MANGALURU: Mangalore University is caught between a rock and a hard place, on starting of first-year undergraduate (UG) classes.
As per the current decision and academic calendar, MU has decided to start first year undergraduate classes from October, three months after PU results. Meanwhile, even if it wants to start first-year UG courses a few weeks after the PU results, it will face a shortage of staff and classrooms, since the first-year, second semester, classes of academic year 2021-22 are still on. It will be completed at the end of August.
A senior professor said that starting the first semester in October is not ideal, since it will inconvenience a lot of students. “Many have already taken provisional admissions in private colleges, and they will not be able to wait for another three months for the UG courses to start. MU needs to come up with another plan,” he added.
Mangalore University registrar Kishore Kumar C K said, “The present plan is to publish UG admission notifications soon after the II PU result. We will carry out the admission, and this will reduce worry among students. In the last academic year, we had delayed the process, which caused a backlash. Therefore, we will start admissions and come up with a concrete plan, on how to start classes for freshers at the earliest,” said Kishore.
He said currently UG students of all three years are on campus. Their semester examination ends in September. The first UG students will be an addition to the campus strength. “If we commence classes, there will be a shortage of classrooms to accommodate all four years of UG students as well. There are suggestions on how this can be addressed, and one of them is online classes for first semester UG students, and second is conducting classes on alternate days, only for them. We will come up with a clear roadmap soon,” said Kishore.
The II PU results are likely to be out by mid-June. Vice-chancellor P S Yadapadithaya said he is aware about the issue on the starting of first semester UG classes. “I have asked the registrar and principals to come up with a solution,” he added.
