Hidden Truth of Engineering Studies That Parents Fail To Understand

Dear Amma & Appa,

               I am sorry for hiding this truth from you , I can no longer hide it and bear the heaviness in my heart. I have 25 arrears which is more than my age, and every time when I see you struggling to pay my fee and keep me going with all that you have, makes me feel even more guilty. You thought I too can succeed by my past record of excellence in my school, Ma here it is different, they teach us to learn and tell us to do which I really don’t understand. I feel I am worthless. I would leave you realising that I have failed and I have failed to be what you wanted me to be.

——Your loving son.

This is the pathetic reality that is happening all over Tamil Nadu, there are nearly around 600 engineering colleges who admit students with 60% of marks, some even less than that, by the influence of money and also from Tamil medium, without any language pre –requisite. Education is a peer pressure among parents. The term “Engineering” is a word of shame among this generation, because everyone around them is an engineer. Here in tamilnadu in each house we have an engineering student. It is one of the biggest industries where the production is higher every year. Large class of students are graduating every year with good percentage without much learned, and then curse them for not getting a job.

The first myth that every parents should get over is “Engineering is not just a general studies where, all can learn in a class room taught by a faculty and it’s not just studying some theory and getting marks”. You must know what your child is capable-off, and know the basic knowledge before enrolling into a course. Stop bothering more on the brand name and start worrying about your child’s brain size. If you are planning to put your son into swimming class, you have a basic idea that your son need his swimming suit and all accessories to learn them, and in the same way if you are enrolling him into an Engineering college you must know, that he will need a computer much more than a smart phone to learn new technology. No matter which department they belong to he/she needs one, if you cannot afford remember you are covering his eyesight and sending him to college.

Based on my recent survey, nearly 90% of the students have chosen engineering and their corresponding branches from the advice of someone who has not studied engineering and they even don’t know what is engineering studies is all about. Most often the panel of advisors emerge to be none other than their school head master, teachers, co-workers, engineering college marketers who get money by the student’s admission.

The funniest part is some of the students have chosen their department which spells to be fashionable like B.Tech, and not B.E. They don’t know the difference of Electronics and Communication department and Electrical and Electronics department. All they know is Engineering College is full of fun and enjoyment. They enter a college as blank paper and leave the college with a paper (a degree) which is blank.

After reading this, if you all come to the conclusion that no one should take engineering studies, will be like avoiding the path since you don’t know the best method of travelling by yourself. Let us stop here and think for a second, where is the mistake happening?

1. Is being ignorant charged with a huge sum of money in the name of education?
2. Who is to be blamed?
3. Who is going to be the eye opener?

Let’s blame the government; No way! They are still busy approving other engineering colleges.

How to get rid of this mania and this contagious disease? “IIT is not possible for my son/daughter, he is not of that standard but still I want him to be an engineer”, yes you can but how?

Stop pushing your children first, and tell them it does not matter in which college they are studying. Bring out the self learning skills, preparing and choosing capability of the students. If they have chosen computer science tell them to work on what other college students are doing in that department. Tell them to check their dream colleges which they failed to get through. Advise them not only to adopt the fashion sense but also, to learn what other college students do in academic. Be prepared in basics before entering everyday’s class, studying a head is not a crime. Make use of free open source learning, which is designed for the true purpose of serving them. If he/she fails in an exam, it’s due to the following reasons,

1. They fail to understand, because he/she is eventually from a background of school feeding and expects the same from college, but he fails to understand that engineering is One’s self learning skill. A staff cannot make you understand, it is your way of understanding concept by using your next best friend “GOOGLE”.
2. If they have missed the class, tell them to learn from free open courseware designed by MIT, IIT’s NPTEL and several online resource. They don’t need a group study or tuition anymore.
3. Tell them to try practically by doing things out of what they have learned by using DIY (DO –IT – YOURSELF) website such as instructables, eHow, etc., Make them to do rather than studying.

Share this to your children,

In college “they will teach what to learn, and they fail to teach how to learn”.

These are the secrets that are hidden by successful students.

Way to keep you on track.

1. Identify an inspiring person
2. Create your profile
3. Sketch your childhood dreams
4. Google efficiently
5. Adopt self-learning skills
6. Form a network
7. Make use of holidays
8. Save earned money
9. Get certified professionally

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