KU meeting discusses progress regarding conducting online classes

KARACHI: The University of Karachi would soon develop an in-house system for conducting online classes. We cannot rely on external systems for conducting classes for long and we should develop our own systems.

We will currently use all available technologies to conduct classes whether it is available at KU or is made available by the Higher Education Commission Islamabad.

These views were expressed by the Vice Chancellor University of Karachi Professor Dr Khalid Mahmood Iraqi on Wednesday. He chaired a meeting held at VC Secretariat to discuss the progress regarding conducting online classes due to ongoing pandemic the Covid-19.

The meeting was attended by the Registrar Professor Dr Saleem Shahzad, all the deans, Director Distance Learning Program Professor Dr Abdul Waheed, President Karachi University Teachers’ Society Professor Dr Anila Amber Malik, the Director Quality Enhancement Cell Professor Dr Syed Jamil Hasan Kazmi, Deputy Director QEC Jawaid Akram, Students’ Advisor Dr Syed Asim Ali, in charge Main Communication Network Dr Sadiq Ali Khan, Engineer Ishfaque Khanzada from MCN.

The KU VC Professor Dr Khalid Iraqi asked all the deans to conduct a meeting with all the chairpersons in this regard and take them onboard. “We intend to start online classes to facilitate students and continue the learning process at the earliest. It is a difficult time for all of us, I pray that all our students, faculty and staff and their families are safe and secure.”

The first meeting to discuss the possibilities and opportunities to start online classes was held on Wednesday, April 15, 2020. The technical committee was also formed in that meeting which comprised of Professor Dr Jamil Kazmi, Dr Sadiq Ali Khan, Dr Syed Asim Ali, Javed Akram, and Engineer Ishfaq Khanzada.

The committee members were asked to present the report in the next meeting, who had developed and shared survey forms with teachers and students to get their input regarding holding online classes, and asked them to share what kind of problems they could face in this regard.

The Convener of the KU eLearning Committee Dr Kazmi, while presenting the finding of the survey, described the readiness about the six dimensions of online classes that KU is looking to carter: University readiness, Faculty readiness, Course readiness, Technology readiness, Library readiness, and Students’ readiness. 

About University readiness, he said that the University of Karachi is in the process of implementing the Learning Management System acquired through HEC, and IDs of teachers have been generated which soon would be sent to teachers.  “An oversight body would be constituted by the authority for certifying the courses as online ready.”

About faculty readiness, he mentioned that in order to assess the faculty readiness a survey has been designed to identify the problem areas and strategy would be devised to resolve the issues. Professor Dr Syed Jamil Kazmi said that training videos for faculty have been prepared to assist the faculty in this regard.

About students’ readiness, he informed the participants of the meeting that another survey has been propagated to identify students’ interests and issues regarding online classes. “So far around 8, 000 students have recorded their responses. We are studying the responses to carter to the needs of students and to make sure that the learning process continues.”

Meanwhile, Dr Syed Asim Ali briefed about the viability of MS Teams Software and Zoom Software and the availability of MS-Teams license in Pakistan Education Research Network subscriptions. He presented HEC’s recommendation about online learning in this regard. He also briefed about the feedback of students regarding online classes received through different means.

Furthermore, Dr Sadiq Ali Khan shared details about the LMS implementation and generation of log-in IDs for faculty members. He said that in a short span of time, our team has been able to create LMS IDs for teachers, so that they can start getting to know about the LMS and can utilize it in a better way.

Later on, Javed Akram briefed about the students and faculty responses to the survey and presented a training manual about the different online learning platforms that could be used by teachers for online classes. To facilitate the banks further for lending under the scheme, Banks’ exposure under the scheme has been exempted from the per-party or the per-group exposure limits.  It will enable them to lend to borrowers that have exhausted their exposure limits.

All these benefits will also be available to businesses availing financing under the scheme from Islamic Banking Institutions.

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