Indian engineering education - make internships compulsory 5

[Ingenuity]

Same with my alma mater, University of Waterloo- engineering there has been 100% co-op since its inception, no exceptions.

Ditto for my alma mater too. NSWIT/UTS (in Sydney, Australia) was (and still is) a co-op university by "sandwich" or "partime". "Sandwich" was 6 months work/6 months study, repeat for 6 years. Always paid 'co-op' work programs.

My younger brother is a structural engineer too, and graduated from the same uni as I, and attended U of Waterloo for 1 year as an exchange student - the co-op program at Waterloo is very good. I worked in Toronto for a few years in a consulting office and the U of W grads were excellent - very practical thinkers.

 

[SwinnyGG]

I'll keep this response short, because the territory has been covered.. but as a Kettering grad, the co-op experience was invaluable. An engineering degree with zero exposure to actual practice teaches you very little about what an actual engineer does day-to-day.

How free internships will affect Indian students is out of my realm... but in my experience, every H1B I've ever worked closely with has struggled MIGHTILY with the difference between the way you solve the example problems in the back of an engineering text, and the way you solve actual problems in the real world where budgets and timing and serviceability and simplicity and consistency and standards are important. Seems to me it will do some good for their median level of real-world engineering competency.

 

[rb1957]

If graduates aren't finding employment (in India) ... where will meaningful co-op placements come from ?

another day in paradise, or is paradise one day closer ?

 

[3DDave]

Maybe this is very good news. By decreasing the number of graduates, the number of resumes that get thrown out will be much smaller.

 

[solid7]

Internships should be required for all engineers, everywhere. At least 60% of the engineers that I've worked with, couldn't design something produceable if their lives depended on it. The best engineers that I've ever worked with, come from humble beginnings, and have a trade on their side. The worst engineers that I have ever worked with, tend to come straight out of Academia, and more often than not, never see a manufacturing operation - and certainly haven't had their hands dirty. Many of the latter belong in strictly research positions.

Education should be a means to build upon a talent or passion, not just open a door, or raise one's net potential. However, more often than not, it's just that. Meanwhile, talented individuals get displaced by "educated" ones.

I'd like to see more internships, with the idea of "discovering" engineers.