LUMS to diversify, introduce new discipline

After business, social sciences and engineering, now opening law school.

LAHORE:

With the hope of establishing a new school later this year, the Lahore University of Management Sciences is geared up to expand its horizons and introduce new disciplines, moving from business, social sciences and engineering to now law.

The university already has three schools – Suleman Dawood School of Business, Mushtaq Ahmed Gurmani School of Humanities and Social Sciences and Syed Babar Ali School of Science and Engineering.

“Over the past almost eight years, LUMS has rapidly turned into a fully-fledged university, encompassing a diverse range of academic disciplines,” says Vice Chancellor Dr Adil Najam while talking to The Express Tribune.

“That is what we are aiming for at LUMS,” he says. Promoting what he terms multiple scholarly activities, Najam says the university has moved from being just a business school to an institute which offers social sciences and engineering disciplines.

But how many such fully-fledged universities does Pakistan have? Najam believes not many.

As demand grows for professionals with an understanding of diverse disciplines – something which he says is a global challenge for all academic institutions – there is an urgent need to create multidimensional people. And for this, universities will need to create linkages among different disciplines.

“Traditionally, interests of students are narrowed down as they specialise – a practice that runs contrary to the global challenges we face,” he says.

With many of the problems like pollution, energy and water shortage, based not just on one discipline, Najam points out the world wants people who can work through all those areas, breaking boundaries to address the needs across other areas.

Citing ancient learning centres where various disciplines were taught, he believes modern universities will have to be modelled on similar lines. “Our problems are diverse and our education needs to be as diverse,” he says.

“This, however, does not mean an end to specialised studies. This should only mean that our specialised students should also be able to understand languages of different disciplines,” he elaborates.

As the world is full of opportunities, Pakistan will have to create an environment where it can retain its intellectuals.

Talking about the future of LUMS, Najam says currently the institute is working on consolidating the programmes in its schools. With a great thrust towards the discipline of science, he says the next discipline sought is that of law.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 11^th, 2013.

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