The State government is determined to raise the standards of education in schools and colleges through various measures, said T.S. Sridhar, Additional Chief Secretary to the State government, Higher Education Department, on Saturday.
Innovative measures spelt out in the Vision 2023 document released by the State government recently includes creation of knowledge hub with a lofty aim to propel Tamil Nadu to the forefront, Mr. Sridhar said distributing medals and certificates to students who excelled at the State and school-levels under the SUITS (School – University-Industry –Tie-up Scheme) programme here.
Observing that the standard of education could be raised by adopting new methods and approaches, Mr. Sridhar said measures such as setting up language laboratories, curriculum development and infrastructure improvements were being taken towards improving the quality of education to benefit students and increase their employability skills.
Computer orientation and communication skills had become essential in the present environment where several jobs were linked to soft skills.
Terming the State government's scheme of providing laptops free of cost to school, college and polytechnic students as ‘revolutionary', Mr. Sridhar said this scheme was now being emulated in Uttar Pradesh.
The government was taking efforts to increase the gross enrolment ratio to 25 per cent by 2023 – 2025 by implementing new schemes, he said.
The SUITS programme of the Bharathidasan University was an innovative concept as it enriched IT knowledge in a practical way to the school students, he said advising other Universities to follow suit.
Vice Chancellor K. Meena said the objectives of the SUITS programme were to create a strong foundation for school students to become IT professionals and enrich their IT knowledge in a practical manner.
Ms. Meena said as many as 27,160 school students were enrolled in the computer courses offered under the SUITS programme during 2011-12. Registrar T. Ramaswamy and Director, Institute for Entrepreneurship and Career Development K. Parthasarathy spoke.
Earlier, Mr. Sridhar opened the Research Consortium of Computer Science, a research wing of the Bharathidasan University Technology Park, on the university's Khajamalai campus here.
