Open universities or distance gaining knowledge of guides are a famous feature of the Indian education machine. Even if they are not the most popular institutions of studying, OUs have helped those students which are overlooked of the mainstream system to advantage employability via distance studying college students, non-traditional path shape and technical mastering.
But that does not alternate the fact that a full-time graduate degree from a university is still what many employers search for in capability employees and like over distance gaining knowledge of path graduates. The concept that open universities and distance studying are not as good as the mainstream colleges is not just perception alone, it's also related to studying outcomes. Whereas a college or university would possibly have a network of colleges that assist college students make extra informed selections, open universities are all approximately ranges.
“The learning outcomes for maximum of the open university publications are low, these college students almost in no way get a task via distinctive feature of on line or distance schooling. A lot of college students had no longer visible cost in those open university stages,” says Shantanu Rooj, founder of edtech startup Schoolguru Eduserve.
What could add this price is the proper task experience alongside mastering, which is what Schoolguru Eduserve is doing with its product WorkX. Envisioned as a two-way channel for students and companies, WorkX lets in distance gaining knowledge of students to pursue an apprenticeship in parallel to their distance mastering or on line course. On the commercial enterprise aspect, the product is referred to as a “human beings supply chain solution” to ease hurdles in more energizing recruitment for groups — freshers are frequently untrained and unskilled regardless of the stages, which WorkX is looking to clear up.
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Rooj recalled how in India, only some years ago, simply being a graduate and having a diploma became true enough, however the state of affairs is changing and employability is a challenge.
“Today 60% of the taxi drivers in Korea are graduates, 31% of the retail checkout clerks within the United States are graduates, or even in India, 15% of the hires in security guards are graduates. So getting a graduation degree these days means not anything, except college students get a terrific return of investment on their money and time,” the Schoolguru founder informed CFT.
For this to happen, universities will need to become more outcome-driven, employability-pushed, and provide real cost to college students. Schoolguru Eduserve targets to help universities get there.
Schoolguru’s Work-While-You-Learn Model
Students enrolled in on-line and distance schooling do no longer want to wait physical classrooms and therefore they've the possibility to take on extra education thru WorkX. By the time the scholars get their tiers from the open college or distance getting to know, they would have also had a yr’s work enjoy in parallel, which might higher put together them for the place of business lifestyles.
The on-activity training thru this apprenticeship presents fingers-on experience to the students as they get to work on stay initiatives with WorkX clients. Working in an workplace environment also facilitates college students to grasp the required gentle talents early on of their careers.
According to Rooj, the apprenticeship version also permits students to earn a monthly stipend of about INR 10K to INR 15K, enabling college students to pursue any better training plans. This holistic method boosts the employability in addition to the skillsets of college students, who might in any other case no longer have the needful soft capabilities to work in companies.
“This student will by no means have problems in terms of having their first task, because they already realize the task. This solves the employers’ issues too, who are involved about the low productivity level of a brisker due to the fact they don’t have work enjoy and do now not know the job,” he brought.
60K Apprentices Across four hundred Companies
Founded with the aid of Rooj in 2012, Schoolguru Eduserve’s WorkX programme brings apprenticeship possibilities with about 350 huge companies and SMEs throughout India such as LG Electronics, Tech Mahindra, Bluestar, and Lupin Limited among others. The startup claims to have grown at a CAGR of more than forty five% and expects to touch INR 45 Cr annual sales in FY 2021. Recruitment massive TeamLease Services owns a majority seventy six% stake in the edtech startup, which makes Schoolguru a subsidiary of the publicly-listed TeamLease.
The TeamLease affiliation clearly opens doors for Schoolguru to paintings with important companies across sectors, given the former’s large presence inside the recruitment marketplace. Schoolguru’s apprentices paintings in banking, manufacturing, ecommerce, BFSI, pharmaceuticals and retail among different sectors — students usually additionally get located in the equal industries.
These part-time jobs encompass profiles including the front workplace managers, assembly line executives, sales officers, branch dating executives for retail or BFSI region, logistics coordinators, in-store buddies, warehouse supervisors, admin executives, and table team of workers, among others.
Schoolguru Eduserve claims to have approximately 400K beginners on the platform and 60K apprentices working with approximately 400 employers. While Schoolguru Eduserve’s partnership with the corporates is unfastened for any enterprise to take, the edtech startup earns a percent of the path expenses, based at the number of offerings provided to the college or distance gaining knowledge of institute.
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Schoolguru Eduserve claims to be operating with forty five Indian universities along with Kurushetra University, Madhya Pradesh (Bhoj) Open University, Subharti University, Aligarh Muslim University, Mizoram University and greater.
Beyond WorkX And Open University Courses
In addition to WorkX, other university-associated services presented via Schoolguru Eduserve consist of on-line assessments, on line studying platform (Lumingo), content material development, on-line assessment platform(Qurio), student helpdesk, alumni control (Optara) and placement help among others.
“Due to Covid-19, universities were non-operational and for this reason the enrollment system of our WorkX application became paused for a while. However, now that the colleges have started accepting enrolments, we're seeing a large call for for WorkX,” stated the founder.
Post-Covid, numerous universities have approached Schoolguru Eduserve to comprise WorkX model for his or her non-distance studying students as properly. For instance, Kurukshetra University in Haryana has tied up with Schoolguru Eduserve to put in force WorkX for all students and the college is even supplying scholarships to students for enrolling with WorkX. Schoolguru Eduserve is also said to have signed an MOU with the Gujarat government to offer WorkX in all public faculties.
