Creating entrepreneurial mindset is one of TASK's focus areas: CEO

Hyderabad: "It is the vision of the Chief Minister of Telangana not just to help youth become employable but also make them entrepreneurs. What our Chief Minister envisions is to make Telangana, a state of employment generators rather than employment seekers. Falling in line with that thought, TASK is working on Creating Entrepreneurial Mindset among the youth in the state", shared Shrikant Sinha, CEO of TASK.

We would like to achieve that through college outreach programs not just in cities but also in rural areas and by conducting seminars and workshops at regular intervals, he added. TASK is a not- for -profit organisation created by Government of Telangana for bringing synergy among institutions of government, industry and academia with an objective of offering quality human resources and services to the industry.

Sinha was Chief Guest at the closing ceremony of 4-day 7th international conference on Transformations in Engineering Education (ICTIEE-2020) held from January 5 to 8 at Anurag Group of Institutions(AGI) in the city.

We have MoU with 20 partners. With their support and others, we reach out to many schools and colleges to create awareness about Entrepreneurial Mindset. What we do is to orient a person towards entrepreneurial thinking, by talking to them about innovation, ability to take risks, what it means to be an entrepreneur etc., he added.

Entrepreneurial Mindset is about the way in which you approach tasks, challenges, ups and downs, failures, mistakes and many such thing, he added. What we have done in this regard so far is just a tip of iceberg. A lot more is to be done. We want to reach out to as many youth as possible on creating entrepreneurial mind set Sinha shared.

As many as 676 colleges, 1,84,689 students are registered with TASK. We have so far trained 2,86,761 students in various aspects of the employment. We have also trained 5701 faculty, Sinha added. Our programmes help corporates gain access to a pool of trained graduates for suitable roles. Our students are trained extensively in latest technologies to help companies find the right candidate, he shared.

Speaking further, Sinha told the Engineering education leaders at the concluding function of ICTIEE-2020 to create more courses catering to the diversified needs of the industry. Multiples colleges from different disciplines can come together to offer these courses such as 'Mechatronics', the combination of Mechanical and Electronics.

He cited an example of how a University formed in Shanghai in China in collaboration of various colleges and offer most unique, need based courses to address a specific requirement of the industry.

Mr Sinha told the Engineering faculty present in the meeting to change the way they teach. Parents of 60 to 70 per cent of engineering students haven't ever been to a college. You need to guide them, show them a right path. Quoting an example of Apple's recruitment advertisement, which sought ITIs and Polytechnic students rather than Engineering students , he revealed that the reason the company said to have revealed later that they preferred those who can handle screwdriver rather than those who just know the definition of screwdriver.

Ramakrishna Reddy Lingireddy, VP of CapGemini said as a company what we worry the most is people, whom want to recruit. No matter how bad media reports the economy is, there is always a dearth of people for our industry. There is a lot of gap exists between what the talent colleges are churning out and the talent the industry badly in need of. Academia plays a huge role in aligning student's talent to the industry requirements.

People coming in the industry must realise that their learning has not ended with getting a job. They must be in continuous learning process. Learning is not going to stop after the college. If one gets that attitude the career of the student stops, Ramakrishna Reddy warned.

Addressing the gathering Anurag Palla, Management Trustee - AGI said that Institutions should create environment that is conducive for students to be better prepared for the world and be employment ready. Training in Design thinking and creative thinking help and give the right push and motivation to students. In his address Conference Chair Dr. G. Vishnu Murthy asked participants to integrate the humanistic approach in their teaching-learning.

Dr. K. S Rao, Director - AGI said that the conference had thrown light on transforming engineering education and will be very helpful to the future generations. Secretary and Correspondent S. Neelima said that the participants gained had many learning experiences and urged them to share and practice what they had learnt. Conferences such as this are the need of the hour in this technical era, she said.

Dr. Padmaja in her report on ICTIEE 2020 said that the conference envisioned bringing professionals and leaders from the industry on one platform. The participants shared best practices in Transformations in Engineering Education. Over 700 plus faculties benefitted by the workshops by diverse experts. 320 attendees took part in 5 technical workshops, 56 engineering projects were displayed as part of poster presentation. Out of over 250 papers received 150 were assessed by 18 chairs and Co-chairs and accepted.

Over 129 authors and 23 Co-authors presented their Papers during the conference. The conference with the theme 'Socio-Humanistic Approach in Engineering Education' turned the spotlight on current and emerging trends in engineering education and some of its future directions. The conference saw numerous academic workshop on topics such as Improving STEAM Education, Building Teacher Excellence Corps, Outcomes based Education, Project Based Learning, Teaching Entrepreneurship for Sustainability, etc.

A number of paper presentations took place during the 3-day conference on topics like outcomes based education; assessment and evaluation; curriculum design and development; societal impact; game based and project based learning; innovations in teaching learning process and entrepreneurship; women in policy and decision making; and outreach.