As long as there is life on earth, the health sector will always thrive. The pandemic only proved this long-known fact. Medical science and allied fields are always in demand. Pharmacy is one such allied field of medical science that is associated with the science and art of preparing standardized drugs. 

But studying ailments and preparing drugs are not the only things in pharmacy. It has a wide scope with variety of career prospects, including research, and a good many colleges are providing quality Education in pharmacy. Sanjivani College of Pharmaceutical Education and Research, Kopargaon, is one such College that has been diligently delivering standard education.   

The Remarkable Journey  

The institute was established in 2004, with a view to promote excellence in Pharmacy education and to prepare upcoming generation to meet the challenges in the area of pharmaceutical industries, education, research and development and fulfils the need for skilled manpower in the field of pharmaceutical sciences by utilizing leading-edge technologies with available resources at the premises. 

The college is recognized by the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), Pharmacy Council OF India (PCI) and permanently affiliated to Savitribai Phule Pune University (SPPU), Pune. In 2004, the four-year degree course in Pharmacy was started with intake capacity of 60. In 2008-09, it was certified as per ISO 9001:2008 standard. In 2010-2011, postgraduate program in Pharmacology and Quality Assurance Technique with 18 intakes each was started. In 2012-13, M. Pharmacy course in Pharmaceutics was introduced with sanctioned intake of 18 seats. In 2020-21, the college started two new PG courses namely Regulatory affairs and Pharmaceutical Biotechnology. 

The college now looks forward to creating an ambiance conducive for inculcating application-oriented knowledge, inventiveness, research aptitude, interpersonal skills, social and ethical commitment, leadership quality, problem-solving ability, lifelong learning abilities etc. in the students.  

Towards Academic Excellence 

The college has always strived for academic excellence. Continuous monitoring and upgradation of the system ensure that the quality of teaching and learning are maintained. The college proves its excellence through comparable academic results, placements and research. The college regularly conducts value addition programmes for students to bridge the gap between academia and industry.  

The college has a very good team of dedicated, experienced, full time faculty members and supporting staff. About 40% faculty members are PhD holders and rest of them are pursuing their PhD.   

Excellent Infrastructure  

The infrastructure of the college is excellent with state-of-the-art laboratories, information and communications technology (ICT) enabled classrooms, sophisticated instruments, digital library, computational facilities with internet, Committee for the Purpose of Control and Supervision on Experiments on Animals (CPCSEA) approved animal house, medicinal garden, etc. required for effective delivery of academics.  

The college library is amassed with number of books, journals, periodicals and e-journals with a pleasant, airconditioned reading room.  

Hostel accommodation is made available to the needy students. Medical and healthcare gymnasium facilities are available.   

Mission, Vision, and Policy:  

Vision  

To become a centre of excellence for education, research, and training.   

Mission  

To impart high quality technical education and training in pharmacy discipline to make professionally competent, ethically sound and skilled pharmacists to cater for the needs of society, especially the rural masses for global competitiveness.  

Quality Policy  

The college is committed to provide quality education to build vibrant pharmacists with ethical attitude, strong skills and adequate knowledge which cater for the need of society. This shall be achieved by adopting modern teaching and training methodologies to meet the prerequisite of global competitiveness ascertaining the requirements of all affiliating and accrediting authorities.  

Holistic Approach  

The institute extends services to the students in career guidance, counselling, organize lectures concerning career planning and invites various eminent persons from academics and industries for placement. 

The institute has taken a step ahead in making rural students aware about the career opportunities and guidance through ‘Career Guidance lecture series’ and ‘Sanjivani Talent Search’. To create desire in students for higher education, the college has established career guidance and competitive examination cell. 

Awareness is created about various financial scholarships and educational loan facilities through career guidance cell before admission. The college’s training and placement cell also conducts career guidance workshops to the final year B. Pharmacy and M. Pharmacy students to build up the confidence level and come up with new ideas and innovations. 

The institute has dedicated Training and Placement Cell with the prime objective of –  

• Creating career opportunities 

• To make the college preferred destination for all national and multinational companies 
• To build institute’s brand value in the corporate world  
• To train the students on soft skills and technical skills 
• To introduce video conferencing/seminars, lectures with industry experts and successful alumni to create awareness for Campus to Corporate Transformation.  
• To plan training programs from 1st year to prepare students to meet corporate needs and requirements

A National Level Innovative Research Idea Competition for UG and PG students called ‘Sanjivani Avishkar’ is organized every year for students to showcase their research talents. The college guides students for participation in paper presentations, seminars, conferences, workshops, project competitions, publish research papers in several national and international journals and conferences etc. Financial support is provided for these activities. 

The institute has started a few excellent practices to overcome challenges – 

• Mentoring activity/Parent-Teacher  
• Alumni Interaction 

• Interaction with eminent industrial expert/scientist 
• Industrial visits  
• Sanjivani Thought Leader 
• My Story Board 
• Industrial research projects and internships 

• Dedicated training and placement cell 
• Induction program for newly admitted students  
• Sports activity 
• Minor research project at UG level

The Leading Light  

Shri Amit Nitinrao Kolhe, Managing Trustee, Sanjivani Rural Education Society is a visionary and an educationist. He is a dedicated philanthropist, who dedicated his life for economic and social development of rural people through education and industrialization. He has completed his computer engineering along with MBA in Marketing, a blend of being a technocrat and a strategist. He has been awarded as ICON of Education by Lokmat newspaper, honoured by Education Minister of Maharashtra Shri Vinod Tawde. It is a 38-year-old institute and has been recognized for its best academic practices and infrastructure set up in recent years through best college awards by University of Pune and recognition of NBA and NAAC (A Grade). 

Amit brings with him an experience of managing institutes in rural India and carry practical experiences and perspectives on challenges related to imparting higher education in rural India. He is also Treasurer of Association of Managements Un-Aided Engineering and Polytechnic Colleges for Maharashtra State. He has experience on a similar task force in past, such as Committee of Government of Maharashtra regarding Policy in Professional Education in Maharashtra State. Amit has been elected as a board member of CII Western Region Education Sub-Committee for the academic year 2018-19. His dynamic leadership brings about much needed social reforms through education to empower individuals to become the backbone of an enterprising, productive society. Having deep concern for the poor, rural populace and the weaker sections of the society, he decided to dedicate his resources and expertise to the cause of their upliftment and took a firm foot in that direction by establishing “Sanjivani Foundation” which has come a long way in a short span of time, to become an enterprising entity in the rural education.  

Beating the Challenges 

The recent years saw many pharmacies colleges expanding across the country, especially in rustic India. However, a constant weeping is that students from many from these institutes lack exposure due to an outdated curriculum and various other factors. 

“It is not that we don’t have the right talent, but the main problem is lack of exposure. Upgrading the talent of students belonging to rural areas remains a big challenge. Hands-on training in any course is the necessary gap that needs to be urgently bridged so a student can understand the value and spirit of the programme. It becomes necessary to follow the rapid and continuous changes in pharma industry, which makes academia-industry interaction a requirement,” professed the college management.  

Grooming Future Pharmacists 

The college observes that a pharmacist is an integral and important part of the health care system. The pharmacist has to play many active roles in many areas of healthcare may it be in research, formulation development, community pharmacy or compounding and dispensing. The list is long. Every role is unique and requires training. However, to cultivate the sense of responsibility towards patient health one must be empathetic enough, knowledgeable and trained enough to guide/advice the patient. To be a pharmacist one must have good communication skills also along with subject expertise. 

“We hold the vision to make them morally responsible, ethically aware, technically vibrant, and socially empathetic pharmacists who are ever ready to face the challenges in the midst of ever-changing environment. We have established Institutional Innovation Cell with the guidance from Ministry of Education’s (MoE) Innovation Cell formerly known as (MHRD’s Innovation Council) where we can nurture the creative ideas from the students and allows its growth in Sanjivani-Pre-incubator. We provide them necessary support and for that we have created specific student’s club which are run by students for the students for example – Sanjivani Idea Club, Sanjivani Innovation Club, Sanjivani IPR Club,” informed the management.  

To build social skills and interpersonal communication which is essential for performing any role such as a community pharmacist, the college organises various camps in rural areas through National Service Scheme. It involves basic technical training along with a lot of social interaction which improves communication skills, social awareness and cultivates an empathetic attitude amongst students. Many students acknowledged changed perspective and mindset after attending such camps which underlies importance of such initiatives. 

Besides, various clubs like pharma club, Swarangan gives exposure to hidden talents of students. The college has proactive National Service Scheme (NSS), Women Empowerment Cell (WEC) through which various social activities are executed for the benefit to the society, separate career and competitive examinations guidance cell through which students have also recorded excellent results every year in the competitive examinations such as Graduate Pharmacy Aptitude Test (GPAT), Common Management Admission Test (CMAT), MHT-CET, and Maharashtra Public Service Commission (MPSC) etc., which are conducted nationwide.  

Industry Institute Interaction Cell (IIIC) consisting of faculty and members from industry, is functioning with the objectives of providing high quality technical education, networking with industries and bridging the gap between industry and academia.  

Seeing the Positive during Covid-19  

The college finds it a blessing in disguise that the pandemic literally forced the education system to take upon new ways to deliver the education. Conservative education system has been forced to upgrade from chalk and talk to pedagogical tools. Flipped Classroom, Google Classrooms, MOOCS-based tools, MOODLES-based Learning Management System (LMS) are the modern tools of pedagogy. “Of course, both systems have their pros and cons but a good blend of both will be the future of education. Everyone involved in the education system have realised the intense need to shift focus from Lower Order Thinking Skills (LOTS) to Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) and the same have been followed by the New Education Policy (NEP). These were the gifts of the pandemics,” said the management.  

SCPER has developed its own Moodle based Learning Management Tool through which teachers have delivered the content in lockdown period. Students were highly satisfied with this initiative. Teachers have adopted online teachings and developed high quality online content by using various screen recording tools (ZOOM, Screen Cast-o-Matic etc) and developed their own e-courses based on their expertise. These online tools have surely increased the awareness of teachers and helped them restructure academic delivery in more interesting and fun-ways.   

Ambitions for the Future  

The college looks ahead to achieving number of targets for the betterment of the students and the society. Some of them are –  

• Collaboration with national and international institutes  
• To have laboratory approved by National Accreditation Board for Laboratories to cater the needs of several industries located in periphery for sample analysis by using sophisticated instruments  
• Incubation centre – To develop the innovative ideas given by students and to develop proof of concept for further scale up and technology transfer  
• To become first private autonomous institute in the state  
• Encourage initiatives related to Entrepreneurship Development  
• Skill Development Centre in collaboration with Industries  
• To become centre of excellence in academic, research and training 

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