Ram K Sharma is currently a Fulbright Nehru Visiting Scholar at Center for Studies in Higher Education (CSHE), UC Berkeley. He is also working as Associate Dean, UG Studies and Head, International Office at Shiv Nadar University, an upcoming comprehensive, multidisciplinary, research university in private philanthropic sector in India.
He has also acted as Associate Dean Student Welfare at Shiv Nadar University during 2012-16 and, in addition to his academic administration and internationalization responsibilities, led the formulation of systems and processes that impact the student life-cycle at a university. As the Founding Head of the International Office, he is leading the internationalization strategy including international student recruitment and has helped the university have successful partnerships with globally renowned institutions.
His current research interests are higher education policy and administration; internationalization of higher education; role of technology in classroom learning experience and on student mobility; liberal studies based undergraduate education and its relevance in 21st Century and provision of access, quality and equity of higher education to a large number of students using the extant technology. He has worked as Project Coordinator for a large, collaborative research and outreach project EQUAL (Enhancing Quality, Access & Leadership in Higher Education in India, Euro 1.17 Million, EU funded) at Shiv Nadar University and as part of it worked with Indian and European universities such as University of Hyderabad, Ambedkar University, Jadavpur University, King’s College London and University of Bologna, Italy for successful development of high quality, open academic modules that have been accepted by the Ministry of Higher Education in India (MHRD) for hosting on SWAYAM, India’s national MOOC platform.
Dr. Sharma has received many honors and awards such as Fulbright-Nehru Academic and Professional Excellence Fellowship to work on Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) at University of California, Berkeley and Coursera; International Visitor Leadership Program (IVLP) by the US Department of State themed on Education in Digital Age; Junior and Senior Research Fellowships by Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), Government of India; and Excellence Award by Shiv Nadar University for outstanding commitment and dedication to the advancement of the University during 2011-14 among many others.
Research Objectives:
I am going to investigate and analyze the solutions Technology Enabled Learning (TEL) and Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) offer to address challenges of higher education such as access, equity, and quality. Various models of TEL shall be examined from the experiences of US universities and MOOCs providers such as Coursera and edX. A survey shall be designed, piloted and focused group discussions shall be conducted to propose ways to address challenges of TEL and MOOCs such as low completion rates, sustainability, IPRs, infrastructural requirements, proctoring, assessment, accreditation etc. to propose a model relevant to Indian context. A quantitative study by piloting few MOOCs in classroom setting in India is proposed as future scope of this work.
