Have you ever seen any engineering college giving importance to English language learning.Most of the times you would say no, as English is being treated as another subject to score rather to pass out before entering the main stream subjects in the second year.
Yes I agree that English is not our mother tongue in India.But still it has become the universal sign of communication with respect to everything, though not the world's first widely spoken language.
All the subjects are being taught in English in the college.The students may be from English medium or any regional language medium that is not bothered.What bothers is that any one who becomes as engineer must be able to communicate and interact with the surroundings effectively in English.Iam not at the point that only engineers or any professional degree holders only need to be fluent in English.Any graduate for that matter is applicable.But being a professional degree, engineers have much more expectations in this regard.
Any engineering graduate these days aspires to earn more and get settled soon.So they plan to choose Information Tecnology (IT) most probably as their field of work though not interested much(!!).Knowingly or unknowingly they step into IT and of course they need to be more confident and eloquent with the English language.Not a complex sentence is required, but at least a grammatically right simple sentence which satisfies the other person to understand the needs is more than enough.
So it is evident now that fortunately or unfortunately English has become a vital part in every engineer's life.
I planned to write this matter here as I happened to attend a National seminar on soft skills.It was hosted by a renowned Engineering college in Chennai.I am an engineer and I have also seen and experienced how English is being taught in our college.I like English right from my childhood and so I have a passion for that for that case, any language.So I have been learning and practising English well and I'm confident enough to speak,write and read English effectively.OK now lets not deviate much.(!!)
The seminar had around 40 participants from various Engineering colleges and few Arts colleges across India.I was a participant and had accompanied my well wisher who had to present a paper on soft skills.The program started well and I should say that the hospitality was great from the college side.Few of the participants including the ones from arts colleges and engineering colleges were really great in presenting the paper.I'm not an English graduate or an exponent in English.So I'm not commenting on the content of the paper.But as a lay man and a participant I can comment on the English used by the speakers to present.
I should say that many of the speakers who are lecturers in various top engineering colleges stammered to speak well in front of the public.The audience crowd was not huge to fear people.OK first time presenters can be granted.But then they are lecturers who teach lots and lots of students in their college everyday.They can tell their point in a simple and neat way.
Iam not happy in saying this actually.the basic grammar was also not correct.One of the presenters even used his regional language to communicate while presenting in the National level seminar.Few had just taken the content from the Internet and have not even prepared to present it well.Some of them just went through the PPt and replicated it as such.Due to all these reasons their body drooped with our confidence and hence body language for the presentation was also poor.
The judges were not happy with the presenters of course as mentioned earlier few exceptions were there.
The teacher is unable to communicate well and hence the students too.The same teacher teaches lots of people every day and think about their plight.Those students from regional language mediums suffer as victims and of course English medium students can manage to some extent.These lecturers were arts students and could have emerged as successful students when they were in their college.But When it comes to teaching that too in engineering college's they fail miserably.
There are many reasons behind that.The prime is the lack of importance given to Humanities and Sciences in the engineering colleges compared to main streams.The English professors are not being paid much and are not encouraged to exhibit and enhance their skills.They are not involved in many developmental activities in the college,Since the management doesn't value English and its teachers well ,the students too follow that.
The second thing is that there are numerous engineering colleges every where we turn around.Every college needs English teachers and its not possible that each of them gets efficient,proficient teachers as the number of engineers graduated every year is much much greater compared to the number of English graduates passed every year.I feel that way and not any survey says like that.
Finally due to the above reasons the professors lose interests and just come for the pay they get.
It doesn't happen every where but it happens mostly.So to improve this sorry state ,the management,students ,staffs and parents need to co operate with each other and plan and execute things successfully.
Most of the engineers are rejected in the campus interviews in the Group Discussions(GD) due to poor English speaking skills.Language learning is an art .It needs to be focused and shapened well.Its in the hands of every one associated with that to make it work victoriously.Lets join hands and celebrate English learning.
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