Bhubaneswar: Aiming at improving academic quality in higher education institutions, artificial intelligence (AI) skills, entrepreneurship and employability, the higher education department on Saturday rolled out a series of initiatives with skill development programmes set to cover more than 1.25 lakh students.Higher education minister Suryabanshi Suraj launched an ‘AI Course for All’ programme in collaboration with Nasscom, while the state signed MoUs with CSRBOX, Nandi Foundation, and Odisha Knowledge Corporation Limited (OKCL) for similar courses.Under the MoU with the IBM-CSRBOX, more than 1.25 lakh students from arts, science and commerce streams will be covered under a skill development programme. They will receive training in areas such as AI, digital literacy, enterprise design thinking and project management through online courses, workshops and project-based learning.The programme will have a special focus on students from 107 higher education institutions in remote and aspirational districts. It will also include efforts to build the AI capabilities of faculty members, officials said.Expanding the focus on AI, the initiative will make online courses in the subject available to students and faculty members of higher education institutions across the state. The programme aims to equip more than one lakh students with skills suited to a fast-changing technology and employment landscape, Suraj said.The department is also looking to strengthen the entrepreneurship ecosystem on campuses. In collaboration with the Entrepreneurship Development Institute of India (EDII), Ahmedabad, it will conduct a faculty mentor development programme, under which 40 faculty members from Odisha will undergo six days of training at the institution. It will cover entrepreneurship, training capabilities, mentoring, enterprise development tools and institutional ecosystems. The initiative is expected to help faculty members better mentor aspiring entrepreneurs, and strengthen startup and entrepreneurship activities in higher educational institutions, the minister said.These apart, the department and Odisha State Higher Education Council on Saturday launched a system to assess the academic performance of higher educational institutions and teachers.Under the new framework, institutions will be assessed through 52 key performance indicators (KPIs) grouped under four broad pillars — student, faculty, infrastructure and activities. Suraj said the exercise would provide a structured mechanism to assess the academic performance of higher educational institutions across the state.A question bank portal, aligned with the National Education Policy 2020, was also launched. The portal will adopt a two-tier mechanism to improve the quality of question papers and facilitate their preparation in line with the standards of the National Credit Framework.
