These days, in Surajpur, Chhattisgarh, the District Collector can be seen frequently interacting with school and college students. 2013-batch IAS officer Gaurav Kumar Singh conducts interactive sessions with them under an initiative launched by him, named ‘Bhavishya Drishti – Yuva Srishti’ programme. The main objective of this meaningful initiative is to prepare the students for best possible careers and connect them to better employment channels.
‘Bhavishya Drishti – Yuva Srishti’ programme is a vision for building the youth’s future, as envisioned by Collector Singh. Under this programme, not only he, but other top officials of the district directly interact with the school children. They visit schools and colleges to directly interact and assist the students in their career planning. The officer has also roped in a select group of teachers to engage in these sessions. Indian Masterminds interacted with Collector Gaurav Kumar Singh, IAS, to know more about this initiative.
THE PROGRAMME
As part of this initiative, the officials conduct question-answer interactions with the students. They Listen to the students and try to understand them. Along with this, they also give advice regarding their future and preparation for competitive exams. The students, too,get very excited to have the Collector and other top officials in their schools.
Mr. Singh said, “It is an attempt to unlock the children’s potential.With this programme, we are trying to build the students in a way that they get the best available employment opportunities. We believe that children need to be given a direction and it is being done through this programme. So far, more than 20 sessions have taken place.”
INNOVATIVE WAYS
The district administration has also come up with some innovative ideas to enhance the capabilities of students. They bring the children to the Collectorate to show them how government work is done. Along with this, workshops are also organised every month on one topic.
“This initiative aims to guide the youth in their career choices through dialogue sessions. Mentoring them at the right age is important. We try to assist students to frame their own suitable guidelines and precepts to find their goals. We need to unleash their potential and help them to count on their strength. The focus is also on their personality development,” said Mr. Singh.
EFFECTS
He further said that when they connect with the children, new ideas flow.
“We also learn from them and improve ourselves. So whatever new ideas we get from the children, we apply them accordingly.This is not just to develop the youth to foster their overall growth in a transition phase of their careers, but also to prompt teachers’ response to formulate academic action plans.”
The district has 94higher secondary schools and 11 colleges.The students are also provided information on various welfare schemes and ways to access them.
SAMVAD SESSIONS
The programme’s main objective is to guide the youth through eight dialogue (samvad) sessions. The session begins with a ‘Yuva Samvad’ between the students and the Collector and his team of senior officers. This is followed by weekly ‘Prerna (motivation) Samvad’ in schools or colleges, where the collector, district police chief, available CEOs, and other administrative officials interact with students and teachers. The teachers then spell out ways to fuel one’s ambitions under ‘Bhavishya Samvad’ by discussing topics such as Vishay (subject) samvad, Career Samvad, Vyaktitva (personality) Samvad and Aabhasi (virtual) Samvad.
The initiative commenced last year and has helped over 2,500 students from higher secondary school onwards to evaluate their career prospects and informed choices based on their individual capacity and priority.
