Committee Reports: Skill Development 2020-2021
Director-in-charge: Rtn. Meera Alreja
Chair: Rtn. S V Prasad
Co-Chair: Rtn. Swati Mayekar
Members: Rtn. Ashok Jatia, Rtn. Bipin Vazirani, Rtn. Homi Katgara, Rtn. Ptn. Jaya Prasad
The Skill Development Committee’s goal is to assist youngsters from humble backgrounds in career planning. It embarked upon two initiatives namely: Aptitude Test and A Robust Database on the Cloud.
Aptitude Test : The Bhavishya Yaan (BY) 10th Standard children’s aptitude, interest and personality was tested, followed by individual career counselling sessions; all online, due to the Covid challenges, with children given the option to take the three modules together or one module at a time, in English or Hindi.
Database on the Cloud : A robust database has been required by all – BY Mentors, Scholarship and BY Committees, and Donors, especially from a CSR requirement.
The Database has to be easily accessible, fulfil the needs, with the data accurate and at the same time, flexible and amenable to being sliced and diced as per the various requirements.
What was first needed was an exhaustive Datasheet. We came up with one late in 2019, incorporating students’ personal details: gender, date of birth, AADHAAR number, address etc., parents’ and siblings’ information, income and the scholastic record. A Software Vendor was identified to develop the Database. Covid then hit the world and the Project could not be taken up.
The Vendor identified earlier expressed his inability to develop the database as his staff left due to Covid. In 2020-21, we had a number of Zoom sessions with a new developer, fine tuning the database format, providing for all possible scenarios, subject, course options etc.
We then firmed up an experienced Professional with the necessary soft skills, fluent in Marathi, English and Hindi to contact the children (300 plus in number), collect & enter the data. Many calls were made with every child and the parents, the bonafides explained, and the benefit to them etc.
The Database is now ready with separate tabs namely: School Master, Student Master, academic record of all Students from 8th Standard, Reports, Employment History.
A few sample Reports, downloadable & printable have been put together –
Scholarship Form, Names, Family Income, Academic Performance of children – Boys, Girls, All, Total number of Students – School-wise, Standard-wise, Gender-wise.
Many more reports may be carved out of the Database as per the requirements of various constituents.