Workshop on Life and Livelihood - Job Oriented Skills Demand and Students of Assam

NE Career Guidance, which is a venture with the mission to expose students from North Eastern states of India to the world of opportunities conducted a workshop on Life & livelihood and importance of skill and it’s industry demand at Srimanta Sankardev Kalakshetra on 28^th August’ 2010.

NE Career Guidance with special emphasis on North East India has come up with whole lot of services with the mission to help, guide, motivate and inform students across NE Region. Our aim is to address the need as per industrial demands and subjects that are relevantly required to meet today’s job requirements and the trainings to master requirements of the job world.

The workshop was primarily held to launch “LEARNING-EMPOWERING-EARNING”, initiative across North Eastern States, aimed at enabling youth with Industry skills and access to new technology learning for students across varied age groups. The mission is to create a pool of "well trained, job -oriented individuals to address the major human resources needs of the highest & fastest growing industries.

Workshop was also intended to create Awareness among youths and our citizens and entire Education fraternity. This orientation program was attended by Top level Corporate Leaders who had delivered talks on man power planning as per industry skill needs Vs students of today and how they prepare for better future tomorrow for a brighter and sustainable career. Also, critical Social activist, Economists, NGOs, entire academia based in Assam had grace the occasion. 

           

Workshop was inaugurated by Dr. Jayanta Madhab, renowned economist and social activist. Speaking in the occasion he emphasized on the need of skills and urged to the youths to take the opportunity of learning the skills need by today’s industry. He expressed his happiness about NE Career Guidance bringing this initiative on skill development to Assam to help our youths. Dr. Jayanta Madhab also inaugurated NE Career Guidance’s Skill Development centre at Sunder Singh Bhawan at Udai Path, R. G. Baruah Road.

Director, Higher Education Dr. B. K. Nath graced the occasion and in his speech he clearly mentioned that, our Schools, Colleges and our youths must realized to the fact that, without skills life is going to be difficult and unemployment problem of Assam would always be increasing. He congratulated NE Career Guidance for taking such a initiative to help our youth across Assam and North East.

It was also attended by Mr. Steven Rudolph, who is an American educator, TV personality, public speaker and an author, also known for his own and unique concepts for career counseling across the world who spoke about multiple intelligence and multiple natures and how we as individuals can choose best career option based on ones intelligence and nature.     

Few Corporate Leaders also delivered talks on Industry Skill Demand and Skill Development Programmes to Bridge the Gap and employability solutions for North East, including elementary education, teacher training, Principals Training along-with NE Career Guidance.

Some visuals of the workshop-

Education and Vocational Education in India - An Alarming Situation

A must read analysis -

http://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0BxzZi_DnesR4NGFiNzRmZGQtMWNiNS00NjhhLTg2NjAtYTkzNTczNWM3ZGE3&hl=en

Role of Media in Education

The media always has been playing the critical role in providing information to us. Whether it covers on education, information or entertainment, obtaining the latest information or news in these areas has been made extremely easier nowadays with the help of the media.

Media disseminate information to the people. The right to information is the first and the foremost requirement of the people to do their duties and is very crucial for any socio-economic development. The importance of media in today’s world is evident and it has the power to influence the lives of ordinary people in every way.

Now coming to Education, there is no department in education which is not been impacted or influenced by the information technology (IT) and news media. The different mediums of Media like Print, Radio, Television, Internet and Cinema are playing a vital role in the Education sector. It has provided new ways of learning and has provided Education for better learning.

Access to information has, obviously, improved as well. Media has made it easier to be sure we don't miss what's relevant. They can also enable us to find serendipitous information that helps us to take on new journeys. We have better access to good information today than we did before via news media or the web.

Today’s media-

• Digital Media
• Television
• Documentaries
• Blog
• Internet Resources
• Newspaper
• Magazines
• Social Media

Media plays a centre stage in everybody’s lives today and has big impact in our decision making process, be it social, political, economic or education. It plays a very vital role in our overall development.

Therefore, being a Journalist now considered to be held to a very high standard, and thus at the same time demands to be sensible responsible, rational, pragmatic and reasonable. They have big responsibility for our society today.

If we look at North East Region, as per report in KanglaOnline, “today we have number of media persons from the north-east India working with various national papers and magazines. These national papers and magazines have started giving adequate spaces for the North eastern region and the face of the Center towards North-east India has in fact changed a lot.” Now it’s time that media persons contribute in a big way in the Education sector and help creating more awareness.

There is no point in having trained personnel in an untrained environment. So, before you send a teacher for specialized training, we need to make sure that you are ready to create that kind of environment. And media plays a big role creating the environment. Alongside media,, as far as teachers of today is concerned, teacher’s role needs change from subject experts to knowledge developers. They have to be mentors and go beyond the subject.

We are sure media in the North East Region would continue to deliver and help creating further awareness in the education sector and inform new ways of learning, for the very cause our development.

NE Career Guidance

www.necareerguidance.com

A study on student out-flux & influx from North East India to other cities in India and abroad and its probable causes.

The scope for unrestricted movement of people across regions and nations has widened in the truly globalized world. As a result, highly skilled workers from our Region are now migrating to the developed cities & countries in search of better opportunities.

As per reports by analysts, students from North East India migrate to other parts of the country and rest of the world in large numbers for higher education and job opportunities. It has been witnessed that a few Indian states attract students from other states at secondary level. It is been also seen that the states which attract large volume of students at secondary level have better educational infrastructure especially for streams like Engineering & Medical education, Administration and  to name a few, other professional courses like Finance, IT, Hotel Management, Mass communication etc. It is mainly due to higher number of seats as well as larger number of institutions available in these states and at the same time employment opportunities and ample job prospects. At the very first look there seems to be a direct connection between number of students migrating to other states and the educational infrastructure in those places.

If you look at the trend analysis on North East Indian students going abroad for Higher Studies and job opportunities (2005-2009), it shows increasing trend till about 2007, but decreasing trend since 2008. That could be due to various reasons. But surely if in near future the educational infrastructure and facilities not improved and new ways of learning, new technologies not introduced, out-flux of students and talents would still continue, may be will not increase further but the continue the same trend. 

Trend Analysis (2005-2009)

Fig.: North East Indian Students Going Abroad For Higher Studies and Job Opportunities (2005-2009)

On the other hand as per analysts, students from North East going to large cities in India for Higher Studies & job opportunities during 2005-2009, it shows maximum volume is in the Graduation level and for job opportunities. However, for higher education, percentage remains still low. It could be that we are not either opting for further higher education or facilities not available, where there is absolute need for further higher studies as survey shows that college degrees no longer command authority in the job industry and are now needed to go further to professional, Master’s and PhD level. 

Trend Analysis (2005-2009)

Fig.: Students form North East going to large cities in India for Higher Studies & Job Opportunities during 2005-2009

A very interesting aspect to see that there is a rising trend of people (from NE) returning back to India from abroad after Education due to increasing job potential and growth India has witnessed. And India is still expected to grow further.

Fig.: North-East Indians returning back to India from Abroad after Education

But if we look at students from NE Region returning back to home turf after Education Abroad and other cities, it shows very negligible percentage. This could be due to various reasons, but at the very first glance it seems mainly due to career opportunities available and job prospects in the Region. The entire NE region is yet to come to that level that students gets attracted to return back.

Fig.: North-East students returning back to North-East India after Education Abroad/other cities.

Key Notes:

1. During this period (05-09), maximum number of students had gone abroad for Research & PhD, which is regarded as the most promising talent pool.

2. But, the trend says that the number of students going abroad from NE region has decreased considerably as the opportunities in large cities in India are attracting the new generation more.

3. Australia, New Zealand, South East Asian countries still remain a preferred destination for NE students for higher education.

4. Private colleges in big cities in India are attracting more students from this region.

5. Professional courses like Journalism & Mass Communication, Biotechnology, Microbiology, Law etc. offered by these private colleges attract more students.

6. According to Govt. data, 20000 Indians returned to India in 2009 after losing jobs abroad.

Overall, employment and job opportunities are some of the basic reasons for migration.

Now, if we look at just one aspect of North East, is the volume of population in our rural areas, where we have our maximum population. If we go deeper, do we see enough employment opportunities in these areas? Yes we have extensive agricultural and natural resources. But in absence of new ways doing things, new technologies our young generation is not really motivated. If one can suggest, one of the possible rural Employment Generation could be through vocational education.

Vocational education consists basically of practical courses through which one gains skills and experience directly linked to a career in future. It helps students to be skilled and in turn, offers better employment opportunities. These trainings are parallel to the other conventional courses of study (like B.Sc., M.Sc. etc.).

The Vocational Training in India is imparted by mainly two types of bodies:

• Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs)
• Industrial Training Centers (ITCs) 

So now let’s look at the total number and capacity of ITIs and ITCs per million persons in India for some of the states. It is very interesting to see that states like Kerala, Tamilnadu, Himachal, Goa and Karnataka has very good numbers in terms of number of Institutes and capacity.

Fig.: Number of ITIs and ITCs available per million persons in different states in India

Source: The vocational education and training system report no.-22 World Bank.

If we look at our capacity to impart such courses, we stand far behind compared to other places.

 

Fig: Intake capacity of ITIs and ITCs per million persons in different states in India

Source: The vocational education and training system report no.-22 World Bank.

So it is quite visible that we in the NE Region are far behind in these areas, which can help generating talents and increase career prospects.

Key Notes:

1. If we have to create employment opportunities in the Region especially for the rural areas, further industrialization is needed and that will demand for skilled manpower and which can be fulfilled through imparting more vocational courses and trainings.

2. On the other hand industrialization can also automatically happen through people enhancing their skill through vocational courses etc. and enroll into different government programs or set-up own small scale industries and grow further.

3. This can generate entrepreneurs in different areas and help the whole Region develop & progress.

Compiled by – Prashant Barooah of NE Career Guidance (www.necareerguidance.com)

Re-Blog from Denny Schall - IT Vendor Credentials

"Early data from our benchmarking study on the value of IT Certifications show that credentials from Cisco, Microsoft and PMI lead the rankings of in-demand vendor credentials," - Denny Schall, CLO Mile High Research.Denny Schall - Chief Learning Officer, Mile High Research, Feb 2010
http://milehighresearch.blogspot.com/2010/02/in-demand-it-vendor-credentials.html

You should read the whole article.

Students in North East, learn about - Career in Forestry

One of the major natural resources of North East India is its forests. And forestry is an important and interesting subject of study in today’s world when there is big need for save our environment and to protect, conserve our ecosystem. North East is home to the most amazing herbs, medicinal compounds, natural cosmetics etc. Forestry and Wild Life go together since forests serve as home for wildlife. 

Forest wealth contributes significantly to the economy of our Region. Specially trained personnel are therefore needed to maintain and regenerate the forest cover, forest wealth and resources. This involves the services of forestry specialists, forestry management experts and forest officers. Forestry involves protection of forests and farming.

Eligibility: The minimum qualifications required to pursue a 3-4 years, B.Sc (forestry) is to have passed the 10+2 examination with physics, chemistry and biology or agriculture as subjects.

The major courses in forestry and wildlife in India are:

• B.S.C Forestry
• M.S.C Forestry
• M.S.C wood science and technology

Institutions and colleges in India that provides courses on forestry and wildlife:

§         Birsa Agricultural University, Kanke, Ranchi - 6.

§         Forestry Research Institute, Dehra Dun - 248 006.

§         Indian Institute of Forest Management, Nehru Nagar, Bhopal.

§         Orissa University of Agriculture and Technology, Bhubaneshwar - 751 003.

§         Wildlife Institute of India, Chandrabani, Dehra Dun.

§         Agricultural College and Research Institute, Coimbatore( Tamil Nadu ) Coimbatore ( Coimbatore Dist. ) – 651003

§         Chaudhary Charan Singh (C.C.S.) Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar( Haryana ) Hisar ( Hisar Dist. ) – 125004

§         College of Agriculture, Mysore( Karnataka ) Hebbal , Mysore(Mysore Dist.)– 560024

§         College of Agriculture, Pantnagar( Uttarakhand ) Pantnagar ( Udhamsingh Nagar Dist. ) – 263145

§         College of Agriculture and Regional Research Station, Dharwad( Karnataka )
Dharwad ( Dharwad Dist. ) – 580005

§         College of Forestry, Srinagar( Jammu and Kashmir ) Srinagar ( Srinagar Dist. )

§         College of Horticulture and Forestry, Solan(Himachal Pradesh) Solan (Solan Dist.) – 173230

§         College of Technology and Agricultural Engineering, Udaipur(Rajasthan) Udaipur (Udaipur Dist.) – 313001

§         Dolphin (P.G.) Institute of Bio-Medical and Natural Sciences, Dehradun(Uttarakhand) Manduwala, Chakrata Road , Dehradun (Dehradun Dist.) – 248007

§         Dr. Balasaheb Sawant Konkan Krishi Vidyapeeth, Dapoli(Maharashtra) Dapoli (Ratnagiri Dist.) – 415712

§         Dr. Panjabrao Deshmukh Krishi Vidyapeeth, Akola(Maharashtra) PO Krishinagar , Akola (Akola Dist.) – 444104

§         Jawaharlal Nehru Krishi Vishwavidyalaya : College of Agriculture, Jabalpur(Madhya Pradesh) Krishi Nagar, Jabalpur (Jabalpur Dist.) – 482004

§         Kerala Agricultural University, Vellanikkara(Kerala) Vellanikkara (Thrissur Dist.) – 680654

§         Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana(Punjab) Ludhiana (Ludhiana Dist.) – 141004

§         University of Agricultural Sciences, Bangalore(Karnataka) Gandhi Krishi Vignan Kendra, Bellary Road , Bangalore (Bengaluru) Dist.) – 560065

§         College of Agriculture, Jorhat, Assam (Assam Agricultural University)

§         North Eastern Regional Institute of Science & Technology (NERIST), Nirjuli, Arunachal Pradesh - 791109

Job Prospects and Career Options: There are ample job opportunities available in the government sector. The Indian Forest Services is another good option. The Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education (ICFRE) and its affiliated Forestry research institutes employ trained personnel. NGOs which have taken up the job of preserving forests also appoint such individuals. Timber or plywood manufacturers also employ forestry specialists as consultants. Food and Agricultural Organization also hire forestry specialists for various functions in their organization. The job prospects in the education sector are also very bright. One can also opt for research work in various institutions. There are also jobs abroad as wildlife consultants for esteemed organizations.

In forest and wildlife conservation people can be employed as

• Foresters
• Dendrologists
• Entomologist
• Ethologist
• Silviculturist
• Forest range officers
• Zoo curators 

Having said as above look at one of the survey on North East –

“Rich biodiversity of Northeast India needs conservation

Northeast India, a mega-biodiversity centre and a hotspot1, comprises eight states, viz. Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim and Tripura. It occupies 7.7% of India’s total geographical area supporting 50% of the flora (ca. 8000 species)2, of which 31.58% (ca. 2526 species) is endemic3. It is a transitional zone between the Indian, Indo-Burman-Malaysian and Indo-Chinese regions. It is also a part of the Vavilovian centre of biodiversity and origin of many important cultivated plant species and some domesticated animals.

The region supports a rich biodiversity spanning from tropical rainforests to alpine scrubs. Takhtajan5 describes the region as the ‘cradle of flowering plants’ because of its diversified angiosperms. This rich biodiversity has a significant role in the maintenance of the ecosystem. Besides, the biodiversity of the region is used ethnologically by locals for various socio-economic and developmental purposes.

The region is rich in orchids, ferns, oaks (Quercus spp.), bamboos, rhododendrons (Rhododendron spp.), magnolias (Magnolia spp.), etc.

With the shrinkage of green cover everywhere, the region is also experiencing an impact on its ecological system. The major threats to the rich biodiversity of the region are expansion of agricultural activities, over-exploitation of forests for firewood, shifting cultivation, extensive timbering, grazing, urbanization, man-made forest fires, introduction of exotic plants, ill-managed road construction, mining, etc. which lead to habitat loss and habitat fragmentation that ultimately results in biodiversity loss. Natural calamities such as landslides, floods and forest fires also result in biodiversity loss to some extent. The region is known for its age old institutional mechanisms on cultural and social values for biodiversity conservation, namely sacred groves or forests in Meghalaya, Manipur and Nagaland; sacred landscapes in Sikkim and sacred hilltops in Arunachal Pradesh.

Conserved as the abode of local dieties, these ecosystems represent remnants of ancient forests. But these practices are rapidly vanishing due to modern education and conversion of religion, which have lead to the giving up of traditional and ethnic beliefs.

The region has four biosphere reserves, 48 sanctuaries, 14 national parks, and two world heritage sites. But lack of awareness at the grassroots level hampers the process of biodiversity conservation. Awareness programmes such as seminars and workshops should be held in schools, and colleges and even for the local folks. Public displays in the form of billboards and handing out pamphlets with about the importance of biodiversity and the need of its conservation are needed. It is time for concerned authorities to take up the necessary actions to conserve this rich biodiversity, before it is too late.

Source - Botanical Survey of India”

Therefore there is a big need for saving our Region and we need Government to step forward aggressively and also other activists, NGOs and this whole drive will need skilled manpower.

Save our Region, save the planet!!!

Compiled by – NE Career Guidance

www.necareerguidance.com