History teachers decry Delhi University's course preparation

Twenty history teachers from Delhi University's history department, including Shahid Amin, Nayanjot Lahiri and Prime Minister's daughter Upinder Singh, claimed in an open letter (read full text of the letter) that the public needs to know that the discussions on the new four-year-undergraduate programme were managed by the DU authority, not in a democratic and academic environment framed by university regulations, but in committees carefully screened by the administration.

The signatories said the history department was distanced from the framing of the course structure of the FYUP and that it was kept in the dark during the making of the compulsory foundation courses. They said they weren't privy to the course contents until recently. The teachers made accusations of plagiarism in the foundation course on history.

The letter started by saying that "since forums for academic discussion and debate in the university are no longer functioning, this letter from faculty members in the history department seeks to set the record straight on many details."

The teachers claimed that "serious questions can be asked about the intellectual and pedagogical quality of the foundation courses prepared by the university. The Indian History and Culture course, for instance, lacks academic rigour, refers to subjects from history while providing no context, and does not introduce students to historical methodology or serious scholarship.

"Some of the signatories have drawn attention elsewhere that the course suffers from a naive and flat presentism, and fails to even mention caste, class or community formation. The casualness in the preparation is underlined by the fact that some of the parts are plagiarized from a Class XI CBSE textbook. Leaving the ethics of the case aside, the education of first-year students in DU is pegged at the same standard as the CBSE! ..."

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/education/news/History-teachers-decry-Delhi-Universitys-course-preparation/articleshow/20456134.cms

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