Samarthya, XLRI Organises Career Counselling Fair for School Students

by Priya Jadhav

Samarthya, XLRI recently organized a Career Counselling Fair for school students in Jamshedpur. Steered by Mr. Ronald D’Costa, a founding member of Samarthya and an alumni of XLRI and Chief Mentor Fr. Francis Peter, S.J, XLRI, the event witnessed participation by many professionals and counsellors. Around 500 students and 50 parents of local schools took part in the Career Counselling Fair.

Samarthya organised the Career Counselling Fair with the aim of providing guidance to school students and their parents about various career options available to them from professionals having first-hand information of the field. The event is designed so as to help students make an informed decision about their career choice by collecting information about different fields of their interest at a single venue.

The event commenced with an address by Mr. Ronald D’Costa who explained how important it is today to manage uncertainty as conditions and situations change constantly. Therefore, today's youth needs to be put in a situation to cope up with the same and adapt to new ideas and new techniques. Fr. Francis Peter, XLRI emphasised the importance of career counselling and making an informed decision. He said, “One right step in right direction can make your future brilliant”. He also expressed how important it is for the whole world that the students put their best foot forward.

For Career Counselling, along with XLRI students many professionals graced the event for the benefit of students and went on to share their experiences and their passion that made them choose their respective careers. The event also offered information about wide gamut of off-beat career options like Farming, Sports, Photography, Forestry to standardised options like Engineering, Doctors and Indian Defence.

Mr. Tushar Kabir who has studied from Loyola school chose farming as his career and was described as a “gentleman farmer”. He went on to say that farming is not just a profession but a way of life and described the immense satisfaction he gets in contributing to feeding the entire nation. He also explained to students how infusion of new technology into farming has changed it into a proper profession. Dr. Sanjay Aggarwal who is a psychiatrist by profession told students to think practically and rationally and emphasised on the importance of contingency plans. He tried to put the parent’s perspective before students to provide them the holistic view. Mr. Abhinesh Chaudhary, Indian Forest Service Officer, shared how he followed his passion of going into administration even after pursuing Science in his under graduation and also listed down the perks of being in the Indian Forestry Services.

The students and parents also had one-on-one interaction with the counsellors of their field of interest to get their doubts and concerns cleared from them. The event also included a psychometric test for the school students that was conducted a day before the event. The test was conducted to help gauge the interests of the students.

About Samarthya: Samarthya is an initiative taken by the students of XLRI to help school students realize their full potential by focusing on social and emotional learning. It is the youth wing of Centre for Research, Training, Education and Leadership (CeRTEL) at XLRI. The model of Samarthya consists of group sessions delivered by a team of Samarthya facilitators for classes of school students in Jamshedpur. Team conducts sessions for XLRI staff kids to hone their leadership and academic skills. The teenage years are the formative years and it is in these years that we usually learn the most important lessons of our lives. Today’s teenagers have their plate more than full. Not only do they need to deal with academic calendars and multitude of extra-curricular activities, but also they need to cope with myriad emotions as they evolve into strong and mature adults.