The Hindu in School and CL Educate organised the Knowledge Conclave 2017 at The Park hotel here on Thursday.
The theme for this year’s conclave was “Higher Education and New Age Learning Pedagogy’. A number of academicians, corporate professionals and principals of prominent schools in Delhi and the National Capital Region spoke at the event.
Change in technology
Satya Narayan R., the founder of CL Educate, said, “It is important that children are taught the meta skill of learning. Research shows that 6 of 10 jobs in 2025 are not yet known. With time there will be a change in technology and it is important that students learn the skill of adapting to it.”
The first panel discussion had Jyoti Gupta, the principal of Delhi Public School Ghaziabad; Vijay Datta, the principal of Modern School Barakhamba Road; Anuj Bhasin, the Trade Commissioner, Education, Government of Canada; and Poonam Devdutt, the director, School of Business Studies, Shobhit University Meerut; as panellists.
The discussion on “Institutions and Schools: Area for Collaboration” saw the panellists emphasise the importance of linkage between schools and universities.
“Institutions of higher education and schools need to be connected to develop skills which will make them employable. The point of good education is to have a good life. I have my doubts whether we are producing happy children despite concentrating on improving efficiency,” said Dr. Devdutt.
Emphasising the importance of vocational courses, Dr. Datta said, “As educators, we need to develop respect for labour work. A shoemaker who is doing his job well is as important to the nation’s strength as the Prime Minister. It is important that we recognise this fact.”
“In foreign countries, equal importance is given to vocational courses as well as academic courses. The Central Board of Secondary Education [CBSE] and Delhi University [DU] should sit together and charter a course that will help students. It is important to have an upward linkage,” said Ms. Gupta. The keynote address on “New age technologies for education” was delivered by Ritu Gupta, director, marketing, consumer and small business, Dell India.
