SOPHIA SMT. MANORAMA DEVI SOMANI COLLEGE Sophia Campus Bhulabhai Desai Road Mumbai 400 026
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SELF STUDY REPORT FOR ACCREDITATION SOPHIA SMT. MANORAMA DEVI SOMANI COLLEGE Sophia Campus Bhulabhai Desai Road Mumbai 400 026 (The College is run by the Society for the Higher Education of Women in India; The college is affiliated to the University of Mumbai) TRACK ID NO. MHCOGN22839 TABLE OF CONTENTS Page No. NAAC STEERING COMMITTEE 002 PREFACE 002 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 006 A. PROFILE OF THE INSTITUTION 012 B. CRITERION-WISE ANALYTICAL REPORT Criterion I: Curricular Aspects 023 Criterion II: Teaching – Learning And Evaluation 043 Criterion III: Research, Consultancy and Extension 078 Criterion IV: Infrastructure and Learning Resources 110 Criterion V: Student Support and Progression 144 Criterion VI: Governance, Leadership & Management 167 Criterion VII: Innovations and Best Practices 184 C. INPUTS FROM THE DEPARTMENTS 1. HAFT Department 191 2. SCM Department 204 Declaration by the Head of the Institution 213 Annexures: Annexure – I: Approval of Courses of Affiliating University A. of BSc Hospitality Studies 214 B. MoU with the Garware Institute–re. SCM 218 Annexure – II: Minority Certificate of the Trust 223 Annexure – III: Master Plan of the Campus 225 Annexure – IV: Perspective Plan – 2013-2018 226 Annexure – V: Distinguished Ex-students A. HAFT Department 229 B. SCM Department 232 Annexure – VI: List of Documentaries, videos and broadcast 236 features prepared by the SCM students Annexure – VII: Research of Dr. (Sr.) Anila Verghese 245 1 NAAC STEERING COMMITTEE Principal : Dr. (Sr.) Anila Verghese Steering Committee : Dr. Vidita Rakshit Coordinator Members : Ms Dopati Banerjee Dr. Sunitha Chitrapu Mr. Aspi Daruwalla Ms Nirmita Gupta PREFACE Sophia Smt. Manorama Devi Somani College is situated on Sophia Campus in South Mumbai, which houses a number of educational institutions, all of which are run by the Society for the Higher Education of Women in India (SHEWI). This educational trust was established by the Society of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, an international congregation of religious sisters dedicated to Education. The word ‘SOPHIA’ means ‘Wisdom’. Besides this, Sophia is also derived from the name of the foundress of the Society of the Sacred Heart, Madeleine Sophie, a French woman who lived in the late-eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and who pioneered a network of educational institutions with a focus on the education of girls. Sophia Smt. Manorama Devi Somani College is a Christian minority institution, but it welcomes students from all socio- economic strata of society and from all religious backgrounds. Though it is a co-educational institution, the education of women and empowering them with professional skills is of special importance to us. SHEWI has been engaged in the field of Higher Education since 1941 through Sophia College, and of Technical Education since 1970 through Sophia Polytechnic. At the time when Sophia Polytechnic was founded in 1970, most technical / professional courses were diploma courses and, therefore, Sophia Polytechnic conducted only diploma courses. More recently, there has been a growing demand for technical / professional courses that are degree courses. In 2007, with the express intention of starting degree courses within Sophia Polytechnic, the Management asked for affiliation to the University of Mumbai to open a degree college within the Sophia Polytechnic building. The permission was granted by the State Government and the University of Mumbai and this was the origin of Sophia Smt. Manorama Devi Somani College. In 2009, the degree programme in BSc Hospitality Studies was started at Sophia Smt. Manorama Devi Somani College. Very recently, the one-year media course that has been run in Sophia Polytechnic, namely the post- 2 graduate diploma course in Social Communications Media (SCM), has also been brought under this college, via the MoU signed between our Institute and the University of Mumbai’s autonomous Garware Institute of Career in Education and Development. At present, there are two departments in Sophia Smt. Manorama Devi Somani College: SophiaHAFT (HAFT – Hotel Administration and Food Technology – Department) and SCMSophia. The latter conducts the one-year post-graduate diploma course in Social Communications Media (SCM). The HAFT Department has the following courses: a) UG: B.Sc. in Hospitality Studies (Three year comprehensive degree course affiliated to the University of Mumbai) b) One year full-time Certificate Course: Craftsmanship in Bakery and Patisserie (institute course) c) Short-term, part-time courses: Dynamics in Bakery and Patisserie (part time institute course in three parts/ modules - a) Basic b) Intermediate c) Advanced (a person can choose to do just one of these modules or can do two or all three) Although the Sophia Smt. Manorama Devi Somani College was only started in June 2009, it must be mentioned that both the courses conducted by HAFT as well as SCM have a long history going back to the early 1970s. Originally, the HAFT course was a two-year diploma course run by Sophia Polytechnic. It was one of the first courses of its kind in the city. From the very beginning, the HAFT course was a co-educational one. This two-year diploma course was converted into a three-year degree course that is now affiliated to the University of Mumbai. Besides conducting the two-year diploma course in Hotel Management, the HAFT department also ran a full-time Bakery and Confectionery course and short-term bakery courses etc. before the setting up of the Sophia Smt. Manorama Devi Somani College. The ex-students of HAFT are to be found in top managerial positions in various hotels and other fields of the hospitality industry. The names of some of the distinguished ex- students of the department are listed in Annexure V (A). SophiaHAFT enjoys a very high reputation in the Hospitality Industry. Many of our faculty members themselves are alumni of the department and have been on the faculty of the department well before it became a part of the Sophia Smt. Manorama Devi Somani College. The faculty members of HAFT have excellent rapport with the Hospitality Industry and we draw on personnel from industry for guest lectures and as resource persons for the conducting of workshops and demonstrations. The department also has a very good record of placements of its graduating students. Currently under the University of Mumbai system via the Garware Institute of Career in Education and Development, the SCM course (which has also been running since the early 1970s) was earlier affiliated to the Directorate of Technical Education (Government of Maharashtra). The course was delinked from the Directorate of Technical Education in 2012 and it ran as an Institute course for two years (2012-2014). Till 2013, the post-graduate course in Social Communications Media (SCM) was only for women. Since 2013 it has become a co-educational course, but to date the majority of the students are 3 women. Alumnae of SCMSophia are also well-placed in the media industry. Some have made a mark in this field (see Annexure V (B)). There are some unique features of this course: firstly it focuses on social / community oriented issues and it aims at training future media personnel who have a strong social awareness and a concern and commitment regarding social issues. Secondly, it covers all the areas of media (print journalism, T.V, film, photography, advertising, media ethics and law, corporate communication, communications research, broadcast journalism etc.) unlike most post-graduate media courses that focus on one or other aspect. Thirdly, it invites professionals from the field of media to engage with the students not just for a one-off guest lecture or workshop, but as visiting or guest faculty. The list of the visiting and guest faculty of the department is impressive for it includes well-known professionals such as P. Sainath, Jerry Pinto, Smruti Koppikar etc. The department is able to draw on the very best from the field of media because of our location, namely in Mumbai and more particularly in South Mumbai (which is a major hub of the media industry). Ramachandra Guha, a historian of note and a former faculty member at the University of California, Berkeley, Yale University, Stanford University, Oslo University, and the Indian Institute of Science, has commended the SCM model of media studies which draws on media personnel in an article, titled ‘Pluralism in the Indian University’, published in the Economic and Political Weekly on February 17, 2007, on page 570. Though it is a small department, the SCM course has been rated highly; for example, in the Outlook rating of professional courses in 2014 it was ranked no. 7 among post-graduate media courses. The curriculum is executed with creativity. Where the syllabus is prescribed by the affiliating university we try to fill in the gaps in the syllabus and to go beyond it with additional workshops and events. But for most of our courses, we are able to design our own curriculum and revise the curriculum with inputs from industry. Our committed faculty ensure that all the teaching-learning processes at Sophia Smt. Manorama Devi Somani College are student-centred. We aim at giving the students the very best of professional skills to equip them for the industry, at the same time we give importance to the holistic, all-round growth of the student and have thus additional activities especially through the Sophia Cooverji Hormusji Bhabha Programme in Ethics and Spirituality. In the HAFT courses, we encourage students to be creative and to experiment in creating new recipes or new ways of food presentation. We also motivate them to do practical research by having theme-based lunches, a Theme Dinner and a grand Annual Exhibition Dinner. The SCM course engages the students in hands-on research in the media field because most of the teaching-learning takes place through practical projects for which research is necessary.