Dr. A. Srinath is the Dean of Skill Development And Student Progression at KL University. He is also a Professor in Mechanical Engineering at KLEF and has a PhD in Robotic Mechanisms from REC Raipur. Having completed his bachelor’s degree from Acharya Nagarjuna University-Guntur in 2001, he pursued his M.E. in Machine Design from Rajiv Gandhi Technological University-Bhopal in 2003.

Dr. Srinath’s awards and Accomplishments include the UGC Research Award for the period 2012-14, and the 45th Young Engineer Award from the Institution of Engineers, India, Vijayawada Chapter for guiding eight Research Scholars to accomplish their PhD goals in 2012. He also received the NK Iyengar Memorial Gold Medal from the Institution of Engineers India in 2006, and the Bharat Seva Ratna Award from GEPRA-New Delhi in 2015.

KL University

Can you share your 15+ experience with KL University and what do feel is special at KLU compared to other universities?

It has been a wonderful experience for me at KL University from February 2008 to date. I have served at almost all levels, starting from an Associate Professor to Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering and then as Head of Department for Mechanical Engineering for five years. Thereafter, I have served as the Principal of the Academic Staff College and then as the Dean of Skill Development and Students Progression since November 2021.

In KL University, the special feature is the autonomy given to each faculty in designing their own curriculum, teaching-learning patterns, and evaluation patterns for their respective courses. Another of our unique features is our skill development. First, we empower the faculty by upskilling them in the latest, respective specialization-cohort-based industries/companies, and then, through such trained and certified faculty, we impart skill development training to the students. Doing so not only ensures our students are skilled in industry-required skill sets but also increases the faculty's knowledge and hands-on skill development, which also helps the faculty improve the nature and quality of the research they are doing.

What is the main emphasis of the Skill Development center at KLU and how does it benefit the students?

The main objective of skill development at KL University is to provide the industries who are the end users of our university products, with fully equipped, job and market-ready young professionals who are completely ready to start working in the assigned jobs and roles right from day one. There is no need for employers to train them and spend substantial time and money on imbibing specific skill sets. In a nutshell, my students are fully industry and job-ready right from the later part of the pre-final year, wherein they can contribute in a similar manner as experienced professionals starting from day one of their tenure as an intern or emlployee.

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What steps do you take to assess and match students' skills, interests, and career goals and provide them the appropriate training modules?

At KL University, we have a customised approach to identifying the career goals of our students, and we start this process immediately after the commencement of the very first semester of classwork. It progresses sequentially until the end of the sophomore year, as until this time students do have a superficial overview of their domains and respective fields of careers but after this stage, they get a more comprehensive knowledge of their domain. To enable students to gain comprehensive knowledge, we also conduct several career counselling sessions in the freshman and sophomore years for every discipline. Once the career choices are fixed, we start tailor-made training, and skill development programs for each category of students in their chosen career track, in a sequential manner, which is held in three phases, and each phase is progressive over its former phase and contains technology driven skill development, soft skills communication skills-based training, and competitive exams based training.

Can you share with us some initiatives you have implemented in KLU in terms of developing the skills of the students?

We have spent more than a year having a detailed discussion with each industry and company relevant to every department that offers UG and PG Programs at our university. Through such discussions, we made our curriculum aligned with industry standards and needs, and our faculty was trained in the revised curriculum directly by such industries experts. They also learned the delivery methodology from the relevant industry experts. Thereafter, we divided our courses, curriculum, and faculty into industry skill-based cohorts, numbering over 32. Our students have also been grouped into these skill cohorts based on their chosen specialisations. We have established 32 skill academies or centers in each of the cohorts where we train, skill, and make our students attain global certifications from the respective industries directly without any involvement of third-party agencies. In the 2022-23 academic year, over 15000 students have obtained global certifications from their respective cohorts, like AWS, Google, Microsoft In Cloud Computing/ Architecture, and SAP In Finance.

As KLU has a huge student strength, How do you ensure that the skill development programs are reached to all students from various course appropriately?

We have cohorts of faculty, students, and respective skill academies and centers for each cohort. We make our faculty get the skilling and certifications first from respective skill academies/center-based industries and thereby they train and make the students skilled by appearing for global certifications in respective skill academies and center-based industries. Therefore, it’s a decentralised process and we have not felt any difficulty in delivering and monitoring this process at any moment in time.

What is your vision as a Dean (Skill Development & Student Progression) for the upcoming years?

In the upcoming years, as a Dean of Skill Development, I am aiming to turn the placements and hiring process on campus towards skill-based and certification-based hiring rather than branch or program-based hiring. This will certainly pave the way for better pay packages and also give the hiring industries a talented pool of trained and certified young professionals, for whom the industry doesn’t need to spend even a single minute of time and money to train them further. Additionally, right from day one, they can engage them in the assigned job roles.