C-DAC, Hyderabad launched the PREPARE FUTURE programme at JNTU-UGC Academic Staff College Auditorium to provide research and development experience to the faculties of various engineering colleges as there is a dearth of trained faculty in IT colleges.

“The ability and employability of young graduates needs to be improved if India is to sustain its global image as a resource pool of Information Technology (IT) intellectuals,” said Secretary, Department of Information Technology (DIT), Government of India, Jainder Singh.

Launching the ‘PREPARE FUTURE’ programme of Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC), Hyderabad at Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University (JNTU) -University Grants Commission (UGC) Academic Staff College Auditorium on May 12 (Monday), Singh indicated that the Faculty Updating Programme of C-DAC, Hyderabad provides a unique opportunity for the faculty of various engineering colleges to have exposure to the rich research and development (Rand D) experience of C-DAC. He also encouraged the faculty to explore the use of e-Learning as a teaching tool.

Limited availability of trained faculty is a problem faced by the engineering colleges today. Training the faculty according to the emerging trends in IT is a challenging task. Highlighting these challenges, JNTU Rector, Dr BS Jinaga, assured the support of JNT University for the Faculty Updation Programme of C-DAC, Hyderabad.
Congratulating C-DAC for addressing the most important issue of the IT industry today, J A Chowdhary, managing director, NVIDIA suggested the setting up of centres of excellence in academic institutions. This, he said would provide the interaction between the academia and the industry so as to give the practical orientation to the graduates.

S P Dixit, director, C-DAC, Pune highlighted the expertise of C-DAC, Hyderabad and shared that C-DAC was happy to share its research and development experience for the benefit of the engineering faculty.

Earlier, delivering the theme address, Dr NSarat Chandra Babau, director, C-DAC, Hyderabad explained that the primary objective of the ‘PREPARE FUTRUE’ programme is to update and enhance the skills of engineering faculties in advanced domains of Information Technology keeping pace with the IT industry. This in-turn will help the faculty to develop and design courses for their students, specifically in terms of skill-sets, industry oriented projects, effective utilisation of open source technologies and integration of e-Learning to their class room teaching (blended learning) etc.

The course duration is for four weeks full time in three different streams. The mode of training would be through class room lectures, extensive hands-on and also exposure to e-Learning through on-line course. Babau said that about 70 faculty members from 10 states across the country have registered for the first batch of training in three streams of Embedded Systems, Applications Software and System Software.(EOM)