Degree courses: Earn while you learn in Telangana

TSCHE in collaboration with State Universities will roll out new skill development courses that enable students to land paid internships during the coursework itself and a job after under-graduation

Hyderabad: Degree students in Telangana will soon be able to earn while they learn the course along with gaining industry related skills. The Telangana State Council of Higher Education (TSCHE) in collaboration with State Universities will roll out new skill development courses that enable students to land paid internships during the coursework itself and a job after under-graduation.

To help students acquire industry skills, 10 skill development courses including retailing, e-commerce, operations and logistics, content and creative writing, media and entertainment, animation, entertainment, and pharmacy and allied courses will be introduced from the next academic year.

---

These courses are domain specific. For example, B Com and BBA students are allowed to take retailing, e-commerce, operations and logistics courses, while BSc students can opt for pharm related and animation courses and BA students can choose creative writing, media and entertainment courses.

Students can opt for these courses as a major commencing in the first-year of the undergraduation or as a minor in the second-year of coursework. Upon completion of the course, a certificate will be issued by the Sector Skill Councils.

While there are 1,054 degree colleges including the government and private in the State, this new initiative will be launched in 103 colleges that recorded the highest number of admissions in the last couple of years. Of the total colleges that have been selected, 37 are government and remaining are private and 56 colleges alone are under the Osmania University jurisdiction.

Out of 10 chosen skill development courses, the colleges will be allowed to offer only one or two courses with a maximum of 60 students in each course. The best part of the initiative is that colleges will be mapped to the industry concerned, which offers paid internships to the tune of Rs.6,000 to Rs.10,000 per month and guaranteed job on completion of under-graduation.

The TSCHE and State Universities Friday are holding a meeting to create a roadmap for implementation of these skill development courses.“These skill development courses will also help in securing paid internships in the industry and also jobs on completion of their under-graduation. Students will have three-days of classwork and three-day at industry as part of internship. They will undergo evaluation and certificates will be awarded,” TSCHE Chairman Prof. R Limbadri told Telangana Today.

Colleges to get grades and ranks

To overcome challenges of listing out best colleges in the State, the TSCHE is planning to award grades and ranks to colleges. The grades – A, B, C and D, and rankings will be on the lines of the National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC) and National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) respectively. The grading might be done on the basis of the infrastructure, placements, faculty and labs among other parameters.

During a recently held meeting, the Education department and TSCHE officials were of the view that college grading and ranking be done by an independent body. Apart from grading, officials intend to list out top 10 colleges under each category. The list of colleges along with their grades and ranking will be made available on the Degree Online Services Telangana and Engineering web counselling websites.