Dr. K. Haris Krishna is the Director of the Ashoka Women’s Engineering College. He holds a Ph.D. degree from MJPRU, Bareilly. He has five years of experience in the academic field.

Ashoka Women's Engineering College

You have held key positions at education institutes throughout your professional career. What are the key factors that keep you connected with the education sector?

In the education sector, you feel at the highest level because you are creating the future for many students. Right now, let’s say, given the instance of right now, around 2000 students depending on the way I work. Their future depends on our planning, our executions, and our policies. So, this is a major factor that keeps me in the education sector. This is what appeals to me in the education sector we can make a big change. We could be a key player in creating their future, creating their livelihood. 

Being the director of the Ashoka Women’s Engineering College, how do you strategize about the key programs and plans for the marketing and administration of your college?

Marketing and administration. See, there are a couple of things that I keep strategizing initially. See, the college grows. In the last ten years, our college has grown with leaps and bounds. And the strategies change every year. The reason is that the size of the college is different. The customer base is different. Students who are looking at the college are different. And the market is also changing. I remember starting my journey with this college in Ashoka in 2012, it was just after the recession. And children were not interested in taking up engineering, B.Tech as their career option. From there to today, that students are, engineering is booming. Today, everybody wants to do engineering. If not engineering, then only they prefer to go for a degree and any other subjects, any other degree. 

The education systems in India and other foreign countries are structured very differently. In your experience, what can an inbound student gain from studying here in your college?

Okay, there are two different questions you have asked. So, yes, the Indian education structure is much different than any other country. Right from schooling to higher education. Higher education is not that much but schooling is very much different. When you say inbound students, if you are talking about students from other countries coming into India or to our college, very simple way if I have the means to send my child abroad to study engineering, but definitely I would want my child to study engineering in India. The reason being, first, it is affordable. Engineering is not affordable in Western countries. Engineering is very much affordable in India. And especially for Ashoka, we are, the first thing we are affordable, we are quality driven, and placement is a mandate for every child who is passing out from our college. Last three years, we have been placing, and we have been giving students multiple offers.

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How does the curriculum of Ashoka Women’s Engineering College ensure the best practice in the industry?

Pretty simple. We involve, see, as an autonomous college, we involve industry experts in our curriculum design. So, people who are in very high positions in MNCs like TCA, and Wipro, are on our panel on the board of education. Every year, we have meetings where they come up, they give us suggestions on what should be included, and what should be excluded. Those visionaries who are from the industry know what’s happening, you know, what’s going to happen in the next two, four, five, six years. Accordingly, they suggest, that we have our own, of course, academic team who understands the same thing better. So, basically, our board of education creates a curriculum that is an amalgamation of industry and academic experts. Therefore, we also foresee what’s going to be in demand in the next four years’ time and we include those things. So, our curriculum is very much futuristic and industry-ready.

Any insights into how your college could be more welcoming to students of different races or economic backgrounds?

We have children coming from Bihar and a few other parts of India. And talking about people coming from different countries or different states of India, the major part is how well they feel being here. So, the student community that we have is very secular. Students are secular. Students are also tolerant. They have been taught the tolerance of different races. I have not seen any kind of racial or even any kind of discrimination among students. I have not come across any cases, such cases. So, we are involved a lot in kitchen activities and we make sure students coming from different states of India, their food is also taken care of. –Yeah. –Some vendors also deliver north Indian food to our campus. 

What do you think should be the university’s top priority over the next ten years?

The only way to make India a hub of education and attract students from everywhere to India is the employability, international employability. Our education system is very effective but it is not been marketed that way. So, if we have quality, it has to be known to everybody. So, this one marketing factor that I don’t know how that could be done but universities have to make sure that students are placed internationally. Companies of abroad sectors should also, our education, our students who are trained under us should be appealing to them as potential employees. So, international placements, and international employability skill is what universities should look at next 10 years.