A friend of mine said I am proposing to turn education into a consumer product without values. But, a free market does not do away with values. A person cannot achieve success in any avenue, whether it is business or in a corporate environment, without the core personal values. But in the current system it develops neither any values nor competence.
If a student that comes out of a university now with a certificate that lack any value, it is because the student is not being trained to become an engineer. When a student blindly follows the current education system and graduates with a BTech with good results, the best job that he is getting trained to do is to become a lecturer: to teach other students. The student is clueless about the actual work in the real world. It is not to say that she or he would never be able to start working as a professional, but the person would actually need more training just to start the job that he is supposed to be trained for in the first place.
If the same system of offering a vast variety of subjects as electives and let the student chooses what she or he wants, then an engineering education becomes just what it is meant to be, adding value to the students and helps them to do what they want. If someone wants to specialize in designing ECU (Engine control unit) of F1 cars, they will be able to choose a few subjects on control theory and micro-controllers from the electronics department, some programming subjects from computer science department and some thermal engineering and Engines subjects from the mechanical engineering department and come out as an engineer who knows what he is doing.
So, treating education as a consumer product is exactly the practical solution. But that will do away with the universities and colleges deciding a fixed syllabus. Such monopolies and restrictions are hindering potential of a lot of individuals.
This should be complimented by strong industry involvement in education. The internship concept is catching up now a days and it provides a very strong tool for the student to achieve a real world relevant training so that when he or she passes out, the resume will already have experience on day one. The internship should be of two or three months period and students should be able to do it from S5 onwards. At that time they would already have the basic concepts that would help them to perform certain tasks at a company and the companies can utilize this as a way to evaluate different candidates who can be potential employees and also to get some work done at a cheap price.
This empowers the students in two ways. It opens up the education system for him or her and there is no artificial limit in front of the student about what he could learn. Did you not ever wish for this scenario at least once in your college? Come on… don’t lie to me.
The system controls it all. System given affiliation and the system decides the syllabus. Its not market driven, but its system driven. What is a degree certificate ? Its the mark of a monopoly in the system. Unless you dont have something like a certificate… you are screwed… no matter how knowledgeable you are.
Its an artificial arrangement… where the system decides who is an engineer and who is not… its based on the terms decided by the system… and not by the actual market demand…
Comment by Kenney Jacob — June 8, 2009 @ 7:46 am
@ Domestic Avalanche
At first look your suggestion of vast variety of subjects as electives to enhance the quality of the engineers looks good but the main issue will be the availability of large no qualified staff who is up to date with that particular subject and who is well versed in it .If the faculties are not of utmost quality then it defeat the very purpose for which the concept was suggested.This can be avoided by faculty sharing and college clusters in theory, but till what level it can be implemented is unpredictable.
Comment by Aravind — June 8, 2009 @ 4:34 pm
Internship opportunities before the final year of college is a springboard for a student’s career development. This way they get a good exposure on how the industry works and get them prepared for it ahead of graduation. Any research that is not industry focused, might not find much opportunities. Also, more flexibility in choosing elective courses will enhance knowledge in their area of interest or opportunity. Atleast in the case of Cochin University, they could have offered better faculties and facilities if they din’t have political appointments and release of grands! System does it all and the system does it for indivual benefits!
I wish the next generation gets a quality education that brightens their imagination and encourages them to focus more on thier area of interest. For this, you need quality people to set the standards and not a syndicate system to appoint anyone in educational institutions.
Comment by Linju Jose — June 8, 2009 @ 9:18 pm
As much as I like to agree with the author on his point regarding choosing the electives, I would also like to point out that this would be akin to letting a 3 year old choosing his diet. I do concede that there’re lots of papers in our mechanical engineering that would potentially bore a specialist or would be of little or no practical use whatsoever but consider a themral power plant or an F1 vehicle for that reason- I don’t think there’s any concept in mechanical engineering that is NOT used. Yes, the idea definitely sounds good but I do doubt the effective utilization given the faculty (as Aravind said). I also believe that bulk of the problem stems out of one single thing- herd mentality!
Comment by The Nomad — June 8, 2009 @ 10:49 pm
Its time for the likes of IGNOU to set its shop all over the country and time for Wikiversity to expand its reach. “Show and Tell” is what we need rather than rot learning.
Comment by jkeverywhere — June 9, 2009 @ 12:47 am
I beg to differ.
I am not if you have ever read the tag lines or the goals of any of the engineering colleges.For eg – The Line under the logo of IITB says – Gyannam parmam dheyam.
The colleges are NOT SUPPOSED TO TRAIN YOU FOR THE MCinsey’s and Infosys of the world. These institution’s were never meant to produce “engineers” to meet Demand of the market.And btw trust me on this one – no BTECH in this country is worth a lecturer’s job.If somebody is doing that my heart goes out to the student of that lecturer.
The same thought had occurred to me while i was studying History in 9th standard and today i realise that for sure that was not a waste.
More than the training, its about the experience of 4 years of education that you would make you an engineer. And just FYI – If you intend to make it a consumer product, better make robots. They can do coding just better than their human counterpart’s.
IMHO you need to understand the basic essence of these colleges and institution’s before making declaration’s.
Comment by Vivek Khandelwal — June 11, 2009 @ 9:23 am
What we need is industry and institutions collaborate and complement each other. Any lecturer/teacher should have hands on experience in what he teaches, otherwise the system just ends up where ‘the blind leads blind’.
As a victim of the current system I still empathize when I see students coming out with degree certificates (BA/B.Sc/B.Tech) without having seen at least one person who has used all this theory in real life. They learn all this stuff as if all these things happens in a far away world and they will never face it in real world.
I hope for a system where educational institutions become research centres and teaching is just apart of it.
While teachers are vital for the system if somebody ends up just a teacher without real life experience(including valid research on his field) he is actually damaging another generation.
Also teachers and students alone cannot keep this world running. Unless the system caters to the needs of the society it is useless and waste of resources.
Comment by febin — June 11, 2009 @ 12:31 pm
@Nomad
Students choose electives now without a care because it does not really affect their future. If, and only if it becomes clear that whatever they choose will have a huge impact on their future, the selections will start getting serious. Personal responsibility.
Comment by Domestic Avalanche — June 14, 2009 @ 6:22 am
@Aravind, yes, the faculty is largely out of touch with whats happening in the real world. I’d address that a little bit on Monday.
Comment by Domestic Avalanche — June 14, 2009 @ 6:23 am
@Vivek
True, contrary to what Kenney thinks, the education in school actually served some purpose.
But professional education has no other aim but to create just that – professionals in their field of expertise.
And no, I’d rather have the engineers who come out of these colleges start the next infy or next Google. Sadly, the current system is very inept in that. And once you come out, unfortunately, the only job that you can do without further training is a lecturers job, not that I said it is worth it.
And sir, when it is a consumer product, people know the repercussions of what they get in terms of what they need. The current system does absolutely nothing – We are forced by the system to learn whatever the system has to offer.
Comment by Domestic Avalanche — June 14, 2009 @ 6:29 am
@Febin
>>As a victim of the current system I still empathize when I see students coming out with degree certificates (BA/B.Sc/B.Tech) without having seen at least one person who has used all this theory in real life
You are right on target sir. Please hang around for my next post which more or less reflects what you said.
Comment by Domestic Avalanche — June 14, 2009 @ 6:31 am