Innovation & Entrepreneurship Development

1. Title of the practice: Innovation & Entrepreneurship Development

2. The context that required the initiation of the practice (100 - 120 words):
The Govt. of India initiative and support towards the innovation and Startups encouraged the implementation of the initiative with full swing at our institute. The scope of having more innovations in this region helps our students to remain motivated towards finding innovative solutions for the regional problems. Institute has great potential with most of our faculty and students innovative and entrepreneurial activities taking place under Innovation and Entrepreneurship Cell (IEDC) and more number of the students engrossed in IEDC objectives. Mainly, the Innovation culture and supporting ambience in the institute is congenial for students participation in entrepreneurial activities. Institute has a well planned scheduleforconductingTraining programs, Ideathons and Hackathons to address local and global community issues. Institute has a patronizing ecosystem with a plethora of activities to inculcatea passion for innovation among young minds with a vision focused on our Nations progress.

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3. Objectives of the practice (50 - 60 words):
Our practice is in having the clear Vision and Mission to nurture the innovation spirit in student's minds by creating and providing a great platform to come up with the solutions for various problems as Ideation competitions and hackathons and many social entrepreneurial activities. Identifying the need for various local community-based markets and targeted towards the solutions.

4. The Practice (250 - 300 words):
Institute has a well-supported ecosystem with a lot of activities towards inculcating the young minds towards Innovation for their own as well as national progress. Entreprenuership training is provided to the students under PMYUV scheme of MHRF, GoI. The team of the institute including internal and external mentors have supported the stakeholders. The geographical area where our institute resides hasa number of well-defined problems to be solved technologically and socially. There will be a huge impact of the practice on our students to promote and implement the innovate ideas and design pragmatic impactful solutions. Mainly, the culture and environment in the institute is conducive for student participation in entrepreneurial activities. Institute has well planned training programs and conducts various Ideathons and Hackathons to address local and global community issues. Students are engaged in Idea Box events to submit their ideas for pitching their solution and making their ideas into a prototype , a product with a perfect business model to initiate their startups. Institute creates and allocates workspaces for their work and discussions. Institute supports the expansion of rural development innovation by students who are keen to work in the specific path. Support to the stakeholders for driving through the community-based innovation and also support to the social entrepreneurship to promote the awareness of various benefits of rural development through innovative projects. Various communities will be invited and offered to identify the emerging problem set to be cleared as a priority. Students involved in various activities design and work on more innovative ideas in this field and faculty members also have thrust research areas which have been instrumental in developing some excellent projects. The developed products/service startups are promoted by participation in startup exhibitions with special stalls to promote and display the products. Pitching the business ideas and meeting the targeted vendors may help them in the marketing scenario.

5. Obstacles faced if any and strategies adopted to overcome them (150 - 200 words):
One of the major problems that we have is balancing academics and entrepreneurial activities. Most of the students were interested to take over the E-Cell activities but, due to the other academic workload, they weren't able to work as expected However, Govt. of India and AICTE has declared clear instructions to the institutes to add up on the attendance and allot a few weeks in a semesterfor the students as mandatory for participating in the entrepreneurial activities. Thus we were able to overcome the situation.

6. Impact of the practice (100 - 120 words):
Students participating in various training programs, Ideathons and Hackathons to address local and global community issues actively. Also, e-cell students are conducting and participating in the Idea Box events, workshops, entrepreneur talks, and idea pitching events. Institute is creating and allotting workspace for their work and discussions. The main impact on the students of the institute can be seen as our students won many business ideations (I & II Prizes) at IIT Bhubaneswar, Won 1.5 Lac prize money with Overall championship title at TiE Hyderabad Business Idea Competition grand finale. Students were supported to participate in TiE Global completion held in California, USA. These innovations from the students' lead to win Smart India Hackathon in 2019 and many teams participated in SIH finals, and 324 students participated in SIH 2019 from the institute. The institute supports the students to participate in various national and international competitions to prove their mettle in making innovative products and establish their own startups. Also, ECell of the Institute organized various successful entrepreneur's talks for mentoring the current students. As a part of the mentoring program, institute fosterd an understanding between various organisations and established good networking opportunities for mentoring our students voluntarily. Currently, we are with TiE Hyderabad, IIC, MHRD, NEN, etc. Most of the mentors are having the startups to lead our students towards the success of their business models. Moreover, our faculty promote and support the student pilot projects to make them successful in every aspect like technical, making products and financial model. These students with innovative ideas draw support in filing for patents and also equip themselves to participate in various national and international competitions.

7. Resources required:
A dedicated workplace (incubation centre) and support from the faculty to mentor and encourage them towards the entrepreneurship activities.Infrastructure and Incubation centre access. Feild trips to the nearest Incubation Centers to visit the startups.

1. Title of the practice:
Campus Recruitment Training

2. The context that required the initiation of the practice (100 - 120 words):
Now a days, students are technically competent but they can't get employed unless they are good at Quantitative, Logical, Verbal aptitude, writing skills, communication , resume building skills and coding skills, we have initiated this practice in our institute to improve the student's aptitude and problem solving skills by inducting the aptitude classes along with regular academics. General perception of aptitude is often confused with Mathematics skills but aptitude is strenghthened with general knowledge and speed mathematics. Majority of our students hail from rural background where there is meagre scope to speak in any other language except their mother tongue, therefore communication skills training in English is essential to make the students to open up and express themselves.

3. Objectives of the practice (50 - 60 words):
To improve the student's aptitude, written and communication skills by providing resource material and online quizzes. To improve the student's problem solving skills and empower themto tackle real-world problems.

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4. The Practice (250 - 300 words):
Usually this practice starts from 5th semester, student's will undergo training classes along with their regular academics and online material is provided for all the topics, students can access the content from anywhere using a computer or mobile. For each topic, the online quizzes are provided in three levels - easy, medium, and difficult. Student's performance will be monitored by a training team and remedial classes will be conducted for the students who are weak in a particular topic. The specific topics which are required for various companies are also given special emphasis. Majority of the industries are using online written skills evaluation where a student's performance is automatically evaluated without human intervention, we have our own grammar evaluation tool developed by a team of students with the help of faculty, the tool will evaluate the written English for grammar and punctuation mistakes, many self practice and assessment questions are available in-built in the platform, self practice questions can be attempted by the students without any faculty support from home also, after each question is submitted, the student will be getting a report of the mistakes they have made and suggestion for the correct answer. Assessment questions are used to evaluate the student's performance and initiate necessary future actions. Group discussions and presentations play a major role in improving the student's communication skills every week, students are given a topic to prepare and discuss, this enables the students to improve their confidence and communication skills as well. We also conduct resume building sessions, students are informed about the best practices and common mistakes to be avoided in resume building. One to one interviews by Intra and inter department faculty also help the students to overcome fear of interviews. The next major thrust is coding skills, we group the students into various levels based on their interest and capability, students who are meritorious and skilled with an aptitude for higher order coding are specially trained for niche product companies with high packages and medium and basic level students training will be focused towards employment in service level companies.

5. Obstacles faced if any and strategies adopted to overcome them (150 - 200 words):
One of the major problems that we have is balancing the academics and campus recruitment training, nothing can be ignored - during the time of academic exams we concentrate less on the training and give more importance to academics. The next obstacle is the computer resources, as majority of our training is online based, we often need more number of computers for the students to practice - as majority of the platforms can also be accessed on mobile, we encourage the students to write the exams in mobile whenever possible. The next challenge that we face is how to keep the students motivated throughout the training - as the training is imparted over a four semester tenure, it is important to sustain the students focusand momentum throughout the four semesters - A team of dedicated coordinators in all the departments hand hold the students and support them during stressful situations, very few students out of ignorance may use malpractices, our systems are intelligent enough to identify the students and we give special counceling to them.

6. Impact of the practice (100-120 words):
We have seen tremendous improvement in the student's aptitude, written, communication, coding skills compared to earlier years where a student was given campus recruitment training for a very short period. This has significantly increased the percentage of students placed in recent years. Our placement percentages have always been above 80%. We also see remarkable growth in the number of students getting placed in product companies like Amazon, Expedia, Kony labs, Coviam technologies, Open-text etc. with a high package. There is tremendous improvement in the student's communication skills which is the reason of why our students are able to show exemplary performance in the interviews.

7. Resources required:
A dedicated team of faculty, computers to practice, and internet connection.

Vishnu Institute of Technology has a vision to accomplish the Objectives of promote the Quality enhancement in Technical education. It is to serve the local Community with sustainable programs related to development. It emitted to deliver world class education in diverse Engineering fields to students in an eco friendly green campus. VEDIC (Vishnu Educational Development Innovation Centre) provide innovative methods for staff and students to work in a collaborative environment for teaching and learning and improved behavioural experience. A three day programme on Scientific Educational Practices (SEP) for the faculty is arranged regularly by VEDIC. VEDIC workshops for faculty members are conducted by highly qualified Educational and Industrial Experts on several topics like Scientific Education Practices Learning and Leading, Cultivating Research Mindset, Advanced Engineering Optimization Techniques, ELab, Intrinsic Motivation for Training and Placement Officers, Supply Chain Management, Inspire Impact Introspect, Research Readiness Strategies, CAST Train the Trainer, Think Technology Transform, Advanced Research Training Course Design. CAP (Career Advancement Program): provided the students with adaptive and experiential learning strategy utilizing latest technology platforms like OpenEdX, Moodle, online forums like Piazza, hackathons, formative assessment, online coding platforms like HackerRank, data from Coursera, EdX, Code School, Udacity etc. CRT Special Campus recruitment training sessions for English, Quantitative Aptitude, Logical and Verbal reasoning and special topics in engineering have been conducted by a Team of Faculty along with academics. A total number of 546 students have been placed in Open text, EPAM, Infosys, Hyundai Mobis, Thermax, T.C.S, Capgemini, Cognizant, Accenture etc. MOOC: These courses for the subjects of all branches have been offered to students. Content has been developed and posted on Google class room, www.vishnulearning.in, www.vishnuplacements.in, MOU'S :We have created new opportunities for our students by forging MOUs with universities abroad and a planned transition towards achieving Autonomous status. This has helped us to introduce Certification programs that will encourage our faculty and students to publish papers in various International, National Conferences and Journals. Industry collaboration and Centres of Excellence: In order to make Higher education relevant to the industry, We believe in nurturing the innovative bent of mind of our students and in that direction multi disciplinary Theme Labs and Centres of Excellence (COE) such as the Assistive Technology Lab that provides Engineering Solutions for persons with disabilities, National Instrumentation, E.D.C, all these have provided opportunities for students to show case their innovative activities in collaboration with industries. Radio Vishnu 90.4 and Vishnu TV academy provided a platform for our students to develop and present educative and socially relevant content to the local community. This has tremendously impacted our students in terms of communication skills and social responsibilities. Radio programmes/content and Short films developed by students have focused on issues relevant to education, Environment, Discipline, Scientific temper and Indian Culture, Morals and Ethics.