In a bid to make students job ready, Sunstone, a higher educational start-up claims to be focusing on teaching students with corporate first approach rather than a traditional academic-first curriculum, Ashish Munjal, co-founder, CEO, Sunstone, told FE Education. “Our approach at Sunstone is to prioritise practicality over theory. We first understand the needs and requirements of corporate entities, including the necessary skill sets for entry-level positions. This information is then integrated into our curriculum, allowing us to teach our students these job-ready skills alongside their regular coursework” Munjal said.
The company claims that in 2021 approximately 270 students graduated with 250 job opportunities being made available at the time. In the following year, the students who graduated rose to nearly 500, and the overall number of job offers reached 580. “This year, we have a larger student body of around 1400, with over 900 job offers already received during the ongoing placement season. The placement season is expected to conclude by the end of June or the first to second week of July,” Munjal explained.
Sunstone provides ‘Applied Certification’ courses that are available to all its students. For instance, a student pursuing a BBA in Finance can also opt for an Applied Certification course in Finance. Likewise, students enrolled in the B-tech in Computer Science programme can select an Applied Certification course in Computer Science, such as mobile development and blockchain. “Other Applied Certification options will also be made available to students based on the programme they choose,” Munjal added.
According to the University Grants Commission (UGC), students are required to complete 900 hours of study for any course they have undertaken. Interestingly, if a student is also enrolled in the Sonestone programme, they will get additional 600 hours to acquire skill based training. The additional 600 hours will be split into two segments. “The first segment focuses on quantitative skills, interview preparation, and other related skills, while the latter part involves Applied Certification, where a student can choose one specialisation and complete 150 hours for each of the two available certifications,” Munjal stated.
As of now the startup is runs five programmes. While it has been running the MBA programme for the past four-five years, the other programmes are a recent addition. “We have become proficient in providing MBA programmes to students, but for other programmes that are not as established at Sunstone, which typically last only one or two years, we strive to ensure that they are on par with our MBA offerings. Our goal is to expand our current offerings, currently available in 28-29 cities, to at least 82-100 cities across the country within the next three years,” Munjal added.