Traditional degrees and high marks will no longer help students who should be trained to generate knowledge in the changed world, Speaker P. Sreeramakrishnan has said.
He was here on Wednesday to open an Atal Tinkering Lab, a project of NITI Ayog to inculcate scientific temper, innovation and creativity among schoolchildren, at the Government Vocational Higher Secondary School for Girls, Nadakkavu. Lab facilities, at a cost of ₹12 lakh, have been set up at the school as part of the project. Mr. Sreeramakrishnan also launched some of the development projects conceived by the Kozhikode Corporation at the school.
He said that education had changed from being just a process to gather information to one creating knowledge. Students should be taught how to use the information they gathered from various sources. “We should also examine how that knowledge can be used for the benefit of the larger society,” he said.
“When the proposal to build a rail line through the Konkan route was mooted, many learned engineers examined the area and said it was not feasible because of the rocky terrain. It was left to E. Sreedharan, another engineer, who adopted a multi-disciplinary approach to make the proposal a success. There lies the difference in approach to engineering knowledge,” Mr. Sreeramakrishnan said. The students should also be trained to handle disruptive technology, which was changing the lives of the people around the world, he said.
A. Pradeep Kumar, MLA, who conceptualised “Promoting Regional Schools to International Standards through Multiple Interventions” or PRISM project to improve the infrastructure at the school, said the new facilities would go a long way in improving the academic standards of the students.
