“Make Yourself Employable”
An Alternative Approach to Operationalize Employability
Dr. Gishan Sumanasiri, a Doctoral graduate of Management & Science University of Malaysia currently serves as the Chief Executives Officer / Executive Director at International Medical Campus (IMC) & AIC Campus which are considered to be the latest additions to high quality private higher education in Sri Lanka.
International Medical Campus (IMC) is Sri Lanka’s premier provider of medical university pathway programs to world’s leading medical universities. IMC provides opportunities for students to further their medical education in world’s leading destinations such as USA, Canada, Australia, UK & Europe.
AIC Campus is an international university education provider, and was established to fulfill the growing demand for high quality University Education through unbiased professional advice. AIC’s experienced & internationally trained staff is committed to deliver an exceptional service which students to experience the real American education at AIC.
It’s not a surprise that Dr. Sumanasiri’sinnovative concepts and consultancy have been led to orient the high quality education offers at IMC and AIC Campus. Especially his doctoral studies revealedthe need of restructuring Sri Lanka’s education system in order to make a skilled graduate as well as a comprehensive look at how to get the maximum output from such graduates to fly towards a developed nation. Through his PhD research project, the concept of SelfPerceived-Employability was introduced as an alternative concept to operationalize employability in a clear &measurable manner.
His philosophy is mostly focused on making graduates employable rather than employment. Dr.Sumanasiri’s differentiates the two terms that “Employment” refers to getting some job which may or may not be related to the education students received & “Employability” denotes to having a profession from a field of what the student preferred to pursue their goals & living standards.
He states that recently most private sector companies have a special preference to hire graduates who are armed not only with educational qualifications but with soft skills. Sometimes it’s obvious that employers give high priority to life skills when selecting candidates to appoint.
In this corner, Dr.Sumanasirihas been able to analyze why students with degrees don’t have jobs they expect, how to make employable graduates, what changes have to be done in our educational curriculum in order to develop life skills within the students. Along with his analytical solutions,Dr.Sumanasiri implements his knowledge, experiences, and innovative concepts to make students more employable.
Thus, the students who come to IMC or AIC to pursue theiracademic & professional goalscan see changes to the conventional education system executes elsewhere and the modernizedreal practical experience of learning which is powered by Dr. Sumanasiri’s philosophy.
Dr. Sumanasiri is also conducting visiting lecture series at science faculty of University of Colombo for years at where he obtained his first degree as a science graduate. Throughout this lecture series Dr. Sumanasiri teaches about “Exploring Yourself & Your Career”in which he addresses the solutions to lacking students’ knowledge on life subjects.
After obtaining the BSc degree his great interestin analyzing employment prob- lems of graduates & in finding a way towards to implement educational reformsdrove him to pursue his career in management & science. Since 2000 Dr. Gishan Sumanasirihas lead several Sri Lankan and overseas higher education institutes towards success. Article By, Kusala Madhushani Premaratne