Despite the high demand for professionals and the increasing number of students completing higher secondary level education, the number of scholarships offered for professional studies after class XII have remained more or less the same.

This year the Department of Adult and Higher Education (DAHE) announced 125 scholarships for undergraduate professional courses, including 11 Youth Development Fund scholarships. The number also includes the 50 slots offered by the Indian government every year.

Last year the department had announced 115 scholarships.

According to officials of the department, this was because the Royal University of Bhutan was expanding its programmes and also partly because of financial constraints.

Department officials said that on an average the Royal Civil Service Commission put in a requirement of at least 300-400 professionals every year, based on its human resource master plan, and the corporate and the private sector put in a requirement for about another 150 professionals.

“We meet with officials of the education ministry, the civil service commission, the labour ministry and the university to discuss their most urgent needs and advise them to be realistic,” said the adult and higher education director, Nim Dem.

She said that scholarships of those courses that have been introduced in Bhutan were brought down as in the case of electrical and civil engineering, which was reduced from about 10-15 in the past years to about five this year. “The Royal Bhutan Institute of Technology provide these professional courses,” she said.

What has changed is the type of professional scholarships offered after Class XII said officials of the department. These include courses in international relations political science and B. Tech (Diary food).

Other recently introduced professional courses were the teacher education scholarships (2002), after which the students have to undergo a year-long PGCE programme in National Institute for Education in Samtse.

Scholarships for IT courses were also introduced in the recent years. However, with the BIT course already being provided by Sherubtse College, the slots available for IT professional courses were seven, this year.

Science related professional courses have dominated the scholarship slots with more than half of the slots offered to science students.

About Nu. 60 million is spent every year on undergraduate scholarship students, according to DAHE officials.

Source: kuenselonline.com

This entry was posted by Taman Siswa on Thursday, February 23, 2006 at 9:10 pm and is filed under Education News, Scholarship. Tags: Bhutan, College, Department of Adult, Education News, food, Higher Education, Indian government, Institute of Technology, National Institute for Education, Nim Dem, Royal Civil Service Commission, Royal University of Bhutan, Scholarship, Sherubtse College, Student, Youth Development Fund, . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.