A new batch of students seeking admission in the Ambedkar University Delhi will have an option to top-up their degree courses with add on certificates. These courses will be offered in link with collaboration with the industry and aim to make them employable. These courses will be established under the newly set-up Skill Development Centre (SDC). Students will be able to pursue these certificate programs along with their regular degree programs, which have strongly been recommended by the NEP 2020.
The new centre claims at integrating liberal arts education with vocational education and skill training with more focus on soft skill development to make the graduates employable to meet the needs of the job market.
Apart from offering skill training to students, the SDC will groom and train the workforce by offering short-term skill certificate courses and performing entrepreneurial activities.
The proposed center would offer short-term courses beyond Diploma and B.Voc. Degree level and will get adequately aligned with the National Skill Qualification Framework (NSQF) levels as per the job roles as specified by the relevant sector skill councils (SSC), informed Sitansu Sekhar Jena, professor in vocational education and dean, School of Vocational Studies, Ambedkar University Delhi.
All the courses will be in sync with the ‘Skills India Program’ for imparting knowledge on vital job skills to the students and workforce, thus enabling students to acquire an additional certificate along with their degree certificates, he informed.
Jena said, “Today, the nation faces a demand-supply mismatch as the economy needs a more ‘skilled’ workforce and the managers and entrepreneurs than produced annually. Most contemporary institutions of higher learning remain almost disconnected from the workplace requirements.”
“India, at present, is recognized as one of the youngest countries in the world, with over 50% population under the age of 30 years. It is estimated that by 2025, India will have 25% of the world’s total workforce. To harness the full demographic dividend, India needs a high-quality educational system that is affordable, flexible, and relevant to its needs,” he added.
The Centre envisages offering a skill-training program in four different broad areas, including short-term training programes based on the requirement of local industries.
Special skill training programmes which will be of 15 days to six months duration. The priority areas identified under these courses include logistics, beauty and wellness, IT & ITeS, retail, tourism & hospitality, food processing among others. While organizing the training program, an apprenticeship model could also be used, including industry internships for the trainees.
Second, The SDC will organize such skill training programs in the self-financing model to promote fee-based skill training courses to the working groups. The SDC will coordinate with the NSDC and SSC to identify skill gap areas to determine the workforce requirements in the economy’s various sectors and the skill-sets required for the respective job roles.
Third, The third area on which the SDC would propose to work vigorously to certify informal workers (more than 92 %) through Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) to get equal acceptance as the formal levels of education. It aims to appreciate and assess prior knowledge and skills irrespective of the medium of achieving it.
Fourth, AUD being the higher education institution, the center will focus on the research aspects of skill development. It will serve as a think tank for inputs on research related to skill development and evolve as a credible research center in skill development. Its task will be to serve as an authentic, qualitative and accessible think tank for research related to India’s skill development programs.
“In Delhi, the skill-training program is imparted through centers by certified training partners approved by the NSDC. According to NSDC, 80% of the trained candidates are likely to be offered employment through networking by the training partners. But Delhi is still listed among the top 10 cities with high employability among the candidates. It is in this context believed that one Skill & Entrepreneurship University in Delhi may not be sufficient to meet the employability demand of its population,” said Jena.
“Skill training demand of more than 90% unskilled or semi-skilled workforce engaged in the informal sector in the Delhi and NCR region needs to be focused attention in a convergence model. I strongly feel an integrated mechanism should be developed at the state government level bringing all skill development institutions/organizations to a platform for better convergence of skill development initiatives in Delhi, and the SDC of AUD cannot be also an exception to this as well,” he added.
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