Kohima, July 26 (MExN): The All Nagaland College Students’ Union (ANCSU) conducted a webinar under the theme ‘Boulevard-1’ on July 24. Various speakers were invited to speak on various topics and issues for the benefit of the students’ community and Naga youths, ANCSU stated in a press release.
Advisor for Technical Education and Elections, Medo Yhokha talking on ‘Polytechnic institutes available in Nagaland, courses offered and for deal of these courses’, informed that Nagaland has ‘nine polytechnic institutes which will be functional by this year.’ “We have six functioning polytechnic institutes so far till 2021 and from next academic session, we’ll be starting three new colleges.”
Highlighting on the various diploma courses in Nagaland and the minimum eligibility, Yhokha said that the technical courses offered in Nagaland have been chosen based on the local needs, markets and job availability in Nagaland.
“Nagaland being a developing state in terms of infrastructure like roads, building construction, development of smart cities, transformation of rural areas into towns and urban areas etc we need civil and architecture engineers for effective planning. These developmental activities will take place in many years to come and even after completion of these developments will continue. Therefore, there is an abundant recruitment for skill workers and skilled planners as a compulsory subject,” he stated.
“The main aim of the polytechnic education is to impart a desired practical and qualities of education with accountability at an affordable cost for all those aspiring to take up diploma studies. The polytechnic has been ideally set up in all the districts of Nagaland and provided with the best facilities to provide quality technical education,” he asserted.
Talking on ‘Redefining Youth Life’, Lithrongla T Rutsa said, “To redefine youth life, it is to give a new meaning to the life of a youth or to reimagine or define differently what youth is all about.”
She addressed some of the problems and challenges that the youth/students are facing. Rutsa lamented that youth today is mired by the growing child abuses and escalating criminalization, drug and alcohol abuse and escalating criminalization, which some few decades back was unheard of or unimaginable or unexpected. Multi-media and social media are playing a very vital role and these multi-media technologies are changing the very nature of our education. It is also changing the quality of our everyday life, she said.
Issues related to body image, family problem and domestic conflict, pressure of materialism are also very big challenges facing the youth today. “The other issue is laziness. We cannot come out of our comfort zones and our youths have become dependent on the machineries, on other resource,” she highlighted.
“Dreaming is the beginning of achieving something. Practically speaking, when we look at government establishments it is not the most welcoming situation that we normally get and as officers/public we expect good officers sitting on the other side welcoming us and in getting our work done,” maintained Kesonyu Yhome, IAS.
He spoke on the characteristic critical for an officer to be efficient such as initiative, respect of knowledge and laws, having a good communication skills, common sense, civility, humility and thirst for new knowledge.
Participating in the talk, Alemtemshi Jamir spoke on ‘Yellow chain: easier to buy, easier to sell and easier to earn.’
“Yellow chain intent to link the buyer and seller on the same level; though it shares a big similarity with ecommerce platform like Amazon, it differs in the opportunity for local people in buying and selling local products. Though those multinational companies are moving in that direction, I feet local venture like yellow chain can do this things faster and efficiently,” Jamir observed.
“So putting all this things together, yellow chain is an important opportunity for our Naga men and women in modernizing our way of doing our job/business,” he concluded.
“Nagaland has the highest unemployment rate in NE and the highest second highest in the entire country. What is causing massive unemployment? The answer lies in the way, the formal education has evolved in our state,” Sentilong Ozukum said.
According to Ozukum, the first school was started in Naga Hills in the year 1878. By the time, when Nagaland state was formed, formal education was in full swing in the hills. The first pattern of misconception was the thought that through formal education, we will evolve ourselves into a Utopian society where we don’t have to work hard. The irony is farmers, drivers, are living far more comfortable lives than thousands of educated Nagas. The second misconception was, after the creation of the state; employment opportunity was easily available.
“Our generation was forced to follow this model by our parents. Therefore, we have degrees but not skills,” he lamented. “The future of education lies in moving to 4C’s- Collaboration, Creativity, Communication and Critical thinking,” he suggested.
Presenting a talk on ‘Mushroom cultivation: Avenues and Benefits’, Dr Sosang Longkumer propagated commercial mushroom in Nagaland. “You will be surprised to know that the mushroom consumption in Dimapur is 500-700 kg/day. It is sold at a rate of Rs200/kg so that brings a turnover of Rs 300 crores to the cultivators and suppliers,” he informed.
He said that there is demand since Nagas (99%) consume mushrooms. It has lots of health benefits but the production ratio in comparison to consumption is 5%. On the market scenario in Nagaland, Dr Longkumer said, “demand for mushroom is very high in Nagaland. We are buying huge quantity of mushroom from Assam to meet our market demand.”
Meanwhile, ANCSU has informed that ‘Boulevard-2’ will be organized on the topics such as music, sports, entrepreneurship, legal rights of women and vision & prospect of higher education in Nagaland on July 31, 6:00 pm-8:00 pm.
Room link and information would be circulated in various social media platform and for more details, one may email to the office email at ancsunag@gmail.com
