A verdant green campus draws the eye to the pristine white buildings that stand within. At the T S Srinivasan Centre for Vocational and Advanced Training(CVAT) situated off the Poonamallee stretch, it seems like a quiet afternoon. But a closer look at the well-appointed classrooms reveals little groups of uniformed youngsters hard at work – acquiring the technical skills they have opted to learn. It is business as usual.
“Vocational training is the need of the hour,” says Malini Srinivasan, director of the TVS Educational Society(TVS-ES) the runs the CVAT, “But it will take a long time before our system of education turns to it as an alternative to the `degree’.” Malini’s TVS-ES that runs other schools like the TVS Academies in Hosur and Tumkur and the Sundaram School in Aviyur reflect her commitment to education. The children in the schools that the Society runs, are taught to explore and learn within the context of their immediate environments.
Ask Malini when and where her interest in education began, and she laughs as she relates her growth and journey. “Basically, it was Mr J Krishnamurthy,” she tells you, “I was close to him for about six years… and one day, he asked me, `What do you plan to do?’.” Malini had some answers but none that she was sure about. “Maybe I’ll teach yoga,” she told him, “Or set up a school…”
She did neither then, just went on to do several degrees, among them as Masters in Curriculum and Development from the Stanford University and a Phd in Philosophy that she quit halfway to return and teach at a school for weaver’s children in Benares.
It was a wonderful experience, recalls Malini, waking up before sunrise in an idyllic setting beside a flowing river, to practise yoga under the stars. But it was one that did not last, for she had to return to Chennai – her father had passed away. Some soul-searching years must have passed, for she returned to Stanford for another PhD, this time in sociology.
“On my return,” recalls Malini, “My brother(Venu Srinivasan of TVS Motor) suggested that I join the family business.” That’s when her over-riding desire to do something in the educational field took over. She set forth setting up the schools, nurturing the curriculum around her special interests – philosophy, yoga and the environment. “I wanted the children to explore, enjoy what they do,” she says.
There was some opposition from her illustrious family, especially since she was unmarried too. But “with J Krishnamurthy on my side, I drew tremendous strength from him as long as he was there”. The first ten years, she says, “was a lot of writing and a lot of teacher-training”. For writing, as Malini discovered, was to become one of her other passions.
Malini has also nurtured the Centre for Rural Training, a 10 acre organic farm in Hosur, that serves as an alternative model to modern farming practices that draw heavily on chemical fertilisers and pesticides. “If we offer the farmer a sustainable farming practice that is profitable and eco-sensitive, offer him proper health and proper schooling, there’s no reason for him to leave his land,” says she, commenting on recent trends. She also has plans to set up a school with a unique curriculum in her family village, 80 miles from Madurai.
Skills for Life
The CVAT offers technical training in tune with industry needs. ...
D Geetha’s day begins early. She travels by bus from Koratur where she lives to TVS Electronics in Guindy. After a quick breakfast in the subsidised canteen, she hurries to the shop floor where she is posted for she is to report at 8.15am sharp. “I learn a lot at the shop floor,” says Geetha, “We first learn to observe, then deal with the problems.” The company where Geetha, who is doing her second year in Electronics, Mechanical at the T S Srinivasan Centre for Vocational and Advanced Training, is interned, makes printers, she tells you. “Every day is a learning experience,” says the girl who dreams of ultimately owning her own business in a related industry. Geetha, incidentally, is just 17-years-old.
Geetha is one among the many youngsters who are being trained at the CVAT in Vanagaram, situated off Poonamallee. The Centre offers advance training programmes in three-year-courses in various technical areas like Industrial Electrical – Electronics, Industrial Machine Tool Maintenance and Industrial Machining. The centre also offers training to in-service personnel from industries several options to update skills, with training programmes in Pneumatics, Electro-Pneumatics, Hydraulics and more. There are quite a few industries who approach the CVAT for such updation we learn. For as G Ritter, the German Training and Technology Expert who lends his skills to the CVAT says, “The companies here are more open to take advice and help.”
Geetha comes to the CVAT every Saturday to access the library, learn economics, values and language and practise yoga. “I was very shy during my first year,” she recalls. But interactive sessions and drama classes helped her make friends and bond. For besides the subsidised technical education that it offers, the Centre encourages the students to “develop skills, values and attitudes to meet challenges in their professional and personal domains…”
“It is an all-round training we offer,” says Mallika Srinivasan, director of the TVS – Educational Society, talking of the hands-on learning experience that is offered. In-plant training at the sponsor industries of the TVS group is part of the course curriculum. This is because the technical competencies that the students acquire are based on the in-plant needs of the sponsor industry. CVAT, we learn, also provides career conselling and other services to help the student find suitable employment.
The Centre can be contacted on cvat@vsnl.com
No comments:
Post a Comment