‘Want to build a global-level campus, looking at Saudi Arabia or Singapore’: Woxsen University VC

NEW DELHI: Woxsen University was established in 2020 as the first private university in the state of Telangana. It began as a business school in Hyderabad in 2014 and has now grown into a university with seven schools and over 3,500 students. Its vice-chancellor, RVR Krishna Chalam, spoke to Careers360 about its growth, the interdisciplinary curriculum design, the process of internationalisation and industry partnerships. He also spoke about the plans of the university to open campuses abroad and start bi-annual admissions.

Q. What makes Woxsen University unique in this growing race of private universities?

A. In terms of unique features, we have mostly an interdisciplinary approach. The university itself is formed with multiple schools. It has schools of business, design, technology, law, architecture, liberal arts, humanities and several others. In terms of programmes, also, we combine management with technology, technology and design, architecture and management.

The second part is that we have collaborated with more than 250 industry partners. They are included during designing of the curriculum, they are part of the board of studies. The curriculum is based on the present and future requirements of industry.

Third is the entrepreneurial focus. The students enrolled in our university are from the high-income group, where instead of looking to work in a company, they want to build their own enterprise. We are supporting them in terms of giving them entrepreneurial focus. We support students in incubating their ideas, creating prototypes of their projects and also support them with mentors.

Q. Does industry partnership also mean that they are also part of the faculty?

A. There are three elements. The core concepts are imparted by our own academic faculty. The conceptual part is supported by real-time examples from industry partners. Students have real-time projects through the industry partners. They are part of the delivery mechanism also. The research heads and vice presidents keep coming to
our university.

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Q. How does one view the growth of the university, starting as a business school 10 years ago?

A. Woxsen started as a school of business which was then converted into a university. In terms of numbers, when we started as a B-school, there were 30 students. In 2020, when we became a university, there were 300 students. Today we have about 3,500-plus
students. We have seven schools now and undergraduate, postgraduate and Phd programmes.

Q. How has the university progressed with internationalisation, an important aspect of national policy?

A. The most important aspect of our university is international collaboration. Today we have more than 210 international collaborations across 42 countries. It is a collaboration where faculty physically come to the campus and become part of teaching and mentoring.

There is an international advisory board for preparing the curriculum. At least 30-100 professors would be coming here every year for lectures. The faculty-student ratio is 1:12. It is 1:8 once we include professors across the world. It is one of the best in the country. We have full-time foreign faculty. We have faculties who are chair professors, professors emeriti, and professors of practice.

Q. Has the university implemented the National Education Policy 2020?

A. Yes, all our UG programmes will last four years from this year. However, there are few programmes which are five years long, such as architecture, and there are integrated programmes, which are five years.

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Q. Which is the most sought after course in the university?

A. Almost all schools are faring well. But the schools of technology and design are doing well.Their year-on-year growth is almost 150%. Schools of law and science were started last year, their present growth rate is 76%.

Q. How diverse is your student body?

A. There are students from foreign countries wanting to join full time. We have around 46 such students from European and African countries and Russia.

The other aspect is student exchange. Our students go to European universities with whom we have collaborated, either for semester exchange or a year exchange. We also have faculty collaboration, where our faculty also go and teach in foreign universities. We have collaborated on research projects as well. We have students from 21 states of India and faculty from 26. About 50% of seats are for our region, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.

Q. Does the university also support students from economically and socially backward sections?

A. We have merit scholarships and sports scholarships. Those who qualify our entrance exam and interview, get a merit scholarship between 15-50%.

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Q. Does Woxsen plan to build campuses in other parts of the country?

A. At this point, no. If at all we want to build any campus, it would be in other countries. We want to build a global-level campus. In other countries, we are looking at either Saudi Arabia
or Singapore.

Q. What do you view as the biggest achievement of the university?

A. In terms of accreditation and rankings, we have accreditation from a European agency. Similarly, for MBA programmes, we have 151 rank in QS World Ranking. If you verify the ranking of business schools in the country, we are among the top. In less than four years of establishment of the university, it is a big achievement.

There is significant contribution even in research and innovation. In 2020 we started with 50 articles. Today, we have more than 330 articles and 500 citations. We have a very high placement rate. Every student who had opted for placement was placed. Our alumni have also got actively involved in mentoring and supporting startups.

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Q. What are the future plans for the university?

A. We wanted to start bi-annual admission. Second, we want to make UG, PG levels more research-intensive. We want to have centres of excellence which will look into theme-based research and problem solving.

Q. Your field is environmental science and technology – how has this aspect been integrated into the university?

A. All curricula have been built on the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Every research and course is directly linked to the SDG – be it health, environment or any other. The student has to mandatorily do a community research project. They have to do a societal outreach project, and complete a conceptualisation project. Students have to do an industry project to get the required credit each semester. We wanted to build citizens with ethics and responsibility.