‘University certification for school students? Impossible’, would have been the retort some time back, though not any more.
Bharathidasan University in collaboration with International Institute for Career Development, Tiruchi and Coimbatore-based publishing house Hi-End Software Integrated has launched SUITS (School + University + Industry + Tie-up + Scheme), to impart IT education at the school level and award university certification on successful completion of all the examinations.
The university has observed imparting information technology in middle school level itself would empower and instil confidence in young minds, more so, when accompanied by a university certification on successful completion.
A cross-section of the students that this correspondent met said that they were proud to learn programming languages such as Visual Basic, C, C++, Java etc, even before they stepped into higher secondary school level.
The programme is exclusively designed for the middle, high and secondary school students.
Besides the student, the school which ties up for implementing SUITS programme has an opportunity to get its teachers updated with the latest trend in IT education and adopt different educational technologies in handling the subjects.
The programme was launched three years back in 2009.
Mr S. Kathiravan, Founder-Director of Hi-End Software Integrated says that there has been a steady increase in the enrolment for SUITS. “These enrolments are from class V-IX,” he said.
Hi-End imparts training and organises workshops and guest lectures for teachers, apart from offering guidance and counselling for students