Technology, tools and applications

Post date: Sep 3, 2010 4:45:26 AM

It has been more than a month since I have started teaching. Last few weeks I was busy in forming some Research, Project and activity groups to give students an opportunity to get to know about the field. I must say the response was really overwhelming. After forming groups, I started to meet them on group basis. In the beginning. as most of them were new to the field, I told them to bring in new ideas, learn about technology etc. It was really surprising for me that most of them were confused about the technology and tools.

In my sessions with them, the most common thing that I observed that they are worried about tools more then technology. Most common questions were Should we go for MATLAB? Should we stick to C? How about using Java for Image Processing? These were the students those have no background in hardware, image processing.

I believe that engineering students at undergrad level should be prepared as technocrats rather than application developer, and a very clear distinction should be made right in beginning of their studies that tools, languages are just an aid to implement the technology. Once you know the technology, tools are not more than syntax and semantics, all they have to learn is how use certain language or tool to implement an idea.

Looking at the common response in my university, I believe that most of the Indian students are not aware of it. Now with increased competition, it is imperative now that there should be a proper orientation given to students about these common details of engineering so that during the course of study students should focus on technology more the use tools properly as an aid not as the prime focus.