Microsoft bags cloud order from AICTE

The governing body for technical education in India, All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) has adopted cloud computing to improve technical education and prepare Indian students for the workforce. Microsoft’s Live@edu service will be deployed in more than 10,000 technical colleges and institutes throughout India over the next three months.

Live@edu is a hosted communication and collaboration service that offers email, Microsoft Office Web Apps, instant messaging and storage to AICTE’s more than 7 million students and nearly 500,000 faculty members, for a total reach of 7.5 million users — roughly double the size of the Los Angeles population — making AICTE Microsoft’s largest cloud customer ever.

AICTE: Technical education in-the-cloud

“Microsoft’s cloud platform will make for a truly progressive ecosystem and contribute to the country’s technical education by providing a better communication and collaboration platform for institutes and students,” explains Dr S S Mantha, chairman of AICTE.

According to Anthony Salcito, vice president of Worldwide Education, the country is witnessing rapid economic activity and growth. Developing India’s youth and their skills is going to play an important role globally in the country’s inclusive growth. “The union budget also laid emphasis on skill development and so does the proposed 12th Five Year Plan with a National Policy on Skill development. The PPP model (public-private partnership) is most essential in running and managing training institutions that provide every opportunity to address the skill gap most efficiently,” adds Salcito.

Sums up Sanket Akerkar, managing director, Microsoft India: “Microsoft has always seen education as a priority area and believes that technology offers possibilities that can help empower not just teachers and students but collectively India as a nation.”

A stamp of approval

Sharon Bamford, Chief Executive of the Association of MBAs (AMBA), was in Delhi recently to speak at a global accreditation conference. The UK-based organisation accredits programmes at 190 business schools in over 70 different countries. Sharon spoke with me about the AMBA accreditation process and global quality standards for Indian business schools.

Debeshi: All of a sudden, leading business schools in India are scrambling for international accreditation. Why, in your opinion, has this happened?

Sharon: India has taken its place at the top table in terms of global politics, global companies and global leaders - it is now important that India's top business schools are recognised for their global standards in research and teaching.

Sharon Bamford: accreditation is key

Accreditation differs from rankings in that it is audited to ensure compliance. Our accreditation in particular, is not about imposing irrelevant foreign standards on a school, but ensuring key quality indicators are benchmarked globally and the programmes we accredit are relevant for the context and the Market, thus, ensuring impact. We regard it as a developmental and consultative process and schools feed back to us that the process was as important as receiving the accreditation itself.

Globalisation requires not only a global mindset, but global knowledge and the skills to operate in a global marketplace. India's top schools already have outstanding international partnerships with schools who hold international accreditations, but to be an equal partner it is important that India's schools also benchmark themselves against these global quality standards.

India has the opportunity to attract international students to its top business schools, but this discerning market will require assurances of standards, not just in the teaching and learning, but in aspects of pastoral care, alumni relations, industry links, to name but a few.

Indian graduates are taking global leadership roles and need to be cognizant of the recognition of their qualifications on the world stage - an international accreditation of their programme is.

Debeshi: When awarding AMBA accreditation, what are the things that are taken into account?

Sharon: A critical element for us is the three years of relevant work experience, which we see as the cornerstone of a quality MBA. In India we accredit the MBA that new graduates sign up for as the equivalent of a Masters in Management, and the Executive and Part Time MBAs as an MBA. We look for international experience, which can be given in a variety of ways that suit the school and its students and we require minimum cohort size of at least 20 and at least 50% of the faculty to have PhD's, thus ensuring the quality and relevance of the learning for the student. The programme should also have been running for a certain number of years.

We originated as an organisation 'by MBAs, for MBAs' so a prospective student signing up for an AMBA accredited MBA can be assured of a qualification that is recognised internationally and is rigorous and relevant.

Debeshi: How does accreditation from an international agency such as yours improve prospects of domestic business schools?

Sharon: Business school graduates are increasingly mobile and even a very good school might not be recognised by employers around the world. An international accreditation articulates that the school meets global quality standards and that the school belongs to an elite 'club'. An employer in Australia may not have heard of an Indian school, but they would understand that if that school had met the same quality standards as Queensland University of Technology, for example, they would be able to set the candidates qualifications in the context of a quality school from their own environment.

We are also an MBA membership organisation and the alumni from all of 190 accredited schools across the world provides an outstanding network.

Debeshi: Which are the Indian b-schools that have been awarded AMBA accreditation?

Sharon: IIM Lucknow, IIM Kozikhode, SP Jain and MDI Gurgaon are the Indian schools with AMBA accreditation.

Debeshi: Any new updates/developments that you would like to share with my readers?

Sharon: I was invited to speak at the first global accreditation conference here in Delhi, but have extended my visit to meet with our schools and also with candidate schools that are going through the accreditation process.

The Indian alumni from our accredited schools that have returned to India are also important to us and we running an MBA Refresher, delivered by international and Indian faculty in August this year. Part of our mission is to maintain the professionalism of the MBA through continuous professional development.