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RELEVANCE OF CAREER COUNSELLING AND SKILL-BASED TRAINING
DR. RAJ SHREE DHAR
“The roots of education are bitter, but the fruit is sweet.” - Aristotle
Globalization has led to a paradigmatic shift in terms of nature, relevance and variety of employment opportunities, which makes the need for educated and skilled persons absolutely indispensable. To achieve these goals, Higher Education Department of J & K is recasting its curriculum, thereby introducing new skill oriented courses also, new approaches are being promoted in order to facilitate the acquisition of skills, competencies and abilities for communication. The Department is seriously concerned with student learning and development at individual, small group and large class room levels. Design courses like Architecture, Nursing, Horticulture, Law and many more are being launched in the State, for which the best of the intellectuals are required who can transform the students’ minds and equip them with employability along with ethical human values and principles.
In present times, quality in Higher Education is a multidimensional concept which should embrace all the activities like teaching and academic programmes, research, staff, students, infrastructure, equipments, facilities and above all academic environment. With the emergence of new businesses and other employment opportunities, our students need specific skill-based learning; therefore diploma programmes are the need of the hour. It is immensely significant to establish a connection among the students, trainers, and industry professionals via skill-oriented programmes of education. It is high time that the institutions come up with newer innovation, industry oriented education and quality research.
Students should be prepared enough to face the competition in the job market, by involving themselves in campus placements, soft skill trainings, mock tests, personality development programmes, thereby aiming at time management, problem solving skills, handling market skills and body language, capacity building programmes, event managements, thinking skills, entrepreneurship and career counseling programmes in every field like Journalism, Tourism, Banking, Civil services, Dramatics, etc. to help them build and practice leadership skills and make accurate decisions along the way. Through counseling and guidance, the students are encouraged to professionally develop for a brighter and positive future in the workplace. The students of our state can compete at national and international levels, provided they are given right counseling and assistance by the dedicated people. It is important that students be given counseling vis-à-vis their careers so that they are able to choose those fields of their expertise which go well with their psyche and more importantly, which enable them to enjoy and learn simultaneously, thus transforming themselves into global managers, promoters of multinational corporations and above all good and ethical human beings.
The mantra for a bright future should be to dream big and fight the challenges which come along your way.