Professors, members from private institutions, industrialists, and students expressed their thoughts on the prevailing education system at a zonal-level higher education stakeholders’ meeting headed by Higher Education Minister Govi Chezhiaan here on Tuesday.
Many teachers from colleges and universities across the southern districts noted down the issues affecting the efficient education delivery to students in the institutions.
B. George of Madurai Kamaraj University College said that though the State government announced conversion of the university college into government college, the Government Order was not issued regarding the matter.
“Due to this, salary has not improved, facilities are poor, college fee is high. The delay in implementation has put all efforts at stake,” he noted.
V. Gurumoorthy, lecturer at Madurai Institute of Social Sciences, complained that skill possessed by students following their college education did not match the industries’ expectations.
“Though the ‘Naam Mudhalvan’ scheme addresses the issue to a certain extent, the trainers appointed for the programme should be upskilled to improve the training imparted to the students,” he added.
When programmes like ‘Naan Mudhalvan’ provide skill-based training, value-based training to enhance students’ attitude to win job interviews was lacking, he said.
“As the scheme’s concepts are very generic and common, measures should be taken to focus the training based on the students’ specific needs,” he noted.
Other lecturers from colleges affiliated to Manonmaniam Sundaranar University raised the issue of ‘Naan Mudhalvan’ classes clashing with the regular classes.
They requested to make the programme classes specific to particular days in a week so that the teachers could plan accordingly.
As colleges followed syllabus framed by Tamil Nadu State Council for Higher Education, internship for students was made mandatory, said Jayakumar of Madurai Institute of Social Sciences.
“When only a handful of industries are located in Madurai and nearby districts, the chances of internship opportunities are very less for students. Even those industries were not taking students for training,” he added.
Mr. Jayakumar requested officials to instruct industries to allow more students for internships.
Malathi of Anna University Regional Campus - Madurai mooted an idea to record lectures which were delivered to the students.
“Akin to institutions like IIT, when the lecture is recorded and made available to students through YouTube videos or at computer labs, students not so familiar with the foreign language could watch it repeatedly to make their understanding better,” she added.
Mr. Chezhiaan appreciated the idea and instructed officials to take it up for immediate implementation.
Demands were also raised to direct private institutions to publish students’ fees on their websites so as to ensure transparency and for the knowledge of the public.
Representatives of industries located in and around Madurai district voiced their need for skill training centres in the southern region as they could not afford training for their recruits in places like Bengaluru.
“When most of the students who completed their diploma or ITI lack industrial training, industries are forced to train them after hiring them. As we do not have an inbuilt centre to train them, we have to go for external training centres,” they added.
Earlier, Mr. Chezhiaan issued transfer orders to about 290 lectures at Sri Meenakshi Government Arts College for Women.
Following this, he flagged off a drug awareness rally and inaugurated a students’ help desk at the college.
K. Gopal, Additional Chief Secretary, Department of Higher Education, T. Abraham, Commissioner, Directorate of Technical Education, E. Sundaravalli, Commissioner of Collegiate Education, M.P. Vijayakumar, Vice-Chairman, Tamil Nadu State Council for Higher Education, and M.S. Sangeetha, Madurai Collector, were present at the event.
Published - November 26, 2024 08:31 pm IST
