Saint Claret College Ziro conferred Autonomous status by UGC -

Read Time:5 Minute, 46 Second

Saint Claret College, Ziro (SCCZ), has been conferred Autonomous status by UGC (University Grants Commission), New Delhi, and Rajiv Gandhi University (RGU), Itanagar. It is the first College in Arunachal Pradesh to be conferred this prestigious status.

SCCZ is established by the Claretian Formation Association of North East India, a registered charitable society under the aegis of the Claretian Missionaries of the Province of Northeast India.

The College is located in the verdant countryside at Salaya, near Old Ziro in the Lower Subansiri District of Arunachal Pradesh on a twenty acre plot donated by the Lod Kalung Panyu Ayo clans of the Apatani tribe. A College at Ziro had been a long-cherished dream of the Apatani tribe of Ziro Valley. The Claretian Missionaries responded generously to this genuine need. With its dreams for a healthy mixture of traditional and innovative educational endeavours and extension programs, the College has been working towards realising the educational aspirations of the people of Arunachal Pradesh supported ably by the local people and the District Administration.

The foundation stone for SCCZ was laid in December 2002 and the first academic year began on August 11, 2003. The College which is permanently affiliated to Rajiv Gandhi University, Itanagar (RGU), is recognised by UGC under sections 2(f) and 12(B) of the UGC Act.

The motto of the college is “Truth, Light, and Life”, which is adopted from the prayers of ancient rishis of India, asato ma sadgamaya, tamaso ma jyotirgamaya, mrtyorma amrtam gamaya alluding to the belief that it is through education one can achieve truth, light and life

SCCZ’s Vision is to become a premier institute of higher education in North East India, committed to providing value-based, soulful higher education for people, especially the tribal youth, in order to help them be honest seekers and practitioners of truth and earnest agents of transformation within and around them.

The Mission of the College is to “To mould intellectually competent, professionally skilled, spiritually evolved, morally upright, socially responsive, and culturally tolerant citizens, through holistic Claretine education, for advancing a civilisation of love.”

In its twenty one years of existence, SCCZ has achieved several laurels such as being, the first private college in Arunachal Pradesh to have been accredited twice with Grade ‘A’ from the National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) in two cycles, the only HEI in Arunachal Pradesh to have received a Commendation Certificate for meritorious services in the field of Higher Education, and to have been awarded the Best Performing Private College Award by the Government of Arunachal Pradesh.

SCCZ has secured about 300 ranks in the Rajiv Gandhi University Examinations over the years of its existence. Echoing the disciplined and cultured behaviour, the College was awarded the Best Disciplined Team award several times in the Inter Collegiate Youth Festivals conducted by RGU for its affiliated colleges.

SCCZ has excellent infrastructure to complement its achievements:

The Library with an open access system, automated through an Integrated Library Management System and RFID.
Indoor games facilities which provide entertainment, and social interaction.
Outdoor sports such as basketball, volleyball and football, which help the students improve their physical, mental and social well-being.
A gym which affords an array of health benefits.
The spacious auditorium for hosting cultural events.
Large, spacious, well-lit Classrooms, labs, ICT facilities, support facilities, etc. enrich the academic ambience of the College.

SCCZ also has several Cells and Associations through which the students get opportunities to participate in extension and co and extra-curricular activities. In addition, SCCZ has tie-ups and MoUs with several institutions including other Autonomous Colleges such as Mount Carmel College (Autonomous), Bengaluru, Karnataka, and St. Agnes College (Autonomous), Mangaluru, Karnataka, Nirmala Institute of Education, Panaji, Goa, facilitating academic and cultural exposure to students. The College is also a nodal centre for the Distance Learning Programme of IIRS/ ISRO, Dehradun. The College organises several workshops, Seminars and Conferences thereby facilitating a culture of research. Renowned resource persons are frequently invited to the college to interact with the students and faculty members. One such initiative is the Ziro Literary Festival, which is organised annually in the College campus in collaboration with Pwlo Entertainment Ltd. The two day festival is a platform for budding poets, writers, artists and content creators.

The College provides and provisions scholarships for nearly 98% of the students of the College through Government and Private sources.

A persevering assurance of the institution is to provide value-based, soulful higher education through CHEP (Claretine Holistic Education Programme).

A well-established Counselling Cell that caters to the psychological needs of the students and extends its services to society functions in the College.

Hostels for both girls and boys provide students a great living experience – a home away from home. Students have time to relax and enjoy their free time in sports and games, music and other activities right here in the vast campus.

Academically, the College encourages its faculty to pursue their doctoral programmes and also to research and publish articles in journals and chapters in books. The College has to its credit, the publication of an International Peer Reviewed Multi-Disciplinary Journal of Social Sciences for the last 10 years.

The Autonomous status conferred on the College not only attests to the culture of quality maintained at SCCZ, it also brings in a lot of responsibilities and opportunities. As an Autonomous College, SCCZ is empowered to review its existing courses/programmes and, restructure, redesign and prescribe its own courses/programmes of study and syllabi. It can formulate new courses/programmes within the nomenclature specified by UGC. The College can also introduce programmes leading to the conferment of PhD. As an Autonomous College it is also entrusted with evolving methods of assessment of students’ performance, conducting examinations, announcing the results, issuing mark sheets and other certificates, however, the degree shall be awarded by the parent university, Rajiv Gandhi University (RGU).

To fulfil the requirements of the Autonomous status, the statutory bodies of the college, viz., the Governing Body, the Academic Council, the Board of studies, and the Finance Committee will regulate and guide the college.

Currently SCCZ offers Bachelor of Commerce (B.Com), Bachelor of Arts (BA) in Mass Communication, BA in eight programmes – Anthropology, Economics, Education, English, History, Geography, Political Science and Psychology, Bachelor of Social Work (BSW), and Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA) and Post Graduate Degrees; M>A/ M.Sc. Geography and M.A. Political Science. In addition, the college offers several certificate courses through its own departments, cells and associations.

SCCZ is the torch bearer in the state as the first College to be granted Autonomy, thereby placing Arunachal Pradesh on the list of states having autonomous colleges and fulfilling one of the directives of the NEP 2020. This milestone will go a long way in creating a roadmap for quality Higher Education in Arunachal Pradesh.