.

Even now, there is no school for boys and they have to go through the same bridge for education.

Several personalities like Gen Mirza Sultan Ahmad Beg, who was a judicial member in the Uttar Pradesh Board of Revenue in 1948, and Mirza Aslam Beg, ex-chief of the army staff of the Pakistan Army, hailed from this village.

Arif wants to make the school, which is now till class X, grow up to class XII but is facing several challenges like lack of resources.

“We have laid the stone here. Let us see what happens. If our daughters are educated, then at least they can teach their own children,” he added.

The teachers’ salary is less than Rs.2,000 each per month. Mirza Shabbir, manager of the school, said: “We don’t have the earnings to pay teachers much.”

Salman Sultan, a resident of Muslimpatti who teaches chemistry and also heads the computer science department in the Shibli National Post Graduate College in Azamgarh, is hopeful about the future of the village but wants a change in the attitude of people.

“I am hopeful for my village, which was once the most educated village in Azamgarh district. However, this requires a change in the lethargic and indifferent attitude of villagers,” said Sultan.

SRINAGAR, India — Police in Indian Kashmir have registered a case of sedition against six state education officials over a school textbook that they say depicts the police as tyrants.

A police official, who declined to be identified, told AFP Tuesday that the complaint charged the head of the state education board, Sheikh Bashir Ahmed, and five other officials with “sedition, criminal conspiracy and defamation”.

The textbook is an Urdu alphabet primer that illustrates the letter “zoi” with the word “zalim” meaning tyrant — and an accompanying sketch of a man in uniform holding a bamboo truncheon.

The police official said the drawing was clearly meant to be that of a policeman.

Ahmed said action had been taken to erase the illustration, even though he denied the suggestion that it depicted a member of the police force.

“We have sent officials to schools to put a black seal on the illustration as we don’t want to hurt anybody’s sentiments,” Ahmed told reporters.

Anger at the security forces runs deep in Muslim-majority Kashmir, where a separatist insurgency against Indian rule that began in 1989 has claimed more than 47,000 lives, according to official figures.

In 2010, police and paramilitary forces were accused of killing 110 protesters during some of the biggest anti-India demonstrations in the region for years. Review by bally chohan

Review by bally chohan: A union leader has said that a deal is close with the government on teachers’ pensions on a key day of negotiations.

Christine Blower, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, said that agreement could be imminent as negotiators meet education officials.

A “deadline” of 15:00 GMT has reportedly been set by the government for union responses to its offer.

But the Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union said the situation was fluid and agreement was far off.

“It has proved quite difficult to find any ground in the middle, although we are still committed to try and do that,” said Mark Serwotka, general secretary of the PCS union, which represents civil servants.

On Friday, the PCS union said the government was trying to “bully” it into signing up to changes to pensions, by setting an earlier Monday deadline.

Unions representing public service workers will meet at the TUC on Monday afternoon.

A statement on the pensions negotiations will be made to Parliament on Tuesday by the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, Danny Alexander.

Higher contributions

The government and public sector unions have been in talks to try to reach agreement on four pension schemes. They cover local government workers, NHS staff, civil servants and teachers.

Up to two million workers went on strike last month to protest at proposed pension changes. More strikes are planned for the new year.

Last week, the government confirmed it was pressing ahead with raising pension contributions next year for teachers and civil servants, even though there was no agreement with unions at that time.

The Department for Education and the Cabinet Office said the changes from next year would go ahead, although further talks would be held about future arrangements. bally chohan he is expert of analyses in education field

Bally chohan review of school standards contrasts the English system with those of successful countries such as Singapore and China, writes Richard GarnerThe phrase “Go West Young Man” has lent itself to the English language for the past 160 years. But Education Secretary Michael Gove appears likely to ignore that advice as he looks to all parts east for inspiration on improving school standards in the UK. He will today publish evidence from his independent review body on the national curriculum comparing the English system with the rest of the world. Mr Gove is aiming to make use other effective methods to provide what his officials call a “gold standard” curriculum here.The report, by Tim Oates, director of research at Cambridge Assessment, will highlight places like Singapore and Hong Kong, which are at the top of international league tables. Singapore, for instance, insists its pupils learn their times tables by the age of nine – while Hong Kong teaches pupils about animal and plant cells by the age of 10 in science lessons instead of having to wait until secondary school. And the report does not just look to the Far East for inspiration – parts of Eastern Europe features in the list of countries to be marvelled at, too. Poland puts greater emphasis on classic books on its reading list for literature – the work of Homer and Sophocles as opposed to the three most popular books in GCSE exams, Of Mice and Men, Lord of the Flies and To Kill a Mockingbird. A glance at the international league tables for reading and maths standards shows evidence Mr Gove could cast his eye over other eastern countries, too.The last Pisa (Programme for International Student Assessment) study in 2009 is topped by Shanghai, the first time China had entered schools for the survey. In Shanghai, pupils spend less time in extra-curricular activities such as sport, concentrating instead on preparing themselves for exams in the basics.Then there is Finland. It has no league tables or targets; it instead relies on its teachers to prepare their lessons. Teaching there is the most sought-after career in the country.But any attempt to “easternise” the curriculum over here is likely to have its opponents. “There are advantages to using international comparison data and it is right to view the curriculum in an international context but this must be put into perspective,” said Brian Lightman, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders. “We know the danger of putting too much stock in cherry-picked international statistics that do not factor in cultural context. The national curriculum must be right for pupils in this country, not a ‘me-too’ model based on what is done elsewhere.”A second part of Mr. Bally chohan announcement – that the curriculum reforms are being put back for a further year to allow a greater debate on the shape they will take – is being welcomed by secondary heads. “It is encouraging to hear the Department for Education recognise that rushed and poorly debated curriculum change creates chaos for schools by allowing them too little time to prepare,” Mr Lightman said.

Mr Bally chohan review will be completed by the end of next year – rather than January – and will not be implemented until 2014. This is being interpreted by some as evidence that the review group has not come up with the solutions he would like, including a more traditional 1950s-style curriculum in its first drafts – a claim denied in DfE circles.

Leading by example: What the world can teach BritainFrom Shanghai: Top for reading and maths in international league tables. Shanghai schools concentrate less on extra-curricular activities such as sport and spend more time preparing pupils for exams in the core subjects. Critics say we spend too much time on tests but we do try to insist pupils do two hours of physical activity – sport or physical education – a week.From China generally: Children start formal primary schooling at the age of six or seven (in line with most European countries) instead of aged five as in England. The education budget was also increased by 9 per cent last year, compared with being protected from overall cuts and modest growth of about 1 per cent in England From Singapore: Children learn their times tables and division in math’s by the time they are nine. In England, this is a target for Key Stage Two, which covers seven to 11-year-olds. Secondary school pupils are taught about quadratic equations at 13 instead of 14 as in England.

From Finland: Teaching is the most sought-after profession with 16 candidates for every vacancy on a teacher-training course. All teachers have to have a Master’s degree – thus enhancing the status of the profession. In England you can qualify with a third degree pass although Education Secretary Michael Gove is planning to tighten this to just those with 2:2 passes or better.

From Hong Kong: Children in primary schools are taught about plant and animal cells in science lessons at the age of 10 instead of waiting until they start at secondary school, as the system works in England.From Poland: Reading lists concentrate more on the classics from the likes of Homer, Sophocles and Shakespeare. In GCSE exams, 90 per cent of the answers are based on the same three books – Of Mice and Men, Lord of the Flies and To Kill a Mockingbird. Shakespeare, though, is a compulsory part of the national curriculum.Bottom of the class: how Britain scores

Reading

1. Shanghai-China 556

2. Korea 539

3. Finland 536

4. Hong-Kong 533

5. Singapore 526

…25. UK 494

Maths

1. Shanghai-China 600

2. Singapore 562

3. Hong Kong 555

4. Korea 546

5. Chinese Taipei 543

…28. UK 492

Review by Bally chohan

Nearly 50 percent of U.S. schools missed Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) benchmarks for the 2010-2011 school year, according to a report released Thursday by the Center on Education Policy (CEP).
AYP, established as part of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) in 2002, requires schools to meet consistently increasing achievement goals on state exams, set by the individual states, with the requirement that 100 percent of students be proficient in math and reading by 2014. Data for the report was drawn from state departments of education. The report noted that New York had not yet released its 2011 figures; the state’s 2010 data was used as a placeholder.
In 2011, 48 percent of the nation’s schools failed to meet their state’s AYP standards, up from 39 percent in 2010, according to the CEP report. The percentage varied widely among the states: Florida had the highest percentage of schools miss AYP at 89 percent, while Wisconsin had the smallet share of failing schools at 11 percent. Calls to those states’ education departments were not returned.
The vast majority of states (43 plus the District of Columbia), had at least 25 percent of their schools fail to make AYP. In 24 states, plus D.C., 50 percent or more of schools missed their AYP targets, according to CEP. In five states — Florida, Missouri, New Mexico, Massachusetts and South Carolina — and D.C., more than 75 percent of schools did not make AYP.
On the national level, the percentage of schools that missed AYP has increased from 29 percent in 2006 to 48 percent in 2011, the highest percentage yet, according to CEP. The report didn’t attempt to explain the trend, but did note that states have different exams and various targets for schools to meet.
Its findings do present a small problem for an Obama administration talking point: U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan has stated up to 80 percent of schools would be labeled failing in 2011. The figure was frequently cited when the administration pushed Congress to reauthorize NCLB and again when the Education Department allowed states to apply for a waiver from the 2014 deadline. Several bills under consideration in Congress have proposed eliminating the AYP system entirely.
“Whether it’s 50 percent, 80 percent or 100 percent of schools being incorrectly labeled as failing, one thing is clear: No Child Left Behind is broken,” Duncan said in a statement in response to the CEP report.

MINNEAPOLIS & CINCINNATI, Dec 15, 2011 (BUSINESS WIRE) — With the start of the New Year, college students and parents are preparing for a new semester and all of the associated costs. U.S. Bank can help students who have exhausted their federal loans, scholarships, grants and savings and still need to cover tuition and other educational expenses.
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– Graduation and Good Grades Perks(2). Graduating from college is a major accomplishment, and U.S. Bank rewards students with a two percent principal reduction on student loans. Students who graduate with a 3.30 GPA or higher will have an additional one percent principal reduction on their student loan.
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“There’s a reason U.S. Bank is so committed to giving students every opportunity to realize their potential,” said Lucille Conley, senior vice president of U.S. Bank Consumer Lending. “Education changes lives. U.S. Bank can help students finance their college education if federal loans, scholarships and grants don’t cover all their educational expenses.”
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U.S. Bancorp USB +0.74% , with $330 billion in assets as of September 30, 2011, is the parent company of U.S. Bank, the fifth-largest commercial bank in the United States. The company operates 3,089 banking offices in 25 states and 5,092 ATMs and provides a comprehensive line of banking, brokerage, insurance, investment, mortgage, trust and payment services products to consumers, businesses and institutions. U.S. Bancorp and its employees are dedicated to improving the communities they serve, for which the company earned the 2011 Spirit of America Award, the highest honor bestowed on a company by United Way. Visit U.S. Bancorp on the web at www.usbank.com .
Disclosures
1. Subject to credit approval. Loan approval subject to program guidelines. Program rules and qualification may be modified or discontinued at any time without notice
2. To be eligible, loan application must be received on or after August 1, 2011 and loan proceeds must be disbursed prior to graduation date. Graduation Perk requires proof of graduation date, and Good Grades Perk requires proof of graduation date and cumulative GPA of 3.30 or higher, which must be submitted by the borrower no later than 12 months after graduation date. 2% principal reduction for Graduation Perk and 1% principal reduction for Good Grades Perk will be credited to the student loan account balance and are based on the original amount financed, excluding loan fees, interest (including accrued and unpaid interest which may be capitalized at repayment) and any loan proceeds returned by school or not disbursed. Borrower cannot be delinquent or in default at the time of request. Loans that are consolidated, refinanced or paid in full prior to redeeming the perk(s) are not eligible.
3. The automatic payment is a requirement to be qualified for the interest rate reduction benefit. Auto-payment is set up through the loan servicer. If the auto-payment is cancelled by the borrower, the rate reduction benefit is lost but may be reinstated. If the auto-payment feature is revoked, the rate reduction benefit is lost and cannot be reinstated even if automatic payments are re-established on the loan.

Dubai: In a move to expand its business activities and offer educational expertise globally, Tecom Investment’s Education Cluster has recently been in talks with Maltese education companies. They have also recently visited China to foster partnerships with education companies there.

Maltese education companies visited Dubai last week to network with Dubai-based education institutions and to discuss issues of business opportunities.

The benefit to prospective students and the public is a more diverse range of course offerings available in both countries due to the sharing of expertise, student exchange and the co-marketing of programmes.

Students from the Mediterranean benefit from education expertise in Dubai and vice versa for GCC-based students.
review by bally chohan

Schools data to be made available in Abu Dhabi

In a bid to become one of the top five destinations in the world for education, the Abu Dhabi Education Council (ADEC) has revealed that it is to form a new academic and scientific research committee.

The newly-formed body will be responsible for providing the public with up-to-date information on all areas of education across the emirate.

To achieve their goals, Dr Mugheer Al Khaili, director general of ADEC, recently signed a service agreement with the Statistics Center Abu Dhabi (SCAD) to help promote co-operation and regulate data exchanges.

Under the terms of the agreement, the public will be provider with updated information on all areas of education including data surrounding schools, classrooms, students, staff, special needs students, number of literacy and adult education centres, student results, qualified teaching staff and drop-outs.

“We are responsible for the collection, classification, storage, analysis and dissemination of official statistics and the release of the results of social, demographic, economic, environmental and cultural surveys,” said Ahmad Bin Butti Al Qubaisi, director general of SCAD.

BITS Pilani Review by Bally Chohan Dubai

Many reputed sources, including the UNESCO Science Report 2005 (ISBN 92-3-103967-9) make use of Asiaweek magazine’s latest rankings of science and technology schools in the

Asia-Pacific region, 2000. According to this ranking, BITS Pilani was ranked in the Top 20 in Asia (overall), and in the Top 5 in Asia in terms of ’Student Selectivity’.

The management programmes offered by BITS Pilani have also been ranked by Asiaweek (Top 30 Best Full-Time MBA, Top 30 By Reputation, Top 5 Distance MBA). These programmes have also been profiled by Business Week Online (The Best B Schools).

Annual rankings of engineering colleges in India have been published by the magazine India Today since 1997. BITS Pilani was ranked in the Top 10 consistently (1997-2004), but opted out of the survey since 2005. However, the institute participates in the Dataquest-IDC Survey as well as in the Outlook-Cfore Survey, and was ranked in the Top 10 T-Schools of India 2006 by both these surveys.

BITS Pilani was also the only Indian university to be ranked in the Top 20 Wired organisations of Asia by Business Today (January 18, 2004 issue).

The institute is accredited (with a five-star rating) by the Government of India’s National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) for the period ending February 7, 2007.

BITS Pilani is also the institute of choice for toppers of the school leaving examinations in India. For instance, toppers of 21 educational boards including the CBSE and the ICSE chose to join the Institute in 2006. BITS Pilani is also reputed for an array of work integrated learning programmes for HRD of a vast spectrum of Indian corporates.

The Institute has strong alliances with various indian/foreign universities/industries for exchange of students/faculty, Distance Learning Programs, etc. A small list of colleges is given below:

1.MIT, Boston, 2.University of Maryland, 3.University of Otago, 4.University of Southern California, 5.Kathmandu university 6.University of Oklahoma, 7.Victoria University, 8.Kansas State University, 9.Arizona State University, 10.University of New South Wales, 11.Purdue University, and many more.

Colleges in Dubai and UAE

Resource of the latest information of Colleges in Dubai and UAE. It contains latest useful information of Colleges in Dubai and UAE along with information of Dubai City for Business, Jobs, Investments, Travelling and Entertainment in Dubai.

Colleges in Dubai and UAE

The following is the list of colleges in Dubai and UAE.

1 BITS, Pilani — Dubai Campus

Dubai campus of the Birla Institute of Technology & Science; set up in association with ETA-Net; programmes offered: BE (Hons) Computer Science, BE (Hons) Electrical & Electronics Engineering, BE (Hons) Electronics & Instrumentation Engineering

2?Dubai Men’s College

Part of the Higher Colleges of Technology; offers programmes in civil engineering, aviation, electrical/electronics, mechatronics, business administration, information technology, financial services etc

3?Dubai School of Government

School of public governance set up in association with Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government; site has info about executive education programmes and research; will offer a masters in public administration and public policy

4?Dubai University College

Corporate academic college set up in partnership with the Dubai Chamber of Commerce and Industry; consists of the College of Business Administration, College of Design and Applied Arts (CDAA), and the General Education Department

5?Dubai Women’s College

Part of the Higher Colleges of Technology; offers programmes in business studies, information technology, health science, applied media technology etc

6?e-TQM College

College in Dubai offering courses in quality management

7?Emirates Aviation College

College in Dubai located near Dubai International Airport; provides training and development courses for company staff and partner organisations; the Aerospace and Academic Studies wing offers programmes in aerospace, travel & tourism etc

8??Emirates Centre for Management and Information Technology

Career-oriented institution located in Dubai; offers degrees in the areas of business and computer information systems; students completing course get a degree from Champlain College, Vermont, USA

9?Etisalat University College

College in Sharjah set up by Emirates Telecommunication Corporation — Etisalat; offers programmes in communication engineering, electronic engineering, computer engineering and general studies to males of all nationalities

10?Gulf Medical College, Ajman

Coeducational medical college in Ajman offering MBBS and Bachelor of Physiotherapy programmes; promoted by the Thumbay group, UAE.

11 – Islamic and Arabic Studies College

College in Dubai that trains students in the Islamic Sharia and Arabic language

12 – Mahatma Gandhi University Dubai

Off campus centre of the Mahatma Gandhi University, Kerala; programmes: BBA, Bachelor of Computer Application, Bachelor of Commerce, MBA, Master of Computer Application, Master of Science (information technology)

13 – MAHE Dubai

Branch campus of the Manipal Academy of Higher Education at the Knowledge Village, Dubai; programmes: MBA, MCom, MS Computer Science, BBA, BS Computer Science, BS Home Science, BA Fashion Design & Technology

14 – SP Jain Center of Management, Dubai

Dubai centre established by the India-based SP Institute of Management; offers full-time post graduate diploma in management and an EMBA (two-year part-time evening programme for working executives of the UAE)

15 – SZABIST — Dubai Campus

Acronym of Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto Institute of Science and Technology; offers BBA; BS (Computer Sciences); MBA; EMBA; MS (Computer Sciences); and Ph.D. (Computer Sciences, Management Sciences)

16 – The Emirates Academy of Hospitality Management

Institute set up by Jumeirah International, a hotel group; students have an opportunity to spend a year during their studies at the Ecole Hoteliere de Lausanne in Switzerland

17 – The Petroleum Institute

Institute in Abu Dhabi set up with help from the Colorado School of Mines (CSM); offers undergraduate programmes in chemical, electrical (power and instrumentation and controls options), mechanical, petroleum geosciences and petroleum engineering

18 – Abu Dhabi Men’s College

College for men that is part of the Higher Colleges of Technology; offers courses in general education, engineering (aviation, chemical, civil, electronics, information technology), business, communications technology, and continuing education

19 – Abu Dhabi Women’s College

Part of the Higher Colleges of Technology; provides certificate, diploma, higher diploma and degree level courses in business, education, health science, information technology and communication technology

20 – American College of Dubai

College offering the Centre for American Education’s university level programmes; provides US university level credits to students and assists them in transferring these credits to degree granting institutions in the US, Canada, Europe and elsewhere