Atherton said the plan is to grow from six courses in the first year, which the college aims to launch in August 2025, to more than 30 courses by the eighth year (Representative image | Image: Shutterstock)
Britain’s University of Southampton plans to offer 30 courses and enroll more than 5,000 students over the next eight years at its offshore campus in India, the first in the country set up by a foreign university, according to senior officials.
Elaborating on the university’s agenda in an interview with PTI, Andrew Atherton, Vice President, International and Engagement, said operations of the campus to be built in the National Capital Region of Delhi will begin next year.
Fees at the Indian campus are likely to be around 60 percent of tuition fees at the Southampton campus, but admission requirements will be the same, he said.
The renowned university received a letter of intent earlier this week from the Indian government to establish its campus in the country.
While Australia’s Deakin University and the University of Wollongong have already set up campuses in GIFT City in Gujarat, the University of Southampton will be the first foreign university to set up a campus in India under UGC norms.
“The goal is to reach 5,500 students in the first eight to ten years. So in the first year we will start with six courses, including four undergraduate and two graduate programs. The four undergraduate programs will be in computer science with a focus on artificial intelligence and data science and also in business with a focus on entrepreneurship. The graduate programs will be in computer science and technology,” Atherton said.
“And then every year we will introduce two to four new programmes, so that we will eventually have more than 30 different programmes, around 20 undergraduate programmes and 12 postgraduate programmes taught.
“So, we expect it to be a primarily undergraduate campus because we believe that most of the demand right now in India is for undergraduate programmes and that gives students the opportunity to go abroad for postgraduate master’s studies as well,” he added.
Atherton said the plan is to grow from six courses in the first year, which the university aims to launch in August 2025, to more than 30 courses in the eighth year.
Explaining the plans, Atherton said tuition fees would be more specific to India and not as high as those at the Southampton campus.
“Fees will account for approximately 60 per cent of the fees students have to pay to come to Southampton. Therefore, studying a University of Southampton degree in India on our campus will cost less than studying abroad, because we believe there is a large segment of families and students who would want an international degree and the investment, but at a price that works in India itself.
“That will make it more affordable, but it will still be a high fee in India. It will be set at a rate that works in India. In terms of entry requirements, we will effectively compare our entry requirements in India to the level of entry requirements that we accept in the UK,” he said.
The university currently has six closely connected campuses in the city of Southampton, one in the nearby city of Winchester and another in the Malaysian town of Iskandar Puteri. More than 700 Indian students are enrolled in different courses at the UK campus.
Asked about faculty recruitment plans, Atherton said the university wants a diverse faculty and is already encouraging its UK-based staff to see if they want to be seconded to the campus and have that as part of their professional development.
“We will be recruiting internationally, so all teaching positions in India will be advertised on our UK website as well as on international websites for academic appointments. For equality, we will also be advertising in India. We would like a mix and some local appointments to allow for that opportunity, but also because some of those teachers have local knowledge,” he added.
The Indian campus will also be open to international students.
“There may be some international students who are interested in the Indian campus rather than the UK campus due to geographical proximity. There are countries within a two- or three-hour flight from India where there is a large Indian or local population interested in pursuing a degree at Southampton. That’s why we believe it will become a regional hub.
“We also believe that the majority of students will be Indian because the scale of demand and quality of students in India is huge. At the moment, although there is an expansion in the higher education sector, the expansion of seats is not as high as the growth in demand for additional seats in universities,” he said.
“So we see the Indian domestic market in terms of students growing very rapidly and certainly for the first five years we expect the majority of students to be Indian,” Atherton added.
(Only the headline and image of this report may have been reworked by Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
First published: September 1, 2024 | 12:58 pm IS
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