Nishat Paiker/StudyPlaces Desk
It was a normal Sunday morning, in times of gloom when weekend lunches and dinners end up discussing job market, global finance, recession proof career choices, fears and coping up with this uncertain situation. As usual I picked up the newspaper thrown in the balcony by my newspaper delivery boy. I thought whatever happens this man is not going to loose his job as there will never be end of news and information and people who want more and more the same, so as not to be left behind in being updated.
As a chaotic 2008 draws to a close, there is an alarming concern whether the New Year will bring some sought of relief or not. How can students/professionals confront this recession affect? Flipping through my HT news pages I came across this article ‘Job shaky? It’s time to study’, which reasonably talked about recession being the best time to study and education is one sector that is definitely going to survive the economy slump. The reason being when economy is in crisis people get into academics.
It is always a good idea to go to school, upgrade skills, utilise the bad times and wait till the good times are back. It is better to learn more, study and acquire unique skills through courses like MBAs, specialisations or certifications etc and make your job probably recession proof or later grab a better job when the economy changes.
Management courses executive or full-time MBA degree programmes has a peculiarity to beckon students from disciplines as diverse from Engineering, Science, Medicine, Arts and Commerce to working professionals who consider an MBA a necessity for the growth of their corporate careers. People from any industry who are in the middle of their careers and looking for better pay can add a degree of MBA as an important credential. It will give ones career a push even if economic recession looms. An MBA Programme will also be a significant investment in your personable development.
It has been reported a 22% rise in international test taker registrations for the GMAT admissions test this year. There has been also a spurt in applications in B-Schools. As HT article puts it in the words of M Rammohan Rao, Dean of ISB, “When business is down, business schools applications go up.”
Recession or no recession, there has been an increasing demand of online or distance education programmes/courses along with regular courses. Also it is speculated that by 2011 economic conditions would get better and the market would bounce back giving the then fresh/specialised pass out degree holders ample job opportunities.
The trend has a direct impact on the education sector which is booming even during recession. In India especially this sector is ever growing where an average middle class family’s 8.9 % of the budget is spent on education. Also the demand and supply is seeing a big gap as there are 1,500 new universities India needs, according to National Knowledge Commission. According to CLSA report the private education market is expected to grow to Rs 34,000 crore in 2012 from current Rs 20,000 crore. The figures themselves speak about the burgeoning sector.
