Facebook could be part of college course in India soon

The University of Delhi is mulling a proposal to include “Facebook post writing” to its English Literature curriculum, together with blog and cover-letter writing as part of its skill enhancement courses (SEC).

According to Hindustan Times, the idea to teach Facebook writing is to complement SEC’s emphasis on taking literary-centric teaching to “broad-based, everyday, contemporary concerns”.

“Writing does not necessarily mean […] heavyweight non-fiction books or highly-dramatised fiction,” a senior DU official told Press Trust of India (via The Hindu).

“It also includes writing generic but important content properly, such as that for blog posts, cover letters – or, for that matter, Facebook posts.”

Delhi University could add Facebook course to English degrees https://t.co/wFzavjG9RP

— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) April 25, 2017

Introduced by the English Department’s choice-based credit system core committee, the proposed draft syllabus is now under review by the university’s professors.

Sources told Hindustan Times the school has yet to fix a teaching method and is now awaiting feedback from the teachers before proceeding further with any instructions.

Head of the English department Christel R. Devadawson said once the changes were underway, the teachers would be trained on the new topics.

Colleges can also collaborate with organisations and experts who can give specific inputs on these topics.” – Devadawson

University of Delhi is a public university located in the country’s capital and counts itself as one the nation’s elite higher education institutions. According to Times Higher Education’s World University Rankings for 2016, the school is home to 22,494 students. Among its notable alumni are the country’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi as well as Burmese leader and Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi.

The university is not the first university eyeing Facebook as possible academic material for its students.

Last year, Durham University introduced Facebook chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg’s book on workplace gender equality into the engineering undergraduate curriculum. Durham Advertiser reported Sandberg’s global best-seller Lean In is now being taught to students in the traditionally male-dominated STEM fields in the university.

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