1. Encouraging Students for making career in Arts and basic Sciences.

This activity will focus on enabling students to learn beyond the structured curriculum. Inquisitive students will be identified and screened through a simple assessment method. These students will be provided with scholarships. They will be assigned to mentor teachers who will nurture and nourish their talent by guiding them in projects. They will be encouraged to explore the way of Learning By Doing in Lab (LBDL). These students will also get an opportunity to interact face to face with Experts/ Scientists of National and International repute.

1. Strengthening Laboratory Infrastructure.

Potential laboratories in the campus will be identified for the LBDL activity. The present infrastructure of these laboratories will be strengthened by adding new instruments/ equipments/ apparatus/ consumables etc.

2. Establishing a Language Laboratory.

A well equipped language laboratory will be set up with required hardware, software and other accessories and peripherals. This unit will cater to various language needs of students and teachers by imparting training in Phonetics and spoken English, writing emails, resume writing, group discussion, communication skills, public speaking, interview skills, telephone etiquette, interpersonal skills and presentation skills. Other languages like German, French, Sanskrit, Hindi and Marathi are also offered to the students. The facilities developed under the Language laboratory can also be extended to these students.

3. Initiating —MAST Program ( Model for Arts & Science Teachers).

This programme will enhance teaching-learning skills of teachers. They will be encouraged to prepare teaching aids like models, charts and CD’s. Experts will be invited to conduct special sessions on how teaching could be made more effective by using different pedagogies. In addition to this, the grant assigned for this activity will be also utilized for promoting teachers to participate in training programmes at various centers of excellence and higher learning in the country.

1. Establishing Educational Technology Centre.

A separate Educational Technology Center will be set up. This center will help the teachers in creating e- contents, recording lectures/ demonstrations and making effective use of multimedia presentations. This center will require supporting hardware, editing softwares, high definition camera and its accessories, lighting setup, sound cards etc.,

2. Setting up a Knowledge Portal.

The Knowledge portal will be strengthening the present web site and transforming it into an Interactive Portal of the college. The grant assigned for this activity will mainly help in setting up Internal Knowledge Server Development, stacks for hard disk, data entry and wireless routers. At present the basic structure for implementing knowledge portal exists in the form of L1, L2 and L3 servers, Fiber Optic Connectivity, 1GBPS Ethernet and 10 MBPS leased line. The e-resources created by the teachers will be uploaded on knowledge portal, this will act as one stop shop for information to the students. In addition to this, Wi-Fi zones could be set up in the campus.

1. Evolving STAR (Special Teacher And Researcher) Program.

The Special Teacher and Researcher Program will provide Internship for aspiring teachers and researchers. The internship program will be a platform where the teacher/ researcher will be exposed to basic teaching and research techniques. In addition to this, seed money will be provided to teachers as well as students to do research, after appropriate screening of the proposals.

2. Strengthening Research Infrastructure.

The College has recognized research guides, research centers and research students working for their M.Phil and Ph.D degrees. There is a need to strengthen our research laboratories with addition of specific equipments to cater to the needs of research students

3. Establishing In house Publication Center.

In house Publication Center in the college will help in boosting the process of scientific enquiry and writing research papers / reports/ articles/ case studies among the teachers and students. The financial assistance will be utilized for setting up the basic infrastructure and for contingencies for the publication center.

1. Conceiving an Eco friendly campus.

The college has a 65 acres campus with plenty of vegetation and greenery. A deliberate effort in terms of finance as well as man power is made for upkeep of the campus. There are more than 5000 students on the campus and the amount of waste generated is large. The plan is to involve college students in a campus development project which eliminates waste and views it instead as a valuable resource. Basic work for zero waste campus has been carried out recently. Similarly. A pilot scheme for rain water harvesting can also be implemented through this programme. The campus also houses a separate Botanical Garden, which provides resources to students and teachers of Biological Sciences. Enrichment of the Botanical garden in terms of medicinal species and conservation of some rare plants seems to be the need. The grant provided under this budget head will help in creating a model of environmental management for the rest of the society.

2. Facilitation Centre for International Students.

Approximately 400 International students representing 34 countries are enrolled every year in college for various academic programmes. Students approaching our International Student Cell come from diverse socio-cultural background. The intention is to establish a facilitation center to understand their needs in terms of communication, culture and bring them in the mainstream. The finance provided will be utilized for organizing programmes to promote their interaction with local students so as to increase their comfort level. This center will also provide support to help them gain insight in the subject and also strengthen their communication skills. To accomplish this, there is a need to add hardware, software and other supporting peripherals to the existing infrastructure.

3. Enabling Center for Differently Abled and Educationally Disadvantaged Students.

The enabling center for differently abled students will focus mainly on providing these students with facilities to learn the subject matter with the help of suitable tools and equipments. Student volunteers will be encouraged to interact with them. One of the unique features of this scheme is that educationally disadvantaged students not included in the regular “Earn & Learn” scheme will be provided with short-term financial assistance by way of involving them in college activities.

1. Library automation.

Bai Jerbai Wadia Library(BJWL) of Fergusson College is endowed with a rich collection of books, periodicals, journals and manuscripts. This has been compiled over decades through acquisition and also through generous donations from well-wishers and past students. The urge for providing modern amenities is strongly shared amongst the stakeholders and efforts have been made to satisfy these, though with limited funds. In order to overcome the limitations presented by the disproportionately small number of staff as compared with the student strength and the number of titles, we plan to put in place a complete hardware, software solution including training of the staff.

In the last two years the various buildings on the campus have been connected with a combination of optical fiber and copper cable network. Internet facility has also been made available through a leased line. In the first part of the library automation programme, suitable software will be identified and hardware specifications will be defined followed by purchase and installation. The data entry schedule and staff training schedule will also be finalized parallelly, to ensure minimum gestation period. It will be our priority to bring most functions like acquisition, cataloguing, circulation under the automation programme. Immediately thereafter the features like… are desired to be made operational. Plan of Action:

1. Short listing available library automation software solutions and selecting software that suits the requirements the best.
2. Acquiring and setting up computer hardware and peripherals.
3. Installing the library automation software and commissioning the same.
4. Complete the data entry of the books of main library(BJWL) and departmental libraries
5. Make available the information to users in the form of OPAC

2. MIS for Office administration.

At present, the College Office is automated for routine office work and has certain limitations. The deployment of Management Information System (MIS) will add more value to automation by providing all the essential information needed to manage the organization effectively. The grant assigned for deployment of MIS can be utilized in reviving the hardware and Software, and peripherals. This will aid in managing existing databases/resources and identify additional information needs, link up data sources, help meet information demand of stakeholders, thus instilling greater accountability of both students and teachers.

3. Training program for development of professional skills and all round personality.

Under this programme, skill-based short-term training sessions will be conducted in different areas like additional professional skills, personality development, use of computer, SPSS software, lifestyle management, writing proposals for financial assistance for research projects, disaster management, environmental quality management and so on