Tamil Nadu   

`Engineers should keep learning all the time'

He has done research on digital manufacturing techniques, especially in the process of `laser sintering'. Involved in activities that combine applied research and technology transfer, he guides engineering students in areas such as manufacturing and design. On a visit to Coimbatore, Kenneth William Dalgarno, Senior Lecturer in Design and Manufacture, School of Mechanical Engineering, University of Leeds, speaks to A. A. Michael Raj on engineering education.

TEACHING ENGINEERING students means showing them how to learn. "Once you get an engineering degree, that is not the end. Tools and technology are developing all the time and students need to be able and adaptable. They need to be able to apply sensibly whatever they have learnt," he said.

Going after knowledge and mastering it would have to be the most important task of undergraduate engineering students. Out of the 22,000 students at the University, 5,000 were international candidates who had been attracted by the high quality of courses and the learning experience.

The University took student support seriously, for it was easy to get lost when offices were distributed all over the sprawling campus that was one of the biggest in the United Kingdom.

"Students are expected to be competent. Masters courses are demanding. That is why they are called masters courses. If they were not demanding, everyone would have masters degrees," he said.

Those who studied at Leeds could opt to live on the campus or go in for private accommodation.

"If they are planning to be there for more than a year, they could stay on the campus for a year and move out to private accommodation when they have become more confident. Accommodation could be cheaper outside the campus. The Students' Union has an Indian society and it is useful to contact them for information," he noted.

Mr. Dalgarno said that Leeds was a modern, cosmopolitan university that offered a range of leisure activities. Clubs drew people from different places and backgrounds because of common interests. Men and women students were present in almost equal numbers on the campus, though there tended to be more men students in engineering courses.

However, in recent years, the proportion of women students to men had been increasing. Engineering was no longer a male preserve. In addition to his teaching duties, Mr. Dalgarno was leading a research project on energy efficient manufacturing.

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