R SujathaR. SUJATHA
Polytechnic educators are upset that the admission rate has dipped again this year. In 2022-23, after several years it appeared that the admission had perked up a bit, with 68,888 enrolling in 496 colleges with a sanctioned strength of 1,62,341 seats.
In 2023-24, 63,561 students enrollied whereas there were 1,54,389 seats in 492 colleges. This year so far, colleges say less than half the sanctioned seats have been filled.
While the government colleges had registered 51% admission aided had filled 49% seats and affiliated colleges, 41%. Self-financing colleges filled 23% seats. In hotel management 32% seats had been filled until a few days ago. The institutions have started admitting walk-in students, officials said.
Last year the Directorate of Technical Education revised the syllabus for the first year and the revised syllabus for second- and third-year students will be implemented this year.
A revamp of the syllabus includes longer industry internship opportunities for students in the sixth semester. The revised syllabus would be placed before the board of studies and will be implemented for third year students in 2025-26, said commissioner K. Veera Raghava Rao. The aim is to not only make students industry-ready but also employable the day are absorbed into a company.
On the role of polytechnic education, Mr. Rao said in the academic year 2021, around 75% of the students were placed. The average salary of a polytechnic graduate is Rs. 15,000 and the highest could be Rs. 40,000. Polytechnic educators say there is a huge demand for people who will work on the shop floor in factories.
Polytechnic admits students who have completed class 10. “A student from a government school would opt for polytechnic courses. But a student with a better family income would rather consider BE or even an arts and science degree instead of polytechnic,” said M. Sathyan, Principal in-charge of EIT Polytechnic, Erode.
New courses in paramedical sciences, opportunities to work while studying are keeping students away from polytechnic colleges, he feels.
The DTE has proposed to set up polytechnic centres of excellence under public private partnership mode in 44 government polytechnic colleges at a cost of over Rs. 2000 crore. These will include innovative designing and development, product verification and analysis, automobile manufacture, EV, IoT, additive manufacturing and robotics.
Mr. Sathyan believes that according polytechnic graduates the status of junior engineer would help as the students feel they are merely diploma holders. “Even a 3-month course is called a diploma and students don’t feel their education is valued,” he said.
Though there has been an impetus to increase women representation in the workforce, very few girls opt for polytechnic education. In 2023-24 batch of the 57,280 students who enrolled only 6,281 were girls.
Source Hindu