Sravanthi Challapalli

It’s that time of the year again. The exams will soon be done with, and now comes the task of choosing the subjects you are going to study, preparing for entrance exams and ap- plying to as many courses and colleges as you can.

The obvious choices for many are medicine and engineering. But there is a world beyond, with many new subjects becoming available and some new universities allowing students to study a varied combination of subjects.

Padmavathi Devarakonda, who runs the Hyderabad-based ACA Sports Counselling, says business analytics and digital marketing courses are much in demand. The world over, marketers want to know how customers are shop- ping, where they are shopping, what they are buying, how they are likely to shop and what they are likely to buy. “People in such jobs will mint money,” she asserts. She also points to five-year integrated courses such as B.Com LLB and BBA LLB which are other employment-oriented alternatives. A search on the Internet will throw up information about similar courses for management and sciences as well.

Time to drop set ideas

Well-paying careers come out of science: That’s a very strong mindset with students and parents across the country. However, that’s an impression formed from when there was not much choice in the past, says Sonila Mishra, founder of Latityude, a Gurugram-based mental health and career counselling enterprise. “Now there are over 3,000 careers to choose from. Not all are immediately available after Standard 12, but a career road-map can certainly be defined,” she states.

According to Sonila, this is going to be an age of interdisciplinary education. “The foundation of liberal arts nullifies the boundaries so far existent between science and arts, between different subjects. Instead, it promotes inter-woven learning that emphasises critical thinking, communication and multi-disciplinary approach,” she says. A variety of majors and minors are offered to a student to choose from and in some cases, if a student proves their worth, they may even be allowed to design their own major.

“Abroad such education has been offered for long, in India the New Education Policy should give a great push to such courses,” she says. Such courses are being offered in private universities such as Ashoka, Flame, OP Jindal Global, Azim Premji University and KREA. A career for a student who has studied Physics and arts could be product design or user experience design for gadgets and apps. Careers in STEM and professional jobs such as accounting, auditing, company secretaryship and law will always be there. A liberal arts education will open up opportunities in an array of careers as well as careers which will come into existence in the future, she adds.

Padmavathi says some universities offer short summer internships for Class 10 students to discover where their interests lie. Her speciali- ty is sports scholarships for undergraduate courses in US universities. Sportspersons in tennis, golf, track and field, volleyball, football, basketball, water polo and swimming are con- sidered for these scholarships.

While the students should have completed school without any break, certain concessions in qualifying scores are offered for these schol- arships. A candidate needs to have studied four years of English and three years of Maths in Classes 9-12 to apply.

Once they join the course, they have to maintain a grade point average of 3. “Parents need not feel sports is a waste of time,” says Padmavathi, adding that the universities give them a lot of exposure. The application will have to be made a year ahead of intended date of joining.

See the bigger, better picture

Latityude’s Sonila says students’ and parents’ decisions are often driven by peers and societal trends. Some choose a course or college their friend has chosen because they do not want to be separated. Some bow to pressure from parents and peers. Some do not have all the information to base their choices on.

Delhi-based counsellor Amrita Singh says students inclined towards engineering are exploring other options and parents too are aware of the slump in the market for engineering graduates. Research is becoming popular now, she adds. NEET is not everyone’s cup of tea but suggest paramedical courses as an alternative and parents cannot accept it. They would rather their child give the entrance exam another go. “There are many careers but risk behaviour is not encouraged. Like the beauty courses – there is so much money to be earned there. So also RJ, hair/shoe designer … So the children end up wasting 4-5 years studying something else and make these professions a career after they’ve saved enough money,” she observes.

The factors that count

Sometimes interest alone is not enough. Job prospects and personality matter. For example, a student interested in becoming an archaeologist should know that jobs are fewer when compared to other domains. Besides, the vocation calls for a good dose of adventurousness – one might need to go to jungles, work in a desert or enter caves in the course of their work. Their decision would have to include these factors, says Sonila.

Career demands and work culture differ from profession to profession. Moreover, many parents and students do not have the information and vision to see how the career will unfold ten years hence. Sometimes, there is so much choice that they get confused. In Class 10, for instance, if a student scores well in all subjects it does not mean she has to choose the Science stream and become a doctor or an engineer. Her aptitude and interest level should be taken into account when deciding on what course of study to pick in Classes 11 and 12.

Maths and Management choices

Alternative choices for students of the Physics-Chemistry-Maths stream include Architecture, Design, Pure Sciences, Research, Analytics, Data Science, Defence and Civil Services, Business Studies, Management, Insurance & Investment, Information Technology, Law, Event Management and Hotel Management. Design itself offers around 30 different careers such as Product Design, Graphics, Animation, Interior, Furniture, Spatial and Web Design, Sonila says. In Architecture, one can go in for Interior, Landscape, Urban Planning and other specialisations. There are the NATA and UCEED entrance exams for architecture and design. There is a market for law graduates in the corporate world. Management studies are no longer restricted to Human Resources and Finance; now one can study how to manage hospitals, real estate, sports, IT too.

Amrita says an upcoming course of study is Actuarial Sciences. It is the study of the application of statistics and mathematical methods to manage risk in the banking and financial sectors, so a combination of commerce and maths will suit such study, she says.

State of the Arts

In Humanities, psychology has much potential one can specialise in child, clinical, military or sports psychology. History can set one up for teaching, writing, museology, curation, anthropology and specialisation in domains such as history of art, paintings, photography and scriptures. Degrees or certification in archaeology and anthropology can easily land one a job in a museum. “Museums are going through a revival in India, the future is bright,” says Sonila. Funding and support for such enterprises from both government and private organisations is available now. In Biology, veterinary medicine, marine biology, pharmacy, sports physiotherapy, speech pathology, genetic counselling and immunologist are rising careers.

Exam experiences

Every child is a genius, every child is unique, says Nedunchezhian D, social entrepreneur and founder of the Chennai-based Technocrats India College Finder. However, that potential re- mains buried under layers of ignorance, paren- tal expectation and societal pressure.

Every year 5-10 students clear both the NEET and JEE (IIT) exams, Nedunchezhian says, adding that thirty years ago, it was common for students to study both Maths and Biology in Class- es 11 and 12. He blames principals and teachers for dissuading today’s students from doing that as they fear it will burden the students. “At that age, they can take the load, their educational horizon will expand. Children are natural learners, they can balance all subjects, they should not get stuck in a comfort zone,” he says.

His enterprise helps students with information and choosing colleges once the entrance exam results are out. Nedunchezhian says students need several “exam experiences” to gain confidence and improve their timing at answering the question paper. There are about 80 entrance examinations for courses in government or government-aided institutions. (His firm does not deal with private institutions.) Seventy-five of them do not consider Plus Two scores. Moreover, the course fees are less expensive in these colleges than in the private sector. Private colleges start the admission process earlier and students and parents flock there anxious not to miss out on a seat. “Whoever is waiting for a government seat will get better education at better prices,” he says. He recommends 5-25 admissions so that students can pick and choose.

Also, students should take as many exams as they can in the Science stream because that will give them a better chance of doing well in JEE IIT or NEET. According to him, the same people set the question papers for all these exams.

Prepare early

ACA Sports’ Padmavathi says parents and children have to meet at a middle ground. Amrita says there is little communication between parents and children regarding a career even though the parents themselves are educated and employed.

Thought and discussion about career choices should not be left until Standard 12. They need to start at least in Class 9. There’s not much clarity about career choices at that age and her advice revolves around recommending a stream of study based on aptitude, interest, the student’s personality and scores. Schools have an important role to play in this regard. They can enable children to explore and pay attention to themselves, says Amrita, adding that some schools even do this from Class 6 on- wards.

Psychometric testing can help discover the child’s strengths, talents, aptitude and multiple intelligences. The tests are 85-90 per cent accurate, says Padmavathi. Sonila says testing should begin in Class 9 or at the latest, halfway through Class 10. The motivation towards a career should also be considered – is it wealth, respect and recognition, challenge, leisure/a job that gives them enough time to relax at the end of the day? Once these factors are clear, students can focus on taking a decision about the stream of study.