Engineering education in India – Need for international collaboration for student development

Abstract

Education today is the key driver for Economic development of any country. India bestowed with large Human resource base in the world next to China. There are 55 million youth between age group of 18 and 23 in India and only 15% of them have opportunity to pursue Engineering Education. Though the Focus is to provide access, to many but equally important is to ensure quality of education. Engineering graduates today require not only adequate technological ability and problem solving skills, but also must be equipped with soft skills, business skills, inter personnel and intercultural adaptability. Now, the emphasis should be on self learning and the role of teacher is redefined as facilitator to enable the students to be more involved in active learning through laboratory. Project work, assignments and case studies Lifelong learning and continuous learning is key aspect of teacher and student. International collaborations are essential for better student development. Inview of the globalisation and in this endeavour the role of ICT is the key enabler for enhanced student learning . Apart from F2F learning, Blended learning through online, web based methodologies will provide better opportunities through International collaborations for student development. Innovative models of undergraduate and graduate students is desirable through International collaboration to enrich the students of better understanding and level of competency can be developed.