Mumbai: Civic schools offering skill development training to be renamed

“These are not regular trades like welding but other relevant courses, such as Artificial Intelligence, coding, robotics, tourism and hospitality, among others. Students will be able to pursue the courses of their choice along with the regular school curriculum… with these additional skills it will be easier for them to get jobs later in life,” said BMC (Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation) commissioner Iqbal Singh Chahal.

Select secondary schools will offer courses in electronics, hotel management, apparel, fashion designing, food service, health and hygiene, automobile, and tourism and hospitality from the beginning of the next academic year in June 2023. A budgetary allocation of Rs 28.45 crore has been made for the same. An MOU agreement has been signed among the state Skills, Employment, Entrepreneurship and Innovation Department, the Maharashtra State Skill Development Society (MSSDS), the BMC, and the state Department of School Education.

Adding that Chief Minister Eknath Shinde has asked the civic body to impart vocational education in secondary schools, Chahal said: “Maharashtra Skill Development and Entrepreneurship Minister Mangal Prabhat Lodha took a stock of our schools and observed that students are forced to drop out as they do not get any vocational training.”