AICTE chief tells engg colleges to launch courses on startups

Engineering colleges need to launch three to four courses on startups at a time when jobs are dwindling in large industries, All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) chairman Prof Anil Sahasrabudhe has said.

Speaking at the 17th convocation of the Visvesvaraya Technological University at Janana Sangama campus here on Tuesday, Sahasrabudhe said that courses on entrepreneurship, business plan and converting idea into products were the need of the hour for students.

He said that the AICTE too has come up with student startup policy to create student startups in a big way.

The Smart India Hackathon launched by the AICTE last year witnessed participation of 45 government departments. This year, a five-day hardware hackathon will be organised in which students will come up with prototypes of products, he said.

AICTE has developed Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs)"Swayam" with support of Ministry of Human Resources and Development. With this platform, courses will be available in any corner of the country any time and from the best faculty in India. More than 800 courses have been made available on Swayam platform, Sahasrabudhe stated.

Engineering education has been facing big challenges as the number of students pursuing pre-university courses (Science) is much lesser than the engineering seats available. There is a need to attract students for science and engineering courses. Steps should be taken to draw foreign students also. He called upon the engineering graduates to commit themselves for life-long education and learning, constant upgrading of skills and broadening knoweldge horizon.

Higher Education Minister Basavaraj Rayareddi was present.