QUEEN'S ROAD: The humanities continued to see a downtrend in admissions in the academic year that has just begun.
Commerce and science courses got more students than arts at the pre-university and degree colleges, and that is worrying those looking at the larger picture.
“We have been giving scholarships to attract talent towards arts subjects,” said Prof B Thimme Gowda, Vice-Chancellor, Bangalore University.
Colleges are stopping arts courses because of poor admissions. “A minimum strength is necessary for colleges to run the courses, and in case of poor enrolment, they gradually shut down the courses,” Thimme Gowda told City Express.
Bangalore University, in association with the Institute for Socio-Economic Change, provides scholarships to encourage students to take up humanities courses.
K K Seethamma, Registrar, Bangalore University, said, “Every six months, we spend about `4 lakh on these scholarships. We also allow colleges without the numbers to run the humanities courses if they are willing to,” she said.
Old problems persist. In many cases, parents are afraid humanities courses do not provide enough job opportunities.
“In the last three years, the response for arts subjects has been poor. Students are attracted towards commerce because they have heard of new fields like e-commerce emerging,” said M Prakash, Director of Studies, Seshadripuram Group Of Institutions.
This academic year onwards, the college has stopped offering three humanities combinations: history, economics, political science; history, economics, optional Kannada; and psychology, journalism, optional Kannada. In fact, psychology, journalism, and optional English is the only arts combination offered now.
Prakash also believes it is time the curriculum in the arts courses was updated.
Autonomous and government colleges are not doing so badly, though. “Students from outside Bengaluru join autonomous colleges, and women’s colleges have good enrolments, too. Students from the rural areas take up arts in government colleges because the fee is low,” he said.
Colleges agree the situation is worrisome, but did not reveal the exact admission numbers.
Some colleges do their bit to promote the humanities. “No matter how hard the circumstances, we would never think of shutting down the humanities. We have introduced add-on courses that help arts students develop vocational skills,” said K S Anuradha, Principal, Maharani Lakshmi Ammani College For Women.
Students need to be counselled about the importance of arts courses, some academics said.“If we don’t want to commercialise education, we must continue with humanities courses. If we are don’t teach these courses, how can we get people to teach languages and social sciences in schools?” said Vani N M, Head of the Department of Journalism, NMKRV College For Women, Jayanagar.