In a clear indication of student losing faith in the state owned
colleges, the enrolment in the Tribhuvan University constituent campuses
has dropped to its lowest in eight years even as the student share of
their private counter-parts almost doubled during same period.
A report submitted in the TU senate meeting two weeks ago suggests just 148,141 students got admission to the TU constituent colleges in the last fiscal year-lowest since fiscal year 2005/06 when the enrolment was 132,777. The report also shows a sharp drop in the share of the students for the government-funded colleges. The share of TU constituent colleges has dropped 36.66% from 61.3% over the period while that of the private colleges has increased from 38.9% in 2005/06 to 63.45% in the last year.
Around 186,880students were enrolled in the constituent colleges in 2009/10 but their numbers dipped to 159,359 the following year, the report says.
The downward trend in admission at the TU constituent colleges, which were once considered popular among the middle and lower-middle class families-suggest they are fast losing their appeal.
Education experts attribute the
worrying phenomena to over politicization of academic environment, TU’s
failure to maintain a strict academic calendar, degrading quality of
education and lack of dedicated teachers.
Bur TU officials maintain that as the students from both the private and constituent colleges are the product of the same university, they should not be looked differently.
With the increasing attraction towards affiliated colleges their numbers have increased to 1,088 from 832 since 2007/08 however, the constituent colleges have remained static at 60.
