Break up of Marks in IP University

There has been a discussion on orkut community about the break up of marks in IP university.

Ravi

Well I think 100 marks should be broken into various parts like

1. Class Assignments: 20%
2. Attendance: 5%
3. Lab & Project work: 25%
4. First Terms: 10%
5. Second Terms: 10%
6. Finals: 30%

and now if you make total passing % to 40 then it would hardly make a difference to the quality, infact with this break up students will focus more on assignments, lab and sessionals which means more learning of the subject. Getting marks in finals should not be the sole criteria of passing a subject. 70% is too much for a 3 hour test as compared to a full semester learning. This puts extra pressure on the students during exam days and they focus on just getting marks.

70 + 30 system works well for studious and book worms kinda people :)

What do you think?

It's an awesome breakup... and it's similar to what happens in many top universities/institutes etc etc all over the world.

But... you forget... it's not the breakup of 70+30 that's the biggest problem currently. The problem is how that 70+30 is approached at, and how it is implemented, both by the students and the staff.
If breakup is what is important, then we should be seeing better standard in practicals. The breakup of marks in practicals is pretty decent, but it is not followed honestly.

Problems that I see while implementation (both now, and in future) are:
1) competition (not the healthy kind) between affiliated colleges.
2) no. of attendances taken as a guide of how serious/attentive a student is.
3) aim and objective of the teaching method being more about cramming and marking, than about education. (both for students and staff)
4) only method of judging a college/branch/student being the placements (and usually about package in terms of money)
5) short term over long term
6,7,8,9,etc) and many others

Call me a pessimist, but with the kind of breakup of marks that you're suggesting, I can only see the standards getting worse.
The good thing about this 70+30 pattern is that... the majority of the marks distribution is being done by an impartial agency (the university itself) and only a minority of 30% is with each institute.

The question of 40% vs 50% is interesting. If I have to vote for either of those... it'll be a tough one. I don't know where to stand on that issue.

1. Class Assignments: 20%
2. Attendance: 5%
3. Lab & Project work: 25%
4. First Terms: 10%
5. Second Terms: 10%
6. Finals: 30%

The breakup is better than existing one, but if it is implemented, it would be make situation for most of the students very difficult considering the mindset of faculty of institutes.
Here marks that a student gets is not determined by how much knowledge the student is having, but by the marks he is getting in exams. If a student is getting good marks in exams, teachers give them marks in bulk, while it shouldn't be the case for labs,assignments and projects

The question is whether to trust the institute or not.

I think this break up can still work provided:

1. Terminal papers are checked just like final terms
2. Lab and Project work should be checked by external. In my opinion there should be at least 2 intermediate practical reviews by external teachers.

If colleges provide good education then results will automatically show up but GGSIPU don't really care about whats happening inside the colleges and thats sad. It is becoming factory of engineers.

Institutes can't be trusted at all.
Some faculty members in insitutes run tution centres and that too becomes a basis for giving marks.

Oh thats bad man but this is not the way colleges should run. Thats sad.
Learning is phasing out from engineering. Now its all about getting marks and getting a piece of paper that they call "Degree".

Exactly

yup...
and as Apinder points out... it's better trusting university than college because the university will be equally uncaring towards all, whereas institutes are a bit more biased about it.

You may say... that the present system doesn't allow good institutes to become better because they don't have too much control over their own destiny, but... as I see it... this university is not for the elite. It's to ensure good (if not the best) quality education to all. If you give more independence to individual institutes without proper regularisation and control, then there might be 1 brilliant college in the university, but there'll also be 10 awful colleges around it. Of course, the present system is not the only way, and maybe not the optimal way, but it's an easy way that tends to work at the minimal level.

And about the educations system currently in place... Don't get me started. It's proportionately bad everywhere... including where you'd least expect. Two main reasons being "Lack of flexibility" and the "don't care attitude".

I'm very sorry if I am tending towards darkening the gray shades in this painting.