UNIGIS was invited to coordinate a GIScience education session in the form of a discussion forum for bringing academia and industry face-to-face during the 4th International Conference in HealthGIS’2011 held in Delhi, India during the first week of August.Dr. Shahnawaz (Director S/E Asia, UNIGIS International) conducted the session ‘Problems and Prospects of GIScience Education : A Discussion Forum’ on 4th August. This brought together more than 60 participants including undergraduate and post-graduate students as well as teachers from 3 colleges and 3 universities, industry representatives from leading companies like ESRI India, from Government and non-governmental organisations.
The discussion was focussed around the employability of the recent graduates, which was analyzed in terms of matching demand for GIScience skills from GI-industry with the supply of skilled graduates seeking jobs. It was agreed that the academia-industry communications / interaction is almost non-existent and efforts will be made to achieve a win-win situation.