Self reliance is the mantra of the day. In fact it is the mantra of life. We send our children to school, to college and then to university for higher studies. This process of education is aimed at enabling them for self reliance. The only important point to consider is when should the learning for self reliance begin?

The traditional families of Queen Victoria's era believed that a child should focus only on academics – even during post-graduate study - until obtaining their degree and then start learning for a career. Such thinking today is considered outdated, besides causing delay in career preparation.

The modern generation is swift and smart. In spite of having diversified interests, they are competent and capable of multi-tasking. That is why they are allowed and even encouraged to work during studies as well as take vacation jobs when studying abroad. These jobs provide them with a great opportunity for exposure to the work environment as well as enable self support. Then why in India are quite a few parents reluctant to allow their children to take up part-time jobs - whether on weekends or during vacation - instead of killing their time aimlessly? This requires serious thinking.

The students pursuing the Science stream generally have longer college hours and sufficient assignments to keep them busy such as preparing journals and practical work, not to mention the growing need for joining coaching classes. All this takes much of their time and hence the only opportunity for work experience comes during vacations. Such students should utilize this opportunity, even sacrificing fun activities, for it is during these formative years that one can make best use of time to be trained for their career. This earlier start in career preparation brings on an earlier start in achieving self reliance and earlier growth in one's career as well.

As for students pursuing the Arts or Commerce stream, they should opt for early morning lectures to be free earlier. With availability of correspondence courses abounding, many opt for distance education. The advantage of this is that not only does one save 3 to 4 hours of the day, but also gets ready material to study with a focused mind at one's convenience. This allows them to learn swifter and smarter. The trend of distance education is becoming more popular with students who are career focused, regardless of their income or background.

Pursuing graduation after H.S.C. is viewed more as a mark of higher qualification than a significant contribution to one's career advancement. Graduation can very well be pursued through correspondence, thus saving precious time - for time is essentially the life itself. So let's utilize our time to turn an "education into a career."

To take optimum advantage of available time, one should also have a career plan. Unfortunately routine counsellors rarely construct individual career plans as their knowledge is generally limited to academic qualifications, lacking know-how on professional qualifications.

In the next issue, we shall cover information on "professional qualifications" for career education which can be pursued along with academic education.