The Hindu Business Line : ICFAI varsity plans to evolve into knowledge generating university

ICFAI University is now aiming to evolve into a globally recognised knowledge generating university on the lines of Oxford, Cambridge, Princeton and Harvard universities.

"We are aiming at evolving as a full-fledged research university of global reputation with strong focus on knowledge generation. These activities include publication of books, journals and magazines, backed by reasonably wide and sound research activities," the ICFAI Director, Mr Koshy Verghese, said.

According to him, the ICFAI varsity has already become one of the leading academic publishers in the country. It has published a series of professional books in management, finance, accounting, banking, insurance, marketing, operations, HRM, IT, e-business, organisational behaviour, education and various other allied areas.

"These books have a special focus on new emerging themes for the benefit of working executives, academicians, research scholars and students of professional programmes," Mr Verghese told Business Line.

Case studies

Having taken up rigorous case study method as key teaching technique for almost all its academic courses, the ICFAI University has now emerged as the largest contributor to the European Case Study Forum.

Having commenced its operations in 2001, the books division of ICFAI University improved its production level from 3-5 books per month to as high as 40 per month. So far, it has published close to 1,000 books.

"The institution's overall vision is to be a full-fledged research university of distinction that not only does knowledge dissemination but also work on knowledge generation on a continuous basis. In line with this vision, we are encouraging our teaching community to explore in the domain areas of their interest and expertise and bring out derivative or original books in their chosen fields," Mr Verghese said.

Knowledge generation

Apart from sourcing content from its faculty members, the ICFAI University also sources articles published by some of the major consulting firms, banks and other organisations of global reputation. These include Ernst & Young, PricewaterhouseCoopers, BGC, Emerald, Wipro, Oracle, IEEE, IBM and the publication wings of Federal Reserve Banks, International Monetary Fund, Asian Development Bank and leading central banks world over.

Stating that greater focus is now being planned on knowledge generation and research intensification, he said the institution plans to increase the production of books to 100 a month. "We are confident of achieving this in the foreseeable future," he said.

In the end, ICFAI aims that its books should be household words in the academic world for their qualitative and quantitative treatment of all issues of contemporary relevance, providing at one place a retrospective as well as prospective view of current events with emphasis on general and specialised spheres of knowledge and its applications, Mr Verghese said.