National network of social work schools kicks off today

A national network of schools for quality enhancement of social work education in India will be launched at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) on Thursday.

“Aimed at addressing the long standing demand for a platform for communication across the schools, the move will allow access to open source possible,” said Dr S Parsuraman, director of TISS, while opening a two-day national consultation where the launch will take place.

In the last five years over 300 social work colleges have been started across the country, with 51 in Vidarbha alone. While speaker after speaker expressed pain at the commercialisation of the education process, Dr Armaity Desai, who has headed both TISS and the UGC), was angry at how long this process has taken.

“We first felt the need for such regulatory network in 1976, and following several meetings and consultations, a paper was drafted and sent to the UGC which simply sat on it. By sheer luck I became the UGC chairperson in 1995, and pushed for this proposal and forwarded it to the HRD ministry,” said Desai.