Edu dept to counsel students to join college

CHENNAI: As a step to motivate students into pursuing higher education, the school education department is set to counsel as many as 2,711 students to join degree courses. The counseling is to be held on October 20 at the Collectorate office of respective districts.

Meanwhile, through a higher education counseling session held earlier this month, it has been found that out of the 79,762 students as many as 8,249 students are yet to join college after finishing class 12.

Though 1,581 students enrolled in colleges in subsequent months, 6,718 students are yet to apply for colleges across Tamil Nadu.

Hence the department in order to help these students pursue higher education has managed to track 2,711 students and are actively working in finding out the remaining 4,007 students.

The circular stated that these students are hesitant to pursue higher education because of lack of interest in education, poverty, lack of colleges nearby and difficulty in passing class 12.

However, those students who have been tracked down have been called to the school by the respective school principals along with their parents to motivate them into college.

To strengthen this initiative, the State government has roped in departments like National Health Mission (NHM), district administration, TN Skill Development Corporation (TNSDC) including higher education department. The district collector will facilitate funds for higher education of these students through various means, noted the circular.