JNTU-Hyderabad to introduce Professor of Practice

The colleges under university will now be allowed to appoint professionals in the relevant field with no mandatory PhD clause as faculty members.

Hyderabad: Engineering, Pharmacy, MBA and MCA colleges will now be allowed to appoint distinguished professionals in the relevant field with no mandatory PhD clause as faculty members with Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University (JNTU)-Hyderabad deciding to introduce the Professor of Practice concept starting this academic year.

This initiative by the university will come in handy for colleges which otherwise find it difficult to identify faculty members with requisite academic credentials for conducting classes in newly-introduced courses such as Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, Data Science and Robotics.

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Under the Professor of Practice, there is no mandatory formal academic qualification such as a PhD to teach students, which otherwise is a must for teaching in professional colleges. However, professionals appointed under the Professor of Practice must have at least 15 years of service or experience in their specific profession preferably at the senior level. It is not open for those in the teaching profession-serving or retired.

“For courses like Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning and Data Science, it is difficult to find faculty members. So, it has been decided to introduce the Professor of Practice enabling institutions to hire industry experts as teachers. The university is in talks with the industry to identify experts who can teach in the colleges,” JNTU-Hyderabad Registrar, Prof M Manzoor Hussain told ‘Telangana Today’.

The University Grants Commission (UGC) has recently approved the Professor of Practice and urged the institutions to make necessary changes in their regulations to enable the engagement of Professor of Practice in their respective institutions. The colleges can appoint Professors of Practice not exceeding 10 per cent of the sanctioned posts, whose engagement is for a fixed term not exceeding three years at a given institution.

“Colleges can hire experts from the database available with the university or they can hire by themselves. The experts appointed under  stand valid during the fact-finding committee inspections for granting affiliation by the university,” a senior official said. Apart from teaching, the colleges can involve Professors of Practice in the development and designing of courses and curriculum besides introducing new courses and delivering lectures.