Some Americans think opposition to Obama’s policies is based on racism

Washington, Sep. 18 (ANI): Some Americans, including former President Jimmy Carter, believe that those who are opposing US President Barrack Obama’s policies have a racial element against him instead of simple disagreement.

According to a recent Fox News poll, 65 percent Americans think that opposition to Obama’s policies is based on honest disagreements, while 20 percent say it is mostly motivated by racism.

However, Black voters are twice as likely to say the opposition is motivated by race, with 63 percent citing racism as the reason for opposition and 27 percent say it is based on honest disagreements.

Most white voters (71 percent) say the opposition comes from honest disagreements.

Most Republicans (87 percent) and independents (69 percent) believe that opposition to Obama’s policies is based on honest disagreements, while 48 percent Democrats say honest disagreements and 34 percent say it is motivated by racism, the poll found.

Opinion Dynamics Corp. conducted the national telephone poll of 900 registered voters with a 3-point margin of error.

The poll also found that 54 percent of Americans think Obama is a “new kind” of politician, while a large 39 percent minority says he is a “typical” politician.

As for Obama’s handling of health care, 44 percent approved and 48 percent disapproved.

Obama received better ratings on his handling of the economy (55 percent approve) and on the war in Afghanistan (51 percent).

By a wide 60 percent to 27 percent margin, Americans think the country has become more divided rather than more united since Obama took office in January, the poll found. (ANI)

Carrots are better than sticks when it comes to fostering cooperation

Washington, Sept 4 (ANI): Rewards have been found to be much more successful in promoting public cooperation rather than punishment, suggests a new study.

According to researchers, rewards robustly build compliance and cooperation and could help in developing solutions for thorny problems requiring the cooperation of large numbers of people to achieve a greater good.

“All of us engage in public goods games, on both large and small scales,” said David G. Rand, a postdoctoral researcher at Harvard’s Program for Evolutionary Dynamics and lead author of the study.

“Climate change is a huge public goods game: If each person does his or her part to conserve energy and reduce CO2 emissions, it benefits us all.

“On a more local level, public goods games include volunteering on school boards, helping to maintain public facilities in your community, or cleaning up after yourself and doing your share of work at the office.

“In these types of domains, where people interact repeatedly with each other to solve a group social dilemma, our work suggests that rewards result in better outcomes than punishment,” he added.

Rand said that these rewards could change individuals’ behaviour and encourage cooperation without the destructive negative consequences that come with punishment.

During the study headed by Martin A. Nowak of Harvard’s Program for Evolutionary Dynamics, the researchers examined cooperation among 192 participants in a public goods game probing the fundamental tension between the interests of an individual and a group.

Over 50 rounds of interaction, each of four participants in a group would decide how much to contribute toward a common pool that benefited all four equally. Each participant was then able – at a cost to him or herself- to either reward or punish each of the three other subjects for their contributions to the group, or lack thereof.

As in real life, Rand said, study subjects tend to resent “free riders” who fail to contribute to a group yet reap the benefits of membership in it.

“But despite this anger at free riders, rewarding good behaviour is as effective as punishing bad behaviour for maintaining public cooperation and leads to better outcomes for the group. When both options are available, reward leads to increased contributions and payoff for the group, while punishment has no effect on contributions and leads to lower payoff for the group,” Rand added.

The study appears in journal Science. (ANI)

Sympathetic, kind men unlikely to end up as bosses

Melbourne, July 15 (ANI): Being sympathetic, kind, co-operative and warm may lower men’s likelihood of becoming bosses, according to a study.

The same may also apply to women to a certain extent, say the researchers behind the study.

According to reports, this study has provided firm evidence of the link between personality and job choice.

“People who aren’t very nice are more likely to become managers,” theage.com.au quoted study co-author Michelle Tan, a researcher in the economics program at the Research School of Social Science, at Australian National University, as saying.

The results further showed that men and women tended to enter different occupations, even when they had similar personality traits and skills.

The findings also revealed that despite having the same occupations, similar men and women took home widely different pay packets.

The study used a sample of 5397 men and women drawn from the Household Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia survey, and sought to understand the extent to which personality determined occupation and whether this could explain the gender pay gap.

The authors say that women were found to report overall higher levels of extroversion, agreeableness, emotional stability, and conscientiousness than did men.

According to them, men reported higher levels of “openness to experience”, and there was no difference in men’s and women’s sense of being able to control the events in their life.

The study also revealed that men’s personality traits closely linked to some occupations: the more “agreeable” men rated themselves on a personality test, the less likely they were to be managers or business professionals; and the more “open to experience” men were, the more likely they were to be in business or education.

The extent to which women were “open to experience” was the main influence on the jobs they held.

Just like their male counterpart, the more agreeable women tended to be the less likely they were to be managers. However, unlike men, extroversion was associated with women entering managerial ranks.

While similar men and women often ended up in different occupations, this did not explain the gender pay gap. (ANI)

Higher earning women tend to do more housework

Melbourne, July 15 (ANI): Women who contribute more to the household finances, as compared to their husbands or partners, tend to do more housework, according to a study.

Led by Janeen Baxter and Belinda Hewitt, of the University of Queensland, the study showed that women contributing 70 per cent or more of the weekly income start doing more housework rather than less.

They put in a little more time cleaning and cooking than a woman who contributes half to the family finances.

The study has shown that as women’s earnings increase compared with their husbands’, they gain more leverage over who does the housework.

“No one wants to do housework but it has to be done. But as a woman earns more money, it gives her more say over how much domestic work she has to do,” Theage.com.au quoted Hewitt, as saying.

However, in few Australian households – about 5 per cent – where women contribute 70 per cent or more to the budget, other sensitivities come into play.

“For these women, doing extra housework is about compensating for their husbands not fulfilling the traditional male breadwinner role,” said Hewitt.

The research is based on 1306 married and partnered couples drawn from the Household Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia survey. (ANI)

Why minor neuromuscular damage can affect one’s ability to complete everyday tasks

Washington, July 9 (ANI): In what may help understand why minor damage to the neuromuscular system can at times profoundly affect one’s ability to complete everyday tasks, scientists have found that activities combining movement and force tax the brain to capacity, countering a long-held belief that difficulty with dexterous tasks results from the limits of the muscles themselves.

“Our results show how much the mechanics of the body, and a given task, affect what the brain can or can’t do,” said Francisco Valero-Cuevas of the Brain-Body Dynamics Lab at the University of Southern California, who led the research.

“The so-called ‘problem’ of muscle redundancy-having too many muscles and joints to control-may not be the only challenge the brain faces when controlling our bodies. Rather, we seem to have about as many muscles as we need, and not too many, as others have proposed in the past.

“The scientific world and the clinical world have long been arriving at conflicting conclusions, and this work begins to resolve the paradox.

“While neuroscience and biomechanics studies have suggested that muscles and joints are, in theory, redundant and provide numerous alternative solutions to simple tasks, clinicians routinely see people seeking treatment for hand disability resulting from relatively minor conditions such as aging,” added Valero-Cuevas.

The study followed previous experiments that suggested the brain and complex musculature can barely keep up with requirements posed by our anatomy and the mechanics of even ordinary, real-world, finger tasks like rubbing a surface.

The conclusions begin to explain why even minor damage to the neuromuscular system seems to produce real deficits in manipulation.

The research focused on simultaneous force and motion-specifically from fingers either pushing or rubbing a surface-with volunteers conducting the experiment at defined, yet varying, speeds.

Knowing the force-producing properties of muscle, the researchers expected the rubbing motion would show reduced downward force as the speed of motion increased.

Surprisingly, whether rubbing slowly or at a pace 36-times faster, speed had little affect on the downward force the volunteers could produce.

The researchers interpret the results to mean the brain is sufficiently occupied by the physical demands of combining motions and forces, so the muscle properties are not the limiting factors for how much force the fingers can create.

“This begins to explain the clinical reality that when something in the system is damaged, either in the brain or body, we can see losses of function. We are not as ‘redundant’ as we thought,” said Valero-Cuevas.

The research team is conducting additional research to determine what exact neural and anatomical mechanisms are producing these results.

The current study has been published in the Journal of Neuroscience. (ANI)

Jumping robots may soon find role in military service

London, May 10 (ANI): Robots that can leap 8 metres vertically to clear walls or fences may soon find themselves in the military.

Sandia National Laboratories’ prototype Urban Hopper can really do wonders just by hopping.

Now robot maker Boston Dynamics has landed the job of producing a military version with a dash of more self-control.

US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), which is funding the programme, says it wants the hopper for urban reconnaissance and intelligence gathering – although it admits it could also be fitted with a raft of weapons, reports New Scientist.

Sandia’s shoebox-sized prototype, which is driven by an electric motor, rolls along on wheels. It jumps using a gas piston which is powered by methylacetylene and nitrous oxide.

However, its leaps so far are pretty haphazard.

“The existing hoppers do not maintain a stable orientation during hops, but tumble randomly,” says DARPA spokesman Mark Peterson. (ANI)

Job loss can really make you sick

Washington, May 9 (ANI): Losing a job can lead not just to financial hardships but could also increase the risk of developing health problems such as high blood pressure and heart attacks, says a new study.

Even when people find a new job, there is a raised risk of developing a new health problem as a result of the job loss, the study published in the May 8 issue of Demography claimed.

“In today’s economy, job loss can happen to anybody,” said Kate Strully, who conducted the research as a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health and Society scholar at the Harvard School of Public Health.

“We need to be aware of the health consequences of losing our jobs and do what we can to alleviate the negative effects,” the expert added.

In the study, Strully found that “job churning,” defined as high rates of job loss but low unemployment, has negative health consequences for workers who were not already sick.

For those who lost their job-white or blue collar-through no fault of their own, such as an establishment closure, the odds of reporting fair or poor health increased by 54 percent, and among respondents with no pre-existing health conditions, it increased the odds of a new health condition by 83 percent.

Even when workers became re-employed, those workers had an increased risk of new stress-related health conditions, the study found.

Unlike the results of job loss due to an establishment closure, when health effects were analyzed based on workers who were fired or laid off, significant differences were found based on the workers’ occupations. While being fired or laid off or leaving a job voluntarily more than doubles the odds of a fair or poor health report among blue-collar workers, such job displacements have no significant association with the health reports of white-collar workers.

The reasons for this disparity are unclear based on the study results.

The study was conducted based on data from the U.S. Panel Study of Income Dynamics, a nationally representative survey from 1999, 2001 and 2003. The study looked at establishment closures that included a range of occupations, including managerial or professional positions (30 percent displacement), sales, clerical, and craft jobs, (33 percent displacement), a machine operator jobs (20 percent displacement), and service positions (13 percent displacement). (ANI)

Brighter, full-colour electronic readers coming your way

London, Apr 30 (ANI): Buying an e-reader but not sure if you’d like reading the dim screen? Well, then get ready for e-book reading experience that will be as close to printed media as possible.

Scientists have announced, what is known as Electrofluidic Display Technology (EFD)- the first technology to electrically switch the appearance of pigments in a manner that provides visual brilliance equal to conventional printed media.

The work by an international collaboration of the University of Cincinnati, Sun Chemical, Polymer Vision and Gamma Dynamics, could offer better than 85 percent “white-state reflectance.”

White-state reflectance is a performance level required for consumers to accept reflective display applications such as e-books, cell-phones and signage.

“If you compare this technology to what’s been developed previously, there’s no comparison. We’re ahead by a wide margin in critical categories such as brightness, colour saturation and video speed,” Nature quoted developer Jason Heikenfeld, assistant professor of electrical engineering in UC’s College of Engineering, as saying.

The work on this technology has been underway for several years.

Heikenfeld said: “The ultimate reflective display would simply place the best colorants used by the printing industry directly beneath the front viewing substrate of a display.

“In our EFD pixels, we are able to hide or reveal colored pigment in a manner that is optically superior to the techniques used in electrowetting, electrophoretic and electrochromic displays.”

Project partners at PolymerVision see strong potential for rollable displays, because the optically active layer can be less than 15 microns thick.

And it could be used in a wide range of products, including electronic windows and tuneable colour casings on portable electronics.

“This takes the Amazon Kindle, for example, which is black and white, and could make it full colour. So now you could take it from a niche product to a mainstream product,” said Heikenfeld.

The details of the displays have been published in the paper ‘Electrofluidic displays using Young-Laplace transposition of brilliant pigment dispersions’. (ANI)

Robots take centre stage in U.S. war in Afghanistan

Washington, Mar.24 (ANI): The U.S. military is deploying the robots to Afghanistan to navigate the country’s treacherous terrain.

Called BigDogs, these robots are being deployed in addition to big guns.

The BigDogs – four-legged robots that can navigate the country’s treacherous terrain – and pilotless helicopters than can transport tons of supplies to very remote bases are just two of the new weapons being tested in Afghanistan, reports Fox News.

The machine’s creator, Boston Dynamics, has a motto – “dedicated to the way things move” – and that’s precisely what is both jarring and fascinating about its invention.

Using a gasoline engine that emits an eerie lawnmower buzz, BigDog has animal-inspired articulated legs that absorb shock and recycle kinetic energy from one step to the next.

Its robot brain, a sophisticated computer, controls locomotion sensors that adapt rapidly to the environment. The entire control system regulates, steers and navigates ground contact. A laser gyroscope keeps BigDog on his metal paws – even when the robot slips, stumbles or is kicked over.

Boston Dynamics says BigDog can run as fast as 4 miles per hour, walk slowly, lie down and climb slopes up to 35 degrees. BigDog’s heightened sense can also survey the surrounding terrain and become alert to potential danger.

All told, the BigDog bears an uncanny resemblance to a living organic animal.

Routine helicopter flights operating 24 hours a day, year round, are crucial for the American mission.

The Marine Corps has recently called for unmanned cargo flights to carry essentials to isolated areas that can be reached only by air.

Enter the K-MAX, a remote-controlled helicopter designed to transport heavy loads – even in Afghanistan’s high altitudes.

The K-MAX’s unique rotor design – two intermeshed rotors turning in opposite directions and slightly angled to prevent the blades from colliding – give this unmanned aircraft a distinct advantage.

“All the energy goes into the lift and eliminates the need for the tail rotor,” said Frans Jurgens, spokesman for Kaman Aerospace Corp, which manufactures the K-MAX.

The design enables the relatively small chopper to tow up to 6,000 pounds.

“The K-MAX is basically an aerial truck,” Jurgens said. (ANI)

Distinguished economist Dr. Badal Mukhopadhyay joins TERI University

New Delhi, Mar 12 (ANI/Business Wire India): TERI University is honoured to have Dr. Badal Mukhopadhyay as the Professor of Economics.

He is a well- known academician, who has taught and headed prestigious institutions like Delhi School of Economics and IILM (Institute of Integrated Learning in Management).

He has been a Visiting Professor in several renowned foreign institutions like Vanderbilt University USA, Sydney University Australia, University of Witwatersrand South Africa and Johns Hopkins University USA.

He completed his doctoral degree under the guidance of eminent scholar Mr. Paul Samuelson from Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

He has extensively contributed in the field of economics and has written and reviewed several books and articles. His well known works are ‘Mathematical Models for Economic Analysis’, ‘Theory of the Firm in a Zero Interest Rate Economy’ and ‘Theory of Economic Growth: The Tradition of Ricardian Dynamics’ among others. (ANI)

President Patil to inaugurate conference on higher education on Wednesday

New Delhi, Feb 24 (ANI): President Pratibha Patil will inaugurate a sub-regional conference of South, South-West and Central Asia on Higher Education here tomorrow.

The two-day conference is being organized by the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development and the National University of Educational Planning and Administration (NUEPA) in collaboration with UNESCO.

The theme of the conference is: ‘Facing Global and Local Challenges: the New Dynamics for Higher Education’ and is part of a series of regional conferences being organized as prelude to the World Conference on Higher Education to be convened by UNESCO in July this year.

The conference is an attempt to highlight a range of issues concerning higher education at the global, regional and national levels. These broadly include access, equity, financing, governance, quality assurance and sustainable development pertaining to higher education for the next century. Higher education also needs to re-examine the methods of educational enquiry or pedagogic practices, including those of research and innovation. In today’s highly networked world, interactions through distance learning modes have become more efficient.

The potential of information and communication technologies to create local knowledge content on global platforms is enormous and needs to be harnessed to bring education to all.

The conference seeks to bring together ministers of education, senior representatives of national governments, educationists, academics, NGOs, policy makers and stakeholders in higher education from 14 countries including Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Iran and Afghanistan.

The papers to be given would incorporate country reports from the fourteen countries and would also discuss the current status and future directions of higher education. The Conference would be a platform for the exchange of ideas and aims to create a set of recommendations for further deliberations during the World Conference on Higher Education in July 2009 in Paris.

The objectives of the conference are to examine significant trends and their bearing on higher education, to understand the role of higher education as a driving force for sustainable development and to probe new challenges in terms of achieving “equity” and “quality,” that would shape the strategic agenda for the development of higher education in the future. (ANI)

President Patil to inaugurate conference on higher education on Wednesday

New Delhi, Feb 24 (ANI): President Pratibha Patil will inaugurate a sub-regional conference of South, South-West and Central Asia on Higher Education here tomorrow.

The two-day conference is being organized by the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development and the National University of Educational Planning and Administration (NUEPA) in collaboration with UNESCO.

The theme of the conference is: ‘Facing Global and Local Challenges: the New Dynamics for Higher Education’ and is part of a series of regional conferences being organized as prelude to the World Conference on Higher Education to be convened by UNESCO in July this year.

The conference is an attempt to highlight a range of issues concerning higher education at the global, regional and national levels. These broadly include access, equity, financing, governance, quality assurance and sustainable development pertaining to higher education for the next century. Higher education also needs to re-examine the methods of educational enquiry or pedagogic practices, including those of research and innovation. In today’s highly networked world, interactions through distance learning modes have become more efficient.

The potential of information and communication technologies to create local knowledge content on global platforms is enormous and needs to be harnessed to bring education to all.

The conference seeks to bring together ministers of education, senior representatives of national governments, educationists, academics, NGOs, policy makers and stakeholders in higher education from 14 countries including Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Iran and Afghanistan.

The papers to be given would incorporate country reports from the fourteen countries and would also discuss the current status and future directions of higher education. The Conference would be a platform for the exchange of ideas and aims to create a set of recommendations for further deliberations during the World Conference on Higher Education in July 2009 in Paris.

The objectives of the conference are to examine significant trends and their bearing on higher education, to understand the role of higher education as a driving force for sustainable development and to probe new challenges in terms of achieving “equity” and “quality,” that would shape the strategic agenda for the development of higher education in the future. (ANI)

President Patil to inaugurate conference on higher education on Wednesday

New Delhi, Feb 24 (ANI): President Pratibha Patil will inaugurate a sub-regional conference of South, South-West and Central Asia on Higher Education here tomorrow.

The two-day conference is being organized by the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development and the National University of Educational Planning and Administration (NUEPA) in collaboration with UNESCO.

The theme of the conference is: ‘Facing Global and Local Challenges: the New Dynamics for Higher Education’ and is part of a series of regional conferences being organized as prelude to the World Conference on Higher Education to be convened by UNESCO in July this year.

The conference is an attempt to highlight a range of issues concerning higher education at the global, regional and national levels. These broadly include access, equity, financing, governance, quality assurance and sustainable development pertaining to higher education for the next century. Higher education also needs to re-examine the methods of educational enquiry or pedagogic practices, including those of research and innovation. In today’s highly networked world, interactions through distance learning modes have become more efficient.

The potential of information and communication technologies to create local knowledge content on global platforms is enormous and needs to be harnessed to bring education to all.

The conference seeks to bring together ministers of education, senior representatives of national governments, educationists, academics, NGOs, policy makers and stakeholders in higher education from 14 countries including Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Iran and Afghanistan.

The papers to be given would incorporate country reports from the fourteen countries and would also discuss the current status and future directions of higher education. The Conference would be a platform for the exchange of ideas and aims to create a set of recommendations for further deliberations during the World Conference on Higher Education in July 2009 in Paris.

The objectives of the conference are to examine significant trends and their bearing on higher education, to understand the role of higher education as a driving force for sustainable development and to probe new challenges in terms of achieving “equity” and “quality,” that would shape the strategic agenda for the development of higher education in the future. (ANI)

President Patil to inaugurate conference on higher education on Wednesday

New Delhi, Feb 24 (ANI): President Pratibha Patil will inaugurate a sub-regional conference of South, South-West and Central Asia on Higher Education here tomorrow.

The two-day conference is being organized by the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development and the National University of Educational Planning and Administration (NUEPA) in collaboration with UNESCO.

The theme of the conference is: ‘Facing Global and Local Challenges: the New Dynamics for Higher Education’ and is part of a series of regional conferences being organized as prelude to the World Conference on Higher Education to be convened by UNESCO in July this year.

The conference is an attempt to highlight a range of issues concerning higher education at the global, regional and national levels. These broadly include access, equity, financing, governance, quality assurance and sustainable development pertaining to higher education for the next century. Higher education also needs to re-examine the methods of educational enquiry or pedagogic practices, including those of research and innovation. In today’s highly networked world, interactions through distance learning modes have become more efficient.

The potential of information and communication technologies to create local knowledge content on global platforms is enormous and needs to be harnessed to bring education to all.

The conference seeks to bring together ministers of education, senior representatives of national governments, educationists, academics, NGOs, policy makers and stakeholders in higher education from 14 countries including Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Iran and Afghanistan.

The papers to be given would incorporate country reports from the fourteen countries and would also discuss the current status and future directions of higher education. The Conference would be a platform for the exchange of ideas and aims to create a set of recommendations for further deliberations during the World Conference on Higher Education in July 2009 in Paris.

The objectives of the conference are to examine significant trends and their bearing on higher education, to understand the role of higher education as a driving force for sustainable development and to probe new challenges in terms of achieving “equity” and “quality,” that would shape the strategic agenda for the development of higher education in the future. (ANI)

President Patil to inaugurate conference on higher education on Wednesday

New Delhi, Feb 24 (ANI): President Pratibha Patil will inaugurate a sub-regional conference of South, South-West and Central Asia on Higher Education here tomorrow.

The two-day conference is being organized by the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development and the National University of Educational Planning and Administration (NUEPA) in collaboration with UNESCO.

The theme of the conference is: ‘Facing Global and Local Challenges: the New Dynamics for Higher Education’ and is part of a series of regional conferences being organized as prelude to the World Conference on Higher Education to be convened by UNESCO in July this year.

The conference is an attempt to highlight a range of issues concerning higher education at the global, regional and national levels. These broadly include access, equity, financing, governance, quality assurance and sustainable development pertaining to higher education for the next century. Higher education also needs to re-examine the methods of educational enquiry or pedagogic practices, including those of research and innovation. In today’s highly networked world, interactions through distance learning modes have become more efficient.

The potential of information and communication technologies to create local knowledge content on global platforms is enormous and needs to be harnessed to bring education to all.

The conference seeks to bring together ministers of education, senior representatives of national governments, educationists, academics, NGOs, policy makers and stakeholders in higher education from 14 countries including Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Iran and Afghanistan.

The papers to be given would incorporate country reports from the fourteen countries and would also discuss the current status and future directions of higher education. The Conference would be a platform for the exchange of ideas and aims to create a set of recommendations for further deliberations during the World Conference on Higher Education in July 2009 in Paris.

The objectives of the conference are to examine significant trends and their bearing on higher education, to understand the role of higher education as a driving force for sustainable development and to probe new challenges in terms of achieving “equity” and “quality,” that would shape the strategic agenda for the development of higher education in the future. (ANI)

President Patil to inaugurate conference on higher education on Wednesday

New Delhi, Feb 24 (ANI): President Pratibha Patil will inaugurate a sub-regional conference of South, South-West and Central Asia on Higher Education here tomorrow.

The two-day conference is being organized by the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development and the National University of Educational Planning and Administration (NUEPA) in collaboration with UNESCO.

The theme of the conference is: ‘Facing Global and Local Challenges: the New Dynamics for Higher Education’ and is part of a series of regional conferences being organized as prelude to the World Conference on Higher Education to be convened by UNESCO in July this year.

The conference is an attempt to highlight a range of issues concerning higher education at the global, regional and national levels. These broadly include access, equity, financing, governance, quality assurance and sustainable development pertaining to higher education for the next century. Higher education also needs to re-examine the methods of educational enquiry or pedagogic practices, including those of research and innovation. In today’s highly networked world, interactions through distance learning modes have become more efficient.

The potential of information and communication technologies to create local knowledge content on global platforms is enormous and needs to be harnessed to bring education to all.

The conference seeks to bring together ministers of education, senior representatives of national governments, educationists, academics, NGOs, policy makers and stakeholders in higher education from 14 countries including Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Iran and Afghanistan.

The papers to be given would incorporate country reports from the fourteen countries and would also discuss the current status and future directions of higher education. The Conference would be a platform for the exchange of ideas and aims to create a set of recommendations for further deliberations during the World Conference on Higher Education in July 2009 in Paris.

The objectives of the conference are to examine significant trends and their bearing on higher education, to understand the role of higher education as a driving force for sustainable development and to probe new challenges in terms of achieving “equity” and “quality,” that would shape the strategic agenda for the development of higher education in the future. (ANI)

President Patil to inaugurate conference on higher education on Wednesday

New Delhi, Feb 24 (ANI): President Pratibha Patil will inaugurate a sub-regional conference of South, South-West and Central Asia on Higher Education here tomorrow.

The two-day conference is being organized by the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development and the National University of Educational Planning and Administration (NUEPA) in collaboration with UNESCO.

The theme of the conference is: ‘Facing Global and Local Challenges: the New Dynamics for Higher Education’ and is part of a series of regional conferences being organized as prelude to the World Conference on Higher Education to be convened by UNESCO in July this year.

The conference is an attempt to highlight a range of issues concerning higher education at the global, regional and national levels. These broadly include access, equity, financing, governance, quality assurance and sustainable development pertaining to higher education for the next century. Higher education also needs to re-examine the methods of educational enquiry or pedagogic practices, including those of research and innovation. In today’s highly networked world, interactions through distance learning modes have become more efficient.

The potential of information and communication technologies to create local knowledge content on global platforms is enormous and needs to be harnessed to bring education to all.

The conference seeks to bring together ministers of education, senior representatives of national governments, educationists, academics, NGOs, policy makers and stakeholders in higher education from 14 countries including Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Iran and Afghanistan.

The papers to be given would incorporate country reports from the fourteen countries and would also discuss the current status and future directions of higher education. The Conference would be a platform for the exchange of ideas and aims to create a set of recommendations for further deliberations during the World Conference on Higher Education in July 2009 in Paris.

The objectives of the conference are to examine significant trends and their bearing on higher education, to understand the role of higher education as a driving force for sustainable development and to probe new challenges in terms of achieving “equity” and “quality,” that would shape the strategic agenda for the development of higher education in the future. (ANI)

President Patil to inaugurate conference on higher education on Wednesday

New Delhi, Feb 24 (ANI): President Pratibha Patil will inaugurate a sub-regional conference of South, South-West and Central Asia on Higher Education here tomorrow.

The two-day conference is being organized by the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development and the National University of Educational Planning and Administration (NUEPA) in collaboration with UNESCO.

The theme of the conference is: ‘Facing Global and Local Challenges: the New Dynamics for Higher Education’ and is part of a series of regional conferences being organized as prelude to the World Conference on Higher Education to be convened by UNESCO in July this year.

The conference is an attempt to highlight a range of issues concerning higher education at the global, regional and national levels. These broadly include access, equity, financing, governance, quality assurance and sustainable development pertaining to higher education for the next century. Higher education also needs to re-examine the methods of educational enquiry or pedagogic practices, including those of research and innovation. In today’s highly networked world, interactions through distance learning modes have become more efficient.

The potential of information and communication technologies to create local knowledge content on global platforms is enormous and needs to be harnessed to bring education to all.

The conference seeks to bring together ministers of education, senior representatives of national governments, educationists, academics, NGOs, policy makers and stakeholders in higher education from 14 countries including Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Iran and Afghanistan.

The papers to be given would incorporate country reports from the fourteen countries and would also discuss the current status and future directions of higher education. The Conference would be a platform for the exchange of ideas and aims to create a set of recommendations for further deliberations during the World Conference on Higher Education in July 2009 in Paris.

The objectives of the conference are to examine significant trends and their bearing on higher education, to understand the role of higher education as a driving force for sustainable development and to probe new challenges in terms of achieving “equity” and “quality,” that would shape the strategic agenda for the development of higher education in the future. (ANI)

President Patil to inaugurate conference on higher education on Wednesday

New Delhi, Feb 24 (ANI): President Pratibha Patil will inaugurate a sub-regional conference of South, South-West and Central Asia on Higher Education here tomorrow.

The two-day conference is being organized by the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development and the National University of Educational Planning and Administration (NUEPA) in collaboration with UNESCO.

The theme of the conference is: ‘Facing Global and Local Challenges: the New Dynamics for Higher Education’ and is part of a series of regional conferences being organized as prelude to the World Conference on Higher Education to be convened by UNESCO in July this year.

The conference is an attempt to highlight a range of issues concerning higher education at the global, regional and national levels. These broadly include access, equity, financing, governance, quality assurance and sustainable development pertaining to higher education for the next century. Higher education also needs to re-examine the methods of educational enquiry or pedagogic practices, including those of research and innovation. In today’s highly networked world, interactions through distance learning modes have become more efficient.

The potential of information and communication technologies to create local knowledge content on global platforms is enormous and needs to be harnessed to bring education to all.

The conference seeks to bring together ministers of education, senior representatives of national governments, educationists, academics, NGOs, policy makers and stakeholders in higher education from 14 countries including Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Iran and Afghanistan.

The papers to be given would incorporate country reports from the fourteen countries and would also discuss the current status and future directions of higher education. The Conference would be a platform for the exchange of ideas and aims to create a set of recommendations for further deliberations during the World Conference on Higher Education in July 2009 in Paris.

The objectives of the conference are to examine significant trends and their bearing on higher education, to understand the role of higher education as a driving force for sustainable development and to probe new challenges in terms of achieving “equity” and “quality,” that would shape the strategic agenda for the development of higher education in the future. (ANI)