-By ArdorComm News Network
November 8, 2022
“We want to make them good citizen, good global citizen rather than just any graduate from the University,” says Dr. Amit Ganatra, Provost, Parul University, Vadodara in an interview with Chandan Anand, Founding Editor, ArdorComm Media Group at the ‘ArdorComm New Normal – Education Leadership Summit & Awards 2022’ #ELSAGujarat #ELSAAhmedabad
Would you like to highlight some of the initiatives under your leaderships of Parul University?
So, right now our focus is on skill development at Parul University and what we have done is we have remodelled our curriculum and started remodelling our curriculum and right now we have decided to go for two third that is 66 percent of the practical credits that is practical weightage is going to be almost 60 to 70 percent and theories are going to be lesser so this is one of the important feature of NEP, skill based education. We want to make our curriculum that is modern up-to-date Global and we have explored so many universities, have contacted so many of our alumni, we have consulted number of Industry people also and we have tried to reorient our curriculum based on the need of this society. So, in future students are going to get relevant skill which is I think missing in today’s most of the curriculum. So right skill we are going to provide to the students so that they can be made job ready and it’s not only about corporate or industry we would like to give equal emphasis on providing the opportunities to work for the students in education in government like Indian army, Indian Navy. You see there’s so many opportunities out there a lot of retirement is there in next two to three years so we want to make them good citizen good global citizen rather than just any graduate from the University.
Apart from the regular curriculum how is hard skill and soft skill important?
Both are equally important and I don’t think everybody is lacking for all kind of skill so I think it’s a patient-doctor kind of thing we need to find out which skill in which the students are lacking and based on that like mentors have the responsibility they have to find out the appropriate skill which are missing and they are responsible to install. So, they in turn will discuss with the dean and they are going to attend this session and this groupism can be done and based on that the lacking skill are required to be provided but both are very much essential so interpersonal skills, soft skill, internal qualities are equally important because now you see most of the students are filtered in HR round and we want to restrict that right. So, due to HR issues students should not get rejected this is our prime motto.
Once a person or a student enrols into a higher education, he is definitely looking for placements so how are you helping your placement team and student to actually strengthen that division?
Basically, we do career counselling in fifth semester and we are asking them whether they want to pursue a further study, they want to go for higher education, they want to go for immediate job or they want to start their own business and accordingly we are going to mould them. So, we start from fifth semester and accordingly we prepare like those who want immediate job or entry level job we prepare them separately those who want to become entrepreneurs there is SSIP cell and all they are having initiative by their own and they are preparing for that and those who want to go for government job, research organization and all there is a separate preparation for them.
So, as we have gathered together on a New Normal Education Leadership Summit and Awards so according to you what is the word New Normal to be defined?
You see that after pandemic we have started becoming normal now right so new normal is a very relevant word for what you have kept so I again appreciate you. I was also thinking when I heard first time this one and then I thought after pandemic everything has to be now work exactly like the way we were working so we have started becoming normal and it’s a new normal because nothing has been realized like such kind of pandemic will be there in and we are going to work like online and all. Literally we need to provide training and people were reluctant like digital initiative for which I was doing the training for other branches faculty no one was coming like Google and Google classroom and Moodle and all people were reluctant in adopting and due to that people have started adopting all technologies. So, new normal is very relevant word because after pandemic we have started becoming normal and it’s a new beginning so I appreciate you for this new normal keyword and its very relevant and thank you for inviting us.
I’m happy to share that we recently celebrated our first anniversary, any message would you like to give for ArdorComm Media?
We have to upgrade and update ourselves, we have to be recent and we should be future ready. I think no option is left with me also and no action is left with us also so we have to be flexible, we have to be open-minded and we have to be future ready. So, always we have to ask are we future ready, anybody who is not only from your side in our community also see, if I am not going to adopt the technology I’ll be replaced by the person who is knowing the technology so this is what it is. Thank you for providing the opportunity to interact with all of you, I wish you all the best.