Lessons From The Flying Club Get Together

We the SFC and the Peer Group members take satisfaction from the free and frank exchange of views which took place on the subject of formation of study groups at the Flying Club study centre on the 26th July 2009. .We have noted the several suggestions made by the students including the formation of a website to display counselling schedules and other matters. In the process of organising the get together we met a large number of students at the study centre. We also talked on phone, corresponded through email,SMS and ordinary post to exchange views on formation of study groups and also on the student problems in Australia(which we have been discussing on the blog). In this way we were able to interract with majority of the active students of the 700 strong study centre.
It is correct that the expected number of students did not turn up on that day.But the positive side was the free and frank exchange of views on that day. Several students who were nervous about interracting got a chance to speak and socialise.Some of the parents who had come also expressed happiness that such opportunities for interraction existed. IGNOU students tend to miss out on these aspects of university life which the students of other universities tend to take for granted. Matters have not been helped by a market driven logic employed by the university where students are clients/customers and the university is a firm supplying materials etc. to the students. The student here becomes a customer looking for goods on the shelf rather than an active participant in the corporate life of the university.
Moreover we were not mobilising for a student demonstration.The purpose of the Student Faculty Cell and Peer Group is to enable students to solve their study related problems at their own pace and voluntarily with the senior students or ex students who in turn join this group voluntarily.(This indeed is the concept in UKOU).We want the students to work on this with the Peer Group at a time and place of their mutual convenience. The taking forward of the study processes is basic to this.You can at your pace of study avail the option of going to the peer group members to sort out your problems relating to studying, study materials etc.You can do it individually or in a group.This is merely a facilitative mechanism.
Too often we get caught in the logic of 'political' or 'political state' in evaluating and setting forth our study processes.This perhaps comes from the perspectives of 'Open University' as a political institution; a point emphasised, argued and taken up by several authors in the recent issues of UKOU's journal of 'Open Learning'.In these perspectives the civil society and the political state are confused.As a result the open universities have become entangled in a 'bureaucratic mindset. 'While we do not discount the importance of a healthy and facilitative educational bureaucracy, we definitely need to tackle the unresponsive situations the IGNOU students get caught up in.Everytime we go to a study centre we encounter student helplessness in the questions of getting study materials, assignments, grades not being entered on their cards etc.
It is here that we need to point out that our concepts facilitating study processes are not just a 'particularisation of the political state'(to paraphrase a well known 19th century thinker) and need to be demonstrated as such.It is in this demarcation that we will be able to tackle the 'political' and 'civil society' aspects which building up of study processes encounter.It is perhaps only in building up these study processes that we will be able to sort out the (19th century debate) whether it is with the notion of equation of 'political state' with 'civil society' which suspends the 'political' in the air or whether these differences of political and civil society exist historically and the political life is life in the airy regions-the ethereal regions of the civil society.Either way the university of the air and we have a task ahead.(SFC and PG Flying Club with the help of Mr. Ajay Mahurkar and Dr. Dolly Mathew)

Dear Friends,

The students appeared for the exams (Dec 2008) are still waiting to get the assignments grades. we all received the grade card without the assignment grades, so the result is NOT COMPLETED the course. I went personally to the Regional Centre in May 2009 to see the staff who is handling the assingment grades and requested them about the situation of Delhi Flying Students and she has promised me to update the website within a week time . They showed me the file from the Delhi Flying Club which shows the assignment grades. Unfortunately the website is showing the same old grade card of all of us.

Dolly Maam, Ajay Sir, could you please do something to solve our problem. Thanks,

Beena Nandakumar

Australian Lessons

We the Student-Faculty Cell and the Peer Group members of the Indira Gandhi National Open University welcome the statement of the Australian PM Kevin Rudd that he will do all he can to prevent hate attacks and that even a single racist attack is 'unacceptable'. This statement comes after another Indian student and an Indian taxi driver were attacked in Melbourne.The Indian government too has responded well by suggesting a facilitative mechanism for students seeking work in Australia to help in carrying on their studies.Meanwhile welcome confidence building measures are being taken by the students such as harmony walks and even a Victoria police and Indian students cricket match. As we have been pointing out the spaces for building racial harmony are there and student bodies like FISA should move to consolidate them.Our concern by doing all this is to advance the process of studying in Australia. It is indeed ironical in this context that the student, Mr.MKA Khan, who was racially assaulted in Melbourne was in the process of studying hospitality management.Is it that the process of studying and teaching-learning is not getting its due weightage in the current context? Is this a result of racial or other kinds of narrow stereotyping which is hampering the educational process?Here we could well draw a lesson from Australia's past where the the narrow minded proponent of political economy, E.G. Wakefield ,was astonished to find that in Australia in the 19th century bourgeois socio-economic relations were in the process of becoming and were 'neither present by nature nor are they things'-a common presupposition in the already industrialised countries in the 19th century. Ofcourse we will not follow the disastorous path of imperial economics he imposed on Australia. But we could very well draw upon the lessons of socio-economic 'becoming' as a part of our studying process.A cooperative emphasis on the processes of studying to overcome our individual limitations on our own could help in building a study process.This approach could also help in participating in the broader multicultural processes of which both students in India and Australia could become a part. Afterall multicultural processes too are processes of becoming. In the current contexts in Australia and India this is often overlooked and it is often assumed that socio-economic relations are either present by nature or they are things.Thereby a whole range of educational options are missed. (SFC and Peer Group members of IGNOU with the help of Mr.Ajay Mahurkar and Dr.Dolly Mathew)

Further Lessons From Australia

We the Student- Faculty Cell (SFC) and the Peer Group members of the Indira Gandhi National Open University congratulate the large number of people who turned out in thousands to campaign for an effective environmental policy for Australia in different Australian cities.These included people of diverse nationalities and ethnic groups.The attempt was to create an alliance of students, members of trade unions, members of different religious groups and environment campaigners who could strongly counter" the fossil fuel industry that currently has such a strong grip on climate policy in Australia". Multiculturalism thus acquired an environmental dimension.It is the greed of the fossil fuel industry which in the past and in the present has been held responsible for the threat of droughts, global warming and the threats to the survival of the coastal communities in Australia.This they do by opposing cuts in greenhouse gas emissions.This rally accused the current PM of Australia of surrendering to this lobby and showed a white flag.Now corporate greed backed by the state have been held responsible for the rise of fascism and racism in various historical contexts such as Germany in 1930s. It is in this context that the alliance of multiculturalism and environment is such a positive contribution of the 'emergency rallies ' today in Australia.If the struggle for survival against racism is to succeed in Australia the FISA must take a stand on the environmental issues and educate the Indian students on its links to their struggle to study in Australia.We in IGNOU too should draw appropriate lessons on this issue. (SFC and Peer Group members of IGNOU with the help 0f Mr. Ajay Mahurkar and Dr. Dolly Mathew)

The Way Forward

We the SFC(Student-Faculty Cell ) and the Peer Group of Indira Gandhi National Open University condemn the violent path taken by some Indians to counter racial abuse in Australia. We refer to the stabbing incident highlighted by the media today. While we support all the peaceful means to establish racial harmony, we totally deplore the way today's incidence was caught up in the cycle of violence we have been witnessing in Australia.By being caught up in these revenge attacks the very purpose of students being in Australia will be defeated. That purpose we have stressed is to continue to study in Australia by creating a racially harmonious atmosphere or by contributing to the goals of multiculturalism of that country and its people.This also builds up the confidence of people back home in India.The racist groups all over the world operate by spreading fear , terror ,vengeance and violence. To fall in to that trap by indulging in violence is to defeat the very purpose we are trying to achieve-that is to build a conducive study atmosphere.The students of IGNOU should take particular note of this lesson we are drawing from the Australian incidents.(The members of the SFC and the Peer Group,IGNOU, with the help of Ajay Mahurkar and Dr.Dolly Mathew)

Defend The Students

We the Student Faculty Cell and Peer Group members of IGNOU view the attempts to denigrate the student community in the wake of racist attacks in Australia on the Indian students with extreme concern. We have condemned the racist attacks in an email to the FISA(Federation of Indian Students of Australia) and expressed our support for its attempts towards racial harmony.In this context it must be noted that students of diverse ethnic groups including the Australian students joined together to promote racial harmony with the Indian students.This is the right approach towards building a peaceful and harmonious atmosphere for continuing to study in Australia or anywhere in the world. The attempts by the Australian media to isolate the Indian students from this atmosphere by labelling them as 'smelly' or 'pesky'or by pointing to the limitations of language skills etc. only feeds in to the racial stereotyping which has contributed to the present violence. Students and learners everywhere( including IGNOU) study to overcome their limitations and if these limitations are racially or otherwise put in to a stereotypical mould then the entire process of teaching learning becomes counterproductive. We urge upon the Australian government and people to demonstrate the genuineness of the multicultural ethos which they put forward in their tourism advertisements.This will enable the students to study and work their way through their study programmes in Australia.Their families too will feel more secure back home.We in India and IGNOU too need to draw appropriate lessons from these horrifying episodes in Australia.The need to build a genuine teaching learning process free from prejudice is evermore the need of the hour.In IGNOU we will take this up in our meetings of the student faculty cells and the peer groups.We need more people like Mr.Amitabh Bacchan to stand up to this lawless counter world of prejudice both amongst the students and the wider fraternity.(Members of the Student Faculty Cells and Peer Groups of theFlying Club Study Centre and the Guru Dronacharya College Study Centre of IGNOU,India with the help of Mr. Ajay Mahurkar and Dr. Dolly Mathew)

Students Against Racist Attacks/Kudos To Amitabh Bacchan

We the peer group and the student faculty cell members of the IGNOU Flying Club and Guru Dronacharya study centres view with extreme concern and dismay the recent racist attacks on the Indian students in Australia. This violence is extremely counter productive for the serious study atmosphere we are trying to build. Racist attacks on students as they happened in Mumbai or anywhere in the country or abroad as in the UK or the US only tend to build a world of lawlessness which negates the constructive and peaceful world which students want to move towards.In this context we appreciate the stand of Mr. Amitabh Bacchan the famous Indian actor in refusing the honorary doctorate being conferred on him by an Australian university. Universities anywhere in the world have a major responsibility in countering racism.Mr. Bacchan's gesture is a step in the right direction for us students.We also hope given the fame and popularity of Mr.Bacchan the message goes to the right quarters.We urge upon him to continue to take such stances consistently. ( From the members of the SFC and Peer Group with the help of Mr. Ajay Mahurkar and Dr. Dolly Mathew)