Substantial Edification: An Approach Headlong for North East India

Abstract

In the post-industrial era, the skill sets one obtained in college or a university served one for a lifetime an engineer, designer or science graduate who picked up his skills in college could hope to tap into them throughout his career. However, over time, the shelf life of skills has declined due to the absence of a fresh curriculum. The growing gap between curriculum and market demands is a major challenge for the higher education sector today and has led to a widening skills gap in the talent entering the market. For instance, next to China, India is the largest producer of STEM graduates—2.6 million in 2016 versus China's 4.7 million. However, according to the India skills report in 2019, only 47 per cent of the available talent is employable. This is reflected in the 2019 Deloitte Deans Survey: Only 28 per cent of the deans believe that their students are industry-ready. The main challenge with the current system is that it encourages students to approach their education vocationally—to think just in terms of the jobs they're preparing for. This is a contentious issue in today's educational system across the globe where the students, who put in years of learning, are justified in expecting to be employed at the end of it. On the other hand, a sole focus on employment, diminish the focus on learning. Academic institutions have become recruiting and vocational training centres for the personnel of consumer society, certifying citizens for service, while at the same time disposing of those adjudged unfit for the race. The Indian education system needs immediate attention in rote learning, evaluation system, equal respect to all the disciplines, the introduction of technology, experiential and practice-based education.