S.S. Jain Subodh College Of Global Excellence, Assistant Professor: Dr. Shweta Gaur Interview

Dr. Shweta Gaur is an Assistant Professor at SS Jain Subodh College of Global Excellence, Sitapura. She completed her MSc and then earned a PhD in Chemistry from the University of Rajasthan. She has published a book and eight papers in various national and international journals. Over her career of 13 years, she has also attended a wide variety of workshops, seminars, and FDPs.

What are your roles and responsibilities towards the students?

My roles and responsibilities towards the students are multi-faceted. It is crucial to adhere to the syllabus and complete it on time while providing opportunities for tests and assessments to gauge the student's progress. Additionally, I prioritise creating a conducive learning environment by implementing innovative teaching methods. We believe that every student's voice must be heard and we should always work to overcome our weaknesses and work on our strengths.

How do you establish healthy relations with the students and fellow faculty?

In my opinion, making students feel safe, valued, important, and educated is mandatory to ensure a cordial relationship with them. Hence, I also practise the same thing in institute, ensuring a trustworthy and transparent communication environment for them. It is equally important that they can speak without fear and also give their suggestions for the improvement of various things and a forum to utilise their skills. In addition to this, I also conduct team-building games to inculcate skills like critical thinking, creativity, and innovation. Additionally, when it comes to fellow faculty, I always ensure to listen carefully and make them confident that they can trust me.

How do you introduce a practical and industry-oriented approach towards subjects?

I firmly believe that we can teach Chemistry to students in two ways, either by making available all the theoretical and practical backgrounds necessary to internalise subject concepts to faculty or by providing them with actual tools through which they can rethink and develop their own teaching materials to suit remote teaching. To further enhance industry relevance, we emphasise internships and collaborations with external organisations. These opportunities provide students with firsthand experience in the industry and allow them to apply their theoretical knowledge in practical settings. We also have plans to rebuild and upgrade our facilities to create a more industry-friendly environment.

How do you strategize and update the curriculum to make it befitting for the students?

While preparing and updating our curriculum, we include industry experts, prominent academicians, and specialists to give their input and suggestions. We keep the whole process as democratic and flexible as possible so that we can get the right content and teaching methodologies for our students.

Check S.S. Jain Subodh College Of Global Excellence Placement

What are your views on the placements and higher education of the students from your department?

Our college does provide regular training sessions to students to improve their communication and aptitude skills and personalities and prepare them for the actual interview rounds. Considering the current global circumstances, where survival of the fittest is essential, we are committed to supporting our students and equipping them with the necessary skills and knowledge to succeed in their academic and professional endeavours. By adapting to the changing landscape and exploring new possibilities, we aim to ensure that our students are well-prepared for higher education and have competitive prospects for their future endeavours.

Which strategy do you use to help students to cope with this competitive world?

We believe that learning should be fun, challenging, and exciting, not boring and monotonous. Therefore, we offer engaging and interactive learning lessons to our students so that they can understand and retain the delivered information for a longer period of time. We also encourage them to believe in their skills, knowledge, and experience and not to compare their individuality with others, as they are best and unique in their own ways.

What extracurricular activities are organized in college to enhance the skills of students?

Our college conducts extracurricular programmes like quizzes, brainstorming competitions extension lectures, workshops, debates, extempore, and PowerPoint presentations related to the subject, among others, for the personality development of our students. We also persuade them to lend a hand in various competitions and activities so that they can evaluate their potential and enhance their skills to achieve their goals.

Which challenges are you facing to uplift the education quality of your department?

One of the key challenges we face in uplifting the quality of education in our department is the lack of awareness among students about the possibilities and opportunities available to them after completing their BSc. Many students come from rural backgrounds and may not have access to information about various career paths or higher education options. To address this challenge, we are actively working on creating awareness programs and initiatives. We organize seminars, workshops, and talks by industry experts and professionals to expose students to different career opportunities and pathways. Another challenge we face is the demotivation and lack of enthusiasm among some students. This may be due to the perception that there are limited job prospects or that they have not been able to secure desired opportunities in the past. Additionally, we are exploring innovative teaching methods and technologies to make the learning experience more engaging and relevant. 

What are the approaches you bring in apart from curriculum to teach the students?

We offer rigorous training programs to our students to help them upgrade their skills, and subject knowledge and make them competent and job ready. Apart from this, we also regularly monitor the academic performance of our students to determine in which areas they need to focus more. We conduct various educational visits to chemical factories to train the students practically. Events like seminars, webinars, guest lectures, and training sessions are regularly organised in our institute to educate our students about how the corporate world operates and what their expectations are from us.

Any valuable advice that you would like to share with the young minds?

Opportunities don’t happen on their own, you need to create them. You can seek out internship opportunities, grow your skills and knowledge, stay focused, pursue your passion, actively seek opportunities, build your network, strive for excellence, and stay motivated. I would like to advise my students to properly analyse and understand the needs, and developments of the outside world and the curriculum of their respective courses so that they can contribute to the best of their potential and capabilities in society and nation growth. They should not be afraid of exploring new things and asking questions.