Dr. Arti Kashyap
Why IIT Mandi is ideal for girl students? Over the years it has been noticed that the number of girls opting for professional and technical education is on the rise, which has been most significant for India's march towards attaining the status of a holistically developed nation. The fruition of such interest have already started coming in with a girl candidate being the national topper in IIT advanced exam. In this awakening and also the pursuit of the Nation, IIT Mandi also takes pride in having some special offerings for the potential admission seeking girl candidates in addition to its unique location with very pristine and safe social surrounding along with the standards of education of IIT system. Mandi is a small town in the hills of Himalyas with a rich, peaceful, yet vibrant culture with mostly God fearing religious social set up. It is an ideal town and a safe home away from home. Additionally, IIT Mandi's unique curriculum with emphasis on hands on activities, project based learning and opportunities to do socially relevant technical courses/projects providing a platform for the girl students to outshine others by using their technical skills along with their natural skills of having sensitivity towards societal problems. As part of the curriculum, students do a course on reverse engineering in their first year itself, followed by design practicum in second year where teams of interdisciplinary nature come up with a product for solving some of the problem. In their third year they do interdisciplinary socio technical practicum where the students interact with various sections of the society, be it District Administration, NGOs, Hospitals, Schools, Colleges, Local people etc. to understand what are the various problems which can be solved with the help of available technology. This is an enriching experience and sensitize students towards the needs of society. IIT Mandi partner with the global studies program of WPI, Massachusetts, USA and host WPI students who participate in our third year socio technical practicum. In the fourth year of their B. Tech., students do a complete highly technical or research based B.Tech. project. IIT Mandi had its first placement session and being Faculty Advisor for the placements, I observed that the girls were the first one to get the job offers as well as higher study offers. We had about 85% overall placement with highest package being offered as 18 Lakhs pa, the placement for the girls is 100%. In fact, from the next batch also the girls have fetched internship in good companies. I believe that IIT Mandi is an ideal place for girl students to prosper in the field of their interest and look forward to see good number of girls in the upcoming batch.
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Asso. Prof., SCEE and SBS, IIT Mandi