Kalam asks teachers to pay attention to research

New Delhi, June 19 (UNI) President A P J Abdul Kalam has called upon institutions of higher learning and those teaching in them to place great emphasis on research for turning out high quality products.

''Good teaching emanates from research. The teachers' love for research and their experience in research are vital for the growth of any institution,'' he said addressing the students, faculty members and staff of TKM College of Engineering, Kollam through multi-media conferencing on the occasion of its Golden Jubilee celebrations.

''Experience of research leads to quality teaching and quality teaching imparted to the young in turn enriches research,'' he added.

The President said that in the years to come, India has to graduate from industrial economy to knowledge economy with emphasis on empowerment of the people besides providing basic needs for all-round development.

''The education system has to be creative, interactive, self-learning and informal with focus on values, merit and quality instead of being based on text book teaching,'' he said.

The workers have to be flexibly skilled, knowledgeable and self-empowered instead of being merely categorized as skilled or semi-skilled. The type of work will be less structured and software driven instead of being structured and hardware driven, he said.

Dr Kalam also stressed that management style will be delegative instead of being directive.

''Keeping these characteristics in mind, TKM College of Engineering may like to work towards generation of human resource for meeting the needs of knowledge economy through suitable modification to its teaching methods, the application of technology, enhancing the connectivity among multiple institutions and creating a research orientation,'' he said.

On this occasion, Dr Kalam spelt out the ten missions, he had suggested for the Kerala Government for the holistsic development of the state.

These missions, which included tourism including general, spiritual, health, science, development of smart waterways, development and marketing of Knowledge Products, pharmaceutical products through herbs (molecule to Drug) as well as Ayurveda, deep sea fishing, fish processing, and marketing of sea food products, and establishment of PURAs at the coastal regions to bring prosperity equally to the urban and rural population, could transform the economy of the state, he said.

Underlining that space technology was well established in Kerala, he said it has to be used for connectivity of the state and also for enriching the small scale industries and skill training.

UNI