Why most of the engineering graduates form India do not have any application or practical skills?

Question

For example, electrical engineers who have not seen or worked on power generation and distribution,mechanical engineers who do not understand anything about the design and production process and computer engineers who waste 4 years to learn some Java and C programming etc.It is really pathetic that the education system is wasting such young talents.I have met people from Europe,China and Taiwan with 1 or 2 years of vocational training posses the right skills and are most sought after by manufacturers. They don't talk much but they will do an excellent job.

Answer 1

I studied at MSU at Baroda India, so I know that this is very true.

Colleges do not work with Industries and students just want to pass with hi marks so they do not try anything other than books and notes. For example they have to write journal, which is nothing but copy after copy of same thing year after years. Students do not want to go to see real things in the industries or construction site.
They do not go to classes (many many) just copy some ones notes, but pass with distinction. They have no home work.

So Graduates from India have no practicle training and vocational back ground as they get in to job market. They have operated only a bicycle at the most. They can not cut a sheet metal even with two hands.

However they catch up fast once they are in working environment.
They do well in any field and company.

One of my US interviewer asked me what machines I used as a child? I said a bicycle when I was 15. He said he drove a tractor when he was 6 year old. He was surprized that I became a Mech. Engr. He gave me job to design tractor and I did very well.

Indian students have vision if not the practical experience at the on set. India was very rural but now it is becoming more indstrial. What India needs is more mass production Industries, own and foreign, so future graduates will have both vision and the hands on knowledge too.

Answer 2

I agree with you.Most of the teachers are not aware of the state of the art and they have never worked in any plant or industry in their life.They simply vomit the stuff from the books from exam point of view and make even the best subject as a dull and boring one.Above all, they can not understand the difference between a commercially viable product and a lab demo. I am not talking about learning by experience because to get the experience you need the job and to get the job you need the skills.Everyone is not fortunate enough to have someone to help you out.

Answer 3

I think the answer lies partly in the system of education and partly in society and the individuals. Let me explain....

The Indian system of education relies a lot on rote learning. Because of the sheer number of students that we have, teachers prefer students to answer questions directly from text books "verbatim". If you use your own opinions or thoughts chances are that youll not make it through the exam. (There is also a larger problem of us not paying teachers well, which means we have teachers with poor interest / knowledge creating students with lower calibre... and the cycle continues)

Thus we are never taught to be innovative or creative in our work.

But there is a larger problem... that of society and the individual. It is nearly compulsary to get a graduate degree in India. So an individual has to go on from school to college whether he likes to or not. Often students pick up the wrong vocation and land up doing something they are not comfortable with. And they land up being uninterested in their courses and would never want to study around the topic by reading more material except whats necessary.

We create people who are not innovative and creative but can duplicate things fast and efficiently. And the industry shows that. We have lots of outsourcing (routine monotonous jobs) but a few original designs (virtually negligible R&D based industries)

Answer 4

This is an issue with US colleges too. I work for a major computer corporation and have had out of college hires with CIS degrees who can't even perform simply task in Windows properly. Too much theory and not enough vocational instruction in colleges seems to be the issue to me. Fields like computers and engineering need vocational skills, but colleges focus more on theory and teaching people "how to learn".

Answer 5

Simple reason is the poor payment to the teachers so the best of the lot opt for lucrative jobs instead of going into research and teaching.Simple B-Tech passouts teach B-Tech students to earn just enough to meet their basic needs.

Answer 6

Experiences may be different. I had some experience with a french Engineer who came to my company in India to train his counterparts about a product to be manufactured under collaboration arrangement. Rather than making us enlightened, it was he who had to refer to the basics. Any region or country has nothing to do with talent