What is Skill Hub

Background

Knowledge and skills are the driving forces for social development and economic growth for any country. As there is demand-supply mismatch, the economy needs more ‘skilled’ workforce than in the availability of it. In the school and higher education sphere, knowledge and skills are required for diverse forms of employment in all the industry sectors and other services. By realizing the importance and the necessity for developing skills among students, National Education Policy 2020 emphasised on mainstreaming vocational education and to enable removal of academic silos, a Credit based framework to ensure vertical and horizontal pathways for students and creating work-ready human capital.

Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship (MSDE) in consultation with Ministry of Education (MoE) has planned to implement the ‘Skill Hub Initiative’ under Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana 4.0 (PMKVY 4.0). Scheme aims to facilitate and make education more relevant and create industry fit skilled workforce.

• The ‘Skill Hub Initiative’ under the PMKVY 4.0 scheme shall focus on the introduction of skill training programmes in the education ecosystems.
• Initiative shall consider the policy level synergy on integration of vocational education with general education as envisioned in the ‘National Education Policy 2020’. The effort shall supplement the objectives of ‘National Policy for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship, 2015’.
• As envisioned in the Guidelines of the PMKVY 4.0, for creation of state-of-the-art and sustainable skill Training Centres, phase-wise introduction of vocational courses in school curriculum in coordination with Ministry of Education (MoE) is the need of the hour. This can be accomplished through technical support, greater cross utilization of available infrastructure from Universities/ Colleges/ Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs)/ Polytechnics/ Schools, strengthening of District Skill Committees (DSCs), State Skill Development Missions (SSDMs)/ State Directorate of Technical Education along with handholding, strategic and funding support.

In view of the above, successful integration of skilling with education will require support and synergy from every stakeholder(s) such as MoE, MSDE, other central Ministries/Departments, SSDMs, DSCs, Sector Skill Councils (SSCs), School boards and other key players like Schools, Higher Education Institutions (HEIs), Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs), Polytechnics, Training Providers (TPs).

The ‘Skill Hub Initiative’ shall be implemented under Central component of PMKVY 4.0 through National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) and support of State Education Department/Agencies. The implementation of the initiative shall ensure broad-based convergence of vocational education with formal education in a phased manner to achieve outcomes with speed and standard.

What is Skill Hub?

Skill Hubs are nodal skill centres identified to provide skill development and vocational training opportunities to target population segments from class 6-8th (introduction to world-of-work through orientation, industry visits, bag-less days), 9th to 12th (aimed at exposing students to skill development avenues), school dropouts and out-of-education (aimed for academic credit, mainstreaming back to education and or apprenticeship and employment linkages).

Over a period of time these Skill Hubs will associate with adjoining education and skilling institutions (spokes) over a district, or a cluster of adjacent districts, to provide access to skill development training at hub location or at spoke location.

Such adjoining institutions in the vicinity of the Skill Hub may leverage the infrastructure and resources available at the associated Hub for their In-school, drop-outs and out-of-education candidates in the 15-29 age cohort.

In the initial phase, 5,000 such skill hubs will be identified in the country from across the education and skill ecosystems.

Skill Hubs will be co-opted from the vocational system and education system with participation from MSDE (ITI, PMKK, PMKVY Center, Fee based Center), MoE (Department of School Education & Literacy-DoSEL and Department of Higher Education-DoHE), Ministry of Rural Development (MoRD), Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) and Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY).

Any entity from the below mentioned category will be selected as a Skill Hub depending on the available capacity and/ or previous experience of imparting vocational courses:

• Schools (Government, and Private)
• Higher Education Institutions (Engineering, Technical and General Institutions including institutions offering Language courses)
• Polytechnics
• Government Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs)
• Other Govt Skilling Institutions like RSETI, NIELIT, etc
• Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Kendras (PMKKs)
• Corporate Skill Institutions/ Industry Bodies.
• Institutions under Jan Shikshan Sansthan (JSS) Scheme
• Institutes under Ministry of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprise (MSME)

The ‘Skill Hubs Initiative’ under PMKVY 4.0 aims at creating shared infrastructure, aligning with the needs of the local economy, and addressing the needs of all target segments for vocational training. It is also expected that existing resources in education and skilling system can be put to optimum usage by utilization for skilling beyond normal working hours and during weekends. The scheme is aimed at the following:

• Provision of permanent vocational infrastructure and resources for skilling
• To ensure contiguous availability of skilling centres for ease of candidates
• Align the vocational offerings at all levels with overall economic and local economy needs
• Introduce vocational learning at an early stage with multiple well-defined pathways for candidates to continue with their chosen vocations
• Provide vocational offerings for target segments including in-school, drop-outs and out-of-education candidates

TARGET BENEFICIARIES

The Skill Hubs would offer NSQF aligned vocational courses for the following target segments:

School Dropouts (6th to 12th Class cohort):

To achieve Vocational skill Certification and academic credit through credit assignment and mainstreaming back to School wherever feasible. Candidates shall also be supported with career counselling before and after training. For children who have dropped out of class 6/7/8 option for continuing vocational education along with mainstreaming will be done.

Out-of-education candidates:

To achieve vocational skill certificate and academic credit through Skilling/RPL/ Re-skilling/ Up-skilling courses.

Benefits to the trainees

• Free training for candidate between age of 15- 45 years
• NSQF compliant courses
• Reward money to candidates upon successful certification
• Counselling services at Skill Hubs
• Easy access to vocational skill training
• Conveyance cost for PwD and Transgender candidates
• Convergence/ integration of vocational and formal education
• Placement facilitation for candidates