In an insightful interaction with The Daily Guardian, Prof. P G Babu, Vice-Chancellor of Vidyashilp University, addresses the evolving challenges and imperatives of India’s higher education landscape. Drawing from his international academic experience, Prof. Babu discusses the need for curriculum reform, inclusive access, and institutional autonomy, while highlighting how Vidyashilp University is fostering interdisciplinary learning, tech-enabled pedagogy, and student readiness for global challenges like climate change.
- What are the major challenges facing higher education in India today?
India stands at a pivotal juncture in its educational journey. The scale of ambition is unmistakable, but so are the challenges that must be addressed with both courage and care.
First, the issue of curriculum fragmentation continues to impede holistic learning. Too often, programs remain siloed, with limited integration across domains, thus failing to reflect the interconnected realities that define the modern world.
Second, governance structures, while evolving, still require greater agility and institutional empowerment. The ability of universities to innovate is often constrained by administrative frameworks not fully aligned with the pace of change in the real-world.
Third, access and equity remain pressing concerns. Despite major strides in enrolment, students from socioeconomically disadvantaged backgrounds continue to face systemic barriers. Inclusion must mean more than representation and translate to meaningful opportunity.
Fourth, the regulatory landscape, though well-intentioned, would benefit from a shift towards enabling excellence rather than enforcing uniformity. The aspiration should be to support diverse institutional missions while holding firm on quality and outcomes.
Fifth, merit-based progression, for both students and faculty, requires greater clarity and consistency. Our educators, in particular, deserve robust, ongoing professional development aligned with the evolving demands of teaching and research in a global context.
And finally, we must confront the twin imperatives of financial sustainability and institutional academic freedom. Universities must be equipped not only to survive but to thrive with the ability to attract resources while maintaining the autonomy essential for inquiry and discovery.
These are not trivial challenges. But India, with its deep intellectual tradition and demographic promise, has the opportunity to reimagine higher education as a unified, future-facing endeavour.
- How is Vidyashilp University helping faculty adopt new technologies for better classroom engagement?
Our commitment to student-centred learning is closely tied to our emphasis on thoughtfully integrating technology into pedagogy. We see digital tools not as ends in themselves, but as means to deepen engagement, enhance accessibility, and expand the boundaries of the classroom.
Our faculty have adopted a range of technology-enabled practices that align with their pedagogical goals. For instance, instructors make use of Microsoft Office tools and organize reference materials, assignments, and assessment rubrics on our learning management platform, CollPolla. This allows students to revisit classroom content and expectations at their own pace.
Across the University, we also see increasing use of audiovisual media—podcasts, online lectures, films—as supplements to traditional pedagogy. These are particularly effective in grounding abstract ideas in contemporary contexts, breaking the monotony of lecture-driven formats, and sparking both critical reflection and peer discussion.
Faculty from various domains employ interactive tools to elicit real-time responses from students. These responses are then used to build word clouds, map thematic clusters, and assess the diversity of thought within the cohort. Such tools serve not only as formative assessment techniques but also as entry points into complex debates. In writing-intensive courses, digital platforms like Litmaps are used to support students in organizing literature reviews chronologically, which encourages clarity of structure and depth of analysis.
What we’re witnessing is not a top-down push for digitization, but a growing culture of innovation in pedagogy. Our faculty bring discernment to the use of technology, handpicking those that deepen understanding and enhance the learning experience.
- How has your international teaching experience shaped your academic vision at Vidyashilp?
International experience offers more than exposure. It provides perspective. Having engaged with institutions and academic networks across Asia and Europe, I have come to deeply appreciate both the shared aspirations and the distinct challenges that define global higher education today.
This background brings valuable insights into the mechanics of running long-term academic consortiums, navigating legal and regulatory frameworks for transnational education, and identifying areas where institutional partnerships can thrive in sustained practice. It also sharpens our understanding of strategic complementarities across regions. For example, collaborations with Polish universities offer lessons in transition economies. Also, a consortium in the area of law and economics helps us understand the nuanced differences between civil and public law systems.
These experiences have also helped shape a vision for curriculum innovation at Vidyashilp University. We are able to anticipate emerging areas of relevance, such as behavioural finance, experimental markets, and market design, while understanding how to build programs around them with academic and regulatory clarity.
Equally important is the recognition that preparedness for international standards varies across regions. In Asia, for instance, capacity-building efforts have revealed the need to consider flexible or slow-track learning options to better align with diverse student backgrounds. These regional engagements keep us grounded and responsive to local contexts, even as we move toward global benchmarks.
To that end, international teaching has reinforced the need to augment our core offerings through seasonal programs such as summer and spring schools, modular workshops, and targeted faculty development. These allow us to evolve curricula dynamically and equip both students and educators with tools that meet the demands of an increasingly interconnected world.
4. What makes interdisciplinary learning so important in today’s education system?
Interdisciplinary learning is no longer a pedagogical choice. It is an academic necessity.
The world’s most pressing challenges do not confine themselves to disciplinary boundaries. Addressing them demands not just technical expertise, but the ability to think across domains, synthesize diverse perspectives, and approach problems with a mindset attuned to real-world complexity.
At its best, interdisciplinary education cultivates intellectual agility. It teaches students to hold multiple frameworks in view, to navigate ambiguity with confidence, and to approach problems with both depth and breadth of knowledge. It also builds the ability to collaborate by helping students draw from multiple domains, work across differences, and arrive at more complete solutions.
For universities, embracing interdisciplinarity means more than offering combined programs. It requires rethinking structures, incentivizing collaboration, and building a culture that values curiosity over compartmentalization.
In an era defined by convergence, this approach is not simply about keeping education relevant—it is about making it responsible. The future will not ask what a student majored in. It will ask whether they can connect, adapt, and lead. Interdisciplinary learning is how we begin preparing them to do exactly that.
- How is the university preparing students to address real-world problems like climate change?
Preparing students to address challenges like climate change requires more than scientific understanding. It demands ethical reasoning, problem solving skills, and a deep sense of responsibility. At Vidyashilp University, this begins with the foundation we lay through the VU Core.
Our core curriculum includes courses that focus on Environmental Studies and Sustainability, Critical Thinking, Problem Solving, Human Values and Ethics, Community Engagement, and Gender Sensitization. These are not peripheral subjects. They are central to the kind of education we believe the future demands. Together, they equip students to understand the ecological, social, and moral dimensions of global crises.
Our aim is to nurture graduates who are not just informed, but prepared to lead change. Graduates from Vidyashilp University will view real-world problems not as someone else’s responsibility, but as part of their own evolving role in society.
Prof. P.G. Babu, Vice-Chancellor, Vidyashilp University
