Please create an account to participate in the Slashdot moderation system

 



Forgot your password?
typodupeerror
×
The Almighty Buck Businesses

Indian College Students Face Bleak Prospects 483

The New York Times has a piece on the lackluster prospects facing the great majority of Indian college graduates. Most of the 11 million students in India's 18,000 colleges and universities receive starkly inferior training, according to the article, heavy on obedience and rote memorization and light on useful job skills. From the article: "In the 2001 census, [Indian] college graduates had higher unemployment — 17 percent — than middle or high school graduates... [At a middle-tier college] dozens of students swarmed around a reporter to complain about their education. 'What the market wants and what the school provides are totally different,' a commerce student said.... [A] final-year student who expects next year to make $2 to $4 a day hawking credit cards, was dejected. 'The opportunities we get at this stage are sad,' she said. 'We might as well not have studied.'"
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Indian College Students Face Bleak Prospects

Comments Filter:
  • by Tackhead ( 54550 ) on Tuesday December 05, 2006 @04:05PM (#17117806)
    > But as graduates complain about a lack of jobs, companies across India see a lack of skilled applicants. The contradiction is explained, experts say, by the poor quality of undergraduate education. India's thousands of colleges are swallowing millions of new students every year, only to turn out degree holders whom no one wants to hire.

    Well, Indian companies, if your universities are turning out graduates of sub-par, and you're no longer pleased to being able to bringing products to markets in a timely manner, please to be introducing you a land where you can be outsourcing your business products and services. This land is being called America! And you can be outsourcing your technical business to it!

    (We are apologizing for the quality of the technical support and code we send back. We are knowing that "Howdy Y'all! My name is Jethro! How can ah help y'all with yer blinkinlights?" and "Segmentation pwnage, core dumped, dude" isn't quite what you're used to receiving, but remember... you do get what you pay for.)

  • The Guru (Score:3, Funny)

    by Ice Wewe ( 936718 ) on Tuesday December 05, 2006 @04:13PM (#17117974)
    "Name one indian here that doesn't drive a taxi"

    "That guy on the Simpsons!"

    ... "He is a cartoon!"

  • by bebing ( 624220 ) on Tuesday December 05, 2006 @04:20PM (#17118132)
    You might want to avoid calling them cells though...
  • Re:So... (Score:4, Funny)

    by scheming daemons ( 101928 ) on Tuesday December 05, 2006 @04:28PM (#17118280)
    Is that really different from the US? Most CS graduates can't code their way out of a wet paper bag.

    I know *I* can't. Damn proprietary hardware. Anyone ever seen an API for paper bags, specifically wet ones? Damn hard to find one.

    Now... *plastic* bags, that's another thing. I can code my way out of all kinds of plastic bags. But hey... who can't?

  • I'll never understand why Americans are so bitter about this. I don't have a single colleague who can say they lost their job to offshore outsourcing, or even has any trouble getting a new job for great pay.

    Well, I lost a cushy job to outsourcing... only it wasn't Indians... it was Canadians! Damn their ice hockey, bacon, and Rush!

  • by WickedLogic ( 314155 ) on Tuesday December 05, 2006 @04:34PM (#17118400) Journal
    Wait one minute... you mean we aren't all going to be well paid and rich? This sounds like that dot com thing that I heard about. I'm going to go back to my true plan, selling Amway products. Nutri-lite anyone?
  • by yali ( 209015 ) on Tuesday December 05, 2006 @04:48PM (#17118654)
    What's annoying about the Indians taking the calls is that they pretend to understand when you use words or phrases they don't get, and it quickly becomes apparent as they struggle to troubleshoot a problem they never comprehended in the first place.

    And this is different from American customer service how?

  • by Baldrson ( 78598 ) * on Tuesday December 05, 2006 @04:52PM (#17118720) Homepage Journal
    Most of the 11 million students in India's 18,000 colleges and universities receive starkly inferior training, according to the article, heavy on obedience and rote memorization and light on useful job skills.

    They can get jobs as TA's in American universities where they can require the students to obediently engage in rote memorization. All we need to do is reduce the xenophobia in the US's immigration policies.

  • by crisvtc5 ( 1013299 ) on Tuesday December 05, 2006 @04:58PM (#17118824)
    If I didn't see half my company lose their jobs to India, I'd feel worse for these people.
  • Re:So... (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 05, 2006 @05:03PM (#17118918)
    Didn't make the visa lottery I see.
  • by Peldor ( 639336 ) on Tuesday December 05, 2006 @05:47PM (#17119886)
    You missed a spot.
  • by Sentrion ( 964745 ) on Tuesday December 05, 2006 @06:36PM (#17120736)
    Here's my advice for these students. Save money and get . . .

    DIPLOMAS AWARDED BASED ON LIFE EXPERIENCE - University and College Degrees

    Have all the experience in your profession but no university degree to show for it? Sometimes we consider life experience to be just as good as classroom instruction

    Get your online University Degree based on your life experiences in less than 24 hours!

    • NO STUDYING REQUIRED
    • NO TESTS OR EXAMS
    • 100% VERIFIABLE DEGREES
    • NOBODY IS TURNED DOWN!

    US & CANADIAN RESIDENTS

    INTERNATIONAL RESIDENTS

    These are real, genuine degrees that include Bachelors, Masters and Doctorate degrees. These are verifiable degrees and matching records/transcripts with all pre-requisite courses are also available. This little known secret has been kept quiet for years.

    The opportunity exists due to a legal loophole allowing some established colleges to award degrees at their discretion. With all of the attention that this news has been generating, I wouldn't be surprised to see this loophole closed very soon.

    GET YOUR LIFE EXPERIENCE DEGREE TODAY! - College & University Diplomas based on Life Experiences.

  • by computational super ( 740265 ) on Tuesday December 05, 2006 @06:58PM (#17121088)
    I think the underlying hate comes from the people who have to call tech support at a placed based in India, and then can't understand or communicate with the person on the other end of the line

    I recently had to call a tech support line for a company which I knew outsourced it's call center support to India. The girl on the other end of the line called herself "Irene" and talked like a California Valley Girl (if I hadn't known that the call center was in India, I would have been fooled). It was kind of a turn-on knowing that she was working so hard to fulfill my fantasy that I was talking to an American girl. It made me wonder if I could convince her to wear a cheerleader outfit or a french maid uniform or something.

  • by Warg! The Orcs!! ( 957405 ) on Tuesday December 05, 2006 @07:16PM (#17121318)
    I think you're calling the wrong sort of "support" line...
  • by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 05, 2006 @07:47PM (#17121718)
    They hated it, got a poor grade, but came out better programmers.


    isnt this basically all of georgia tech in a nut shell?

"A car is just a big purse on wheels." -- Johanna Reynolds

Working...