Welcome to Department of Computer Science, School of Mathematical Sciences, RKMVU
The raison d’etre and the vision behind the MSc programme in Computer Science in Ramakrishna Mission Vivekananda University
On the average, Indian students graduating in computer science are often seen to be especially weak in engineering skills. Hence, the Department of Computer Science in this new University aspires to impart engineering-based science education to its students joining the MSc programme in computer science. Even though our thrust will be research and higher studies in computer science, we would nevertheless keep in mind that a section of students would want to get absorbed in the industry/service sector after the completion of the programme and we would therefore endeavour to meet their needs as well. With computer science education becoming more and more lucrative, there has been a proliferation – a euphemism for mushrooming – of institutions imparting computer education and what with the enormous number of computer learners pursuing the subject with the sole object of earning more money, teaching standards have suffered an appalling decline. For one thing, motivated and serious students eager to learn the subject in its depth are becoming fewer, and for another, good teachers are becoming rarer in the field of computer science. On the other side of the spectrum, computer science research is moving away from the pragmatic and real world to more and more abstraction. Although we are not advocating mere application-based research, yet the pursuit of knowledge needs to be meaningful rather than being reduced merely to the intellectual joy of a few talented scholars. With the subject of computer science thus at its cross-roads, a complete change of attitude and outlook is called for. With such a transformed mindset, the students joining the MSc Computer Science programme in this University could become leaders and pioneers in the field of computer science. This is our vision and we are venturing to actualize this vision.
The difficulties and hurdles on the way to this actualization of our vision are many. In fact, the relatively small number of institutions venturing to offer postgraduate computer science programmes with such a vision speaks loudly of the problems on the way. Other than a few premier institutions like IITs and IISc, it is hard, if not impossible, to find institutions offering academic programmes at the MSc level in the field of computer science that orient and motivate the students to pursue research and higher studies in computer science. On the other hand, there is a host of public and private academic bodies helping the students to develop a carreer- oriented acumen tailored to satisfy some narrow professional needs.
Ramakrishna Mission Vivekananda University believes that unless the students are firmly grounded in underlying concepts and principles governing computer science, their so-called higher learning becomes only a vocational training. And one objective of the four-semester MSc computer science programme of our University is to effect this firm grounding in the basic concepts and principles of computer science so that the students might feel enthused to go in for further research and higher studies in computer science.