A number of engineering students are left without job even after attaining a decent percentage, while telling us how this problem can be solved, city lad Rohit Kandakatla says, “Students who are pursuing engineering must realise that they are becoming engineering to solve problems and improve lifestyle of people.
This will help them do better and ultimately bag a good job. Once this thought is inculcated among the students, they would make an effort to know the challenges they have to address and strive to perfect their skills,” he says.
Rohit was recently elected as vice-president of International Federation for Engineering Education Societies (IFEES) at World Engineering Education Forum held in Italy. Ask him what are his goals as a vice-president he says, “I will aim at making more and more students take up engineering not only for studies, but also as career. I will also make them indulge in engineering education research. This will benefit the student community in India and also across the globe.”
After the recent elections, Rohit has become the first Indian and youngest vice president of IFEES.
So what helped the 23-year-old bag the post?
“My work with Student Platform for Engineering Education for Development (SPEED) helped me. I got to interact with a lot people across the globe, especially the IFEES members. This helped me gain their trust and win their vote,” he says.
Foreseeing his journey as a vice-president he says, “My journey will be challenging as I have to work closely with many colleagues from different part of the world. But the fact that this is my passion, I am extremely excited for it. I believe in a student driven change across the globe, as this will definitely contribute towards a better engineering education in the coming years.”
Rohit was also the first Indian to become International President of SPEED. He has received IGIP-SPEED young scientist award at 43th International conference on Engineering Pedagougy in Dubai by International Society for Engineering Education.
Recalling his other achievements Rohit, who completed his Masters in Embedded Systems from Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University says, “I was able to start more than 100 students-initiatives which will create an impact in universities in the next three years.
It was Rohit’s childhood dream to become an engineer. “I had opted for electronic and communication engineering at Manipal Institute of Technology in 2009.
Although I was extremely happy with the opportunities given to me in my college, I realised that there is a huge gap in what we learn and what we are expected to do after graduation. After I joined SPEED, I realised this is a common problem in most of the colleges across India.”
Rohit also counsels aspiring engineers through his website Footsteps. He encourages them to work to bring a change in engineering education to be able to benefit from it.