| MUCH
NEEDED INTERACTION |
 Colleges
and Universities are producing graduates and postgraduates
every year but most of their education is often
found to be not applicable to the requirements of
the industry. Once students are out of the college,
they are struggling to find a job and are not able
to sustain the competitive environment of the market.
The lack of interaction between the industry and
institutions is considered as a reason for this
problem.
The same problem is haunting the young minds of
the first batch of Bachelor of Computer Applications
(BCA) students who will finish their course
very soon. In 1998 the government gave permission
toBCA course in more than hundred colleges with
a view to  create
more software professionals for the ever-growing
software market around the world. Industry Institution
Interaction-2001 seminar held in PG College
Saifabad provided an ideal platform to clear
some of their doubts about the requirements of the
industry. Attended by officials from software companies,
academicians and students from different colleges,
the seminar tried to answer questions like what
the industry needs and how should the students prepare
themselves to suit the needs of the industry.
Delivering his lecture in the seminar Dr P Subba
Reddy, Dean, faculty of Informatics, Osmania
University and the architect behind BCA courses
said IT is the dominant field today and urged the
students to develop their communication skills along
with the software
skills. He also talked about the starting of Master
of Science in Information Systems (MSIS)
for BCA students. "This is a two year
programme exclusively for BCA students. Master
of Science in Information Technology (MSIT)
another course to come up very shortly in collaboration
with Carnegie Mellon University will be an
online degree and teaching will be with the help
of CDs and online tests", Prof Subba Reddy
disclosed.
Vice President of Infosys Mr Chandra Shekar Kakal
who interacted with the students and cleared some
of their queries said that constant innovation and
speed is the need of the hour. "To sustain
the competition one should be ahead of others. New
technology today will be obsolete tomorrow. Focus
on New technology, develop new software programmes,
new languages. The process of learning should not
stop", he said. Referring to the
slump in IT jobs in US he said that it is momentary
and will fizzle out shortly. He also asked the students
to explore new frontiers across the world for jobs
in IT field. When a student raised a query about
the big software companies like Infosys developing
the software for foreign companies, he said that
ultimately such a strategy will benefit India only
as a lot of foreign exchange is earned through it.
Mr Prem Mirchandani, HR Manager of Infosys
said that Infosys is going to build a 50 acre complex
in Gachibowli where it will be recruiting
600 people very shortly. The employees will be those
who are skillful and able to deliver the goods,
he added.
 Such
kind of interactive seminars will be very advantageous
for the students to remove the communication gap
persisting between the students and the institutions.
Says one BCA student Ramesh, "Such
seminars will help us get an exposure to the industry
and make us understand about where we stand in the
industry." Similar views were echoed by
another student Vijay Bhaskar: "The
interactive seminars with IT companies is a nice
opportunity to know what the companies are expecting
from BCA students. Already many companies like Satyam
computers started recruiting BCA students and we
are expecting the same from other companies also".
Many students feel that the sudden decrease
in job opportunities for Java professionals has
not dented their confidence. "Along with
programming we were also taught hardware engineering
and multimedia so absolutely no need to worry about
the unexpected job slump in Java field" says
Vijay Bhaskar.
Industry Institution Interaction seminar proved
to be quite helpful for the students. It gave them
the much needed interaction with company officials
and got the industry feedback to their courses.
A close interaction of this nature is the need of
the hour. |
-MAR Fareed
Photographs by: KP Devadasan |
| 
|
|
