Anantapur: Engineering students left in lurch with no skills

Anantapur: A recent survey conducted on Engineering students revealed 97 percent students required engineering, software jobs, skills while only 3 percent of them had the required skills to get software jobs and only 7 percent are capable of handling core engineering tasks.

Several Private colleges in Telangana and AP have closed down after failing to attract top companies to conduct campus selections for their engineering students. According to official sources, nearly 6,000 colleges and institutes enroll nearly 2.9 million engineering students.

Lack of faculty, skills have increasingly plaguing the engineering education where the students graduate without any skills or knowledge. A senior professor from JNTUA said only a few private colleges are teaching required skills like those Government owned Colleges and attracting few companies. “A very small percentage of their engineering graduates are being absorbed by companies of repute,” he said, adding that admissions into these colleges have drastically dropped with some departments having a single student.

“Just by collecting their degrees despite not being skilled enough to be a productive part, graduates were turning out as unemployed youths” he said.

Every year nearly 1.5 million graduates are produced who eventually enter the job market but since they lack in adequate skills and knowledge these students are left in lurch with no jobs.

Adding to their worries, hiring companies tend to visit only top colleges to recruit their employees. “The IT companies depend on economic conditions of their countries and provide projects according to their needs. Fluctuations generally reduce opportunities in local markets,” Dr Somasekhar Reddy, an analyst, said.

Meanwhile, JNTUA registrar Krishnaiah said the university was providing skill development programme for all students which also includes students from private colleges, DC reported.