Female Indian IT students keener on learning new technologies than their male peers: Study

Hyderabad: While the technology industry in the country is growing at a fast pace, employability factor continues to haunt students and recruiters alike. With an aim to understand the way Indian IT students, as well as the academic fraternity, are trying to address the issue, Hyderabad-based byteXL – one of the leading experiential learning platforms for IT career aspirants – conducted a study on employability in the IT industry, the existing skill-gap in the IT sector, and the measures taken to overcome it.

In terms of student participation rates, it appeared that female students are keener than male students to learn and strengthen new emerging technologies as reflected in both online and offline participation. A shift in focus on technical know-how than on aptitude and communication skills was also observed. Universities/institutions were more focused on helping students get placed in product-based companies such as Facebook and Google instead of merely training students to code, the survey found.

Growing interest in emerging technologies

While there is a growing awareness among students about the kinds of courses they must choose viz. the new wave of technology such as AI, UX/UI, Full stack, Cloud, there is a lack of the right curricula that can deliver the same in alignment with the industry needs. That is why students are looking up to specialized platforms. Based on the trends, 2022 is anticipated to witness a growing interest among the students towards emerging technologies, including Full stack, DevOps/cloud computing, UI/UX, Backend, IoT, AI/ML, Cyber Security, and programming languages like Python that can help in creating a base for emerging technologies. Students are also keen to learn additional certification courses like AWS, MS Azure.

Commenting on the findings of the report, Karun Tadepalli, founder and CEO of byteXL, said, "It's a known fact that the industry is facing a challenge in terms of a gap between the skillsets of available candidates and the required skills. The specialized programs run by the experts are gradually showing positive signs. The students are showing growth in their assessments on new-age technologies which is a great sign of enhancement in their employability quotient. This year is certainly witnessing students showing keen interest in emerging technologies."

Study highlights

Some of the key highlights of the study ensuing from the IT industry's and students' current pressing needs are:

· Tier 1 students prefer skilling with 96% of students opting for a combination of languages and programme while among Tier 2 and Tier 3 students it was 55%.

· The ratio of students undergoing training for immediate IT career placements was highest among Tier 3 students (44%) followed by 29% and 27% in Tier 1 and Tier 2, respectively.

· Maximum interest was seen in the combined group of languages C, Python, and Java with most students (35.9%) selecting the group.

· While C, Java, and Python were most popular among Tier 2 and 3 students, Tier 1 students showed additional interest in Data Structures besides these three.

· A phenomenal progress was witnessed in the performance of female Tier 2 students. With only 1.39% securing 80-100% marks on day 1 of the technology assessment, the figure rose to 51.11% at the end of the specialized skills development programme.

· 18.27% of students across categories secured 80-100% on day 1 and by the end of the programme, the number had reached 64.78%.

· The offline session saw a higher participation rate of students at 85.2%.

The above outcomes also serve as the forecasts for trends in IT coaching platforms and trends for the year ahead. It also serves as a roadmap for EdTech companies at leveraging digital education and will help bridge the skill gap in emerging technologies among educators.

The need for the study encompasses the fact that only 4.7% of technical graduating engineers in India have the ability to code and at least 93% of the graduating engineers in India are not fully equipped with the necessary IT skills to embark on a career in IT companies.

It also appears that reskilling has become mandatory every four-five years especially in the IT sector. This is a good indicator of the skill gap and a call to make students IT career-ready early on so that they can face the industry-level challenges head-on from day one.