What makes Xaviers different from other Graduate Colleges?
St. Xavier’s College, Mumbai is one of the top colleges for Arts, Science and Commerce/ Business. It became an autonomous college in 2010. It received India’s National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) in 2006. It is named after Francis Xavier, the 16th century Spanish Jesuit saint. It is located in south Mumbai and has Gothic style of architecture. It offers junior college courses in arts and science fields for two years, UG courses in B.Sc, B.A, B.Com, B.M.S, B.M.M and B.Sc I.T, diploma courses and PG courses in M.A, PhD, M.Sc, M.P.P and PGDDS.
Following are the reasons why St. Xavier’s College is different from other graduate colleges:
- It is an autonomous college:
It has the liberty to design its own courses and framing the syllabi. It conducts its own evaluation for its students. With this opportunity of implementing autonomy, it can upgrade the level of its education and meeting the aspirations of its students. However, academic autonomy doesn’t include financial autonomy. The fee structure of the courses are set according to the University of Mumbai. It has worked hard to achieve autonomy by working out its credit system, teaching pattern, syllabus structure and continuous internal evaluation.
- Excellent faculty:
St. Xavier’s College, Mumbai has an excellent teaching faculty. The teaching staff is an important reason why the college is amongst the top best graduate colleges in the country. It also has visiting faculty which enhances the teaching experience altogether. The students get the chance to meet some of the professionals who have been doing quite well in their respective fields of business.
- Infrastructure:
It occupies an area of around 2.94 acres in the fort locality of south Mumbai. It is located close to the Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (CST) railway station. It was built in Indo-Gothic style of architecture and it serves as the heritage structure by the Mumbai Heritage Conservation Committee. The Blatter Herbarium was made which includes a large variety of plant, Caius Laboratory for Inter-Disciplinary Research was made to perform drug research, Central Instrumentation Facility (C.I.F.) allows students to use the sophisticated musical instruments, Heras Institute of Indian History and Culture was founded in 1926, as the Indian Historical Research Institute, Xavier’s Visual Arts Studio consists of professional quality, moving and still, cameras with lighting equipment and good editing facilities and a library which has a variety of books and also has lending facilities to the students.
- Fests :
Malhar is one of the most well-known fests in the city. It is an inter-college youth festival held mostly during the rains in August. It involves teams from 60 different colleges from Mumbai and 30 cultural competitions in performing arts, fine arts, literary along with workshops on different themes. Janfest is another famous fest of Indian classical music. It is held by Indian Music Group (IMG) in January which promotes classical music and lets the talented youth to show their talent. It has played host to famous singers like Ravi Shankar, Zakir Hussain and Hariprasad Chaurasia. Apart from these two it also hosts Ithaka, English literature and theatre festival and Aamod, fest organized by “Marathi Vangmay Mandal”.
- Encourages co-curricular activities:
Apart from academics students take part in a variety of activities such as debates, dramatics, sports, quizzes, dance and singing competitions, art fests etc. There are some co-curricular societies formed for students who have interests in various other fields such as The Film Countdown, The English Theatre Society, Fitoor: The Hindi Dramatics Society, The Xavier’s Debate Society and The Dance Troupe.
- It has been awarded NAAC:
In 2007, it received the highest rating A+ in the re-accreditation by the National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC). It is a symbol of excellence. It was rated in the top 10 colleges in India by the national “India Today” magazine. It was regarded as the best arts college and second best science and commerce college in the years 2000 and 2006. It was awarded the “College with a Potential for Excellence” by the UGC in 2006.
