The Government College University Lahore will resume online classes after the training of its teachers and quality control of courses. This will help the students in timely competition of graduation if the lockdown of universities is extended beyond May 31, 2020, due to coronavirus crisis.
Vice-Chancellor Professor Dr Asghar Zaidi announced the University’s Online Teaching Policy which made a special focus on teachers’ training and availability of courses online to ensure the quality of education.
Professor Zaidi said that the GCU constituted a “Panel for Digital Learning Environment” and embarked upon a four-dimension strategy comprising teachers’ training, preparation of approved online-ready courses, adoption of the Learning Management System and procedures for online classes and providing time, support and guidance to students for readiness for online classes.
Zaidi said that the panel which included senior faculty and administration has developed this policy consistent with the guidelines of the Federal and Provincial Higher Education Commission. The policy aims for strengthening and streamlining standards of online classes and it would also oversee the teachers’ training program for e-learning. Only those courses and faculty members who are verified by the Panel to be ready will start their online teaching. In any case, all staff members and courses on offer during the current semester will be online ready at the latest by 31st May 2020.
For motivational and inspirational purposes, the Vice-Chancellor dedicated the working of this Panel for Digital Learning Environment to Dr Mahbub ul Haq (1934 – 1998), a distinguished Ravian and economist, who radically transformed the development paradigm to use Human Development Index data in promoting sustainable development.
Professor added that the quality of teaching was his prime concern as producing substandard graduates was not much worse than the COVID19. He said that the university was not in hesitate to restart online classes and paying special attention to teachers’ training and availability of a well-defined course online.
He went on to say that the crisis has offered us an opportunity and the availability of course material online would also help in making classes interactive.
The vice chancellor hoped that in case coronavirus situation gets controlled and lockdown of universities ends on May 31, university would resume regular classes from June 01, 2020.
He said the university has engaged daily wagers adopting the social distancing SOPs for the renovation of universities’ classrooms. A good classroom is a strong prerequisite of the quality of education, and we are using the current time to prepare model classrooms in each department.