Student assessment of quality of engineering education in India: evidence from a field survey
Quality Assurance in Education
ISSN: 0968-4883
Article publication date: 13 February 2019
Issue publication date: 20 February 2019
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to discuss students’ assessment of quality related issues in engineering education in India.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper uses primary survey data of 1,178 undergraduate engineering students in Delhi, India, in 2009-2010. Students’ experience and views of four important aspects such as teaching methods used in the classroom, evaluation pattern, skills acquired by students during the course and the involvement of students in different activities other than classroom teaching are discussed using descriptive statistics and correlation to examine the quality issues.
Findings
The study finds that the lecture method is still dominant in the teaching and learning of engineering institutions compared to technical demonstration and laboratory work. Around half of the engineering students reported that they had never gone through any field work or industrial visits during their entire program of study. Involvement of students in the activities other than classroom teaching (e.g. working on research projects, attending engineering internships, studying a foreign language and opting for interdisciplinary courses) is more prevalent in government institutions compared to private institutions. The findings suggest that engineering institutions (particularly private colleges) should change their focus from traditional methods of teaching and evaluation of students to interactive methods of learning to improve the quality of technical education in India.
Originality/value
The literature reveals that the quality assessment of engineering and technical education in India is largely based on the information collected from stakeholders other than students. Therefore, this study contributes a new dimension to the existing literature by considering students’ assessment of the quality of engineering education.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
This paper is a part of the authors completed PhD work in the NUEPA, New Delhi, India. The author is grateful to Professor Jandhyala B. G. Tilak (mentor and PhD supervisor) for his guidance to write the paper. However, the errors in the paper, if any, are of the author.
Citation
Choudhury, P.K. (2019), "Student assessment of quality of engineering education in India: evidence from a field survey", Quality Assurance in Education, Vol. 27 No. 1, pp. 103-126. https://doi.org/10.1108/QAE-02-2015-0004
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2019, Emerald Publishing Limited