Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan Introduces the SWAYAM Plus Platform

Discover SWAYAM Plus, offering employment programs & professional development for students & working professionals. Upskill & reskill with mentorship & scholarships.

on Feb 28, 2024

Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan Introduces the SWAYAM Plus Platform | Frontlist

On Tuesday, Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan unveiled the SWAYAM Plus platform, which is operated by IIT-Madras. It provides employment and professional development programmes for working professionals and higher education students. SWAYAM Plus intends to create a digital ecosystem for upskilling and reskilling by offering mentorship, scholarships, and career opportunities.

Professionals can use the SWAYAM platform as a vehicle and benefit from NEP 2020's multiple-entry-multiple-exit feature. "The platform will broaden the scope of the classroom by adding 43 million higher education students and working professionals," Pradhan stated.

"Higher education is no longer exclusive to traditional students. It is now open to the working population as well. The NEP 2020's provision for numerous entry and exit points enables individuals to pursue education at their own speed. This approach is reflected in SWAYAM Plus, a vehicle that allows working professionals to balance employment and study by providing a wide range of online courses. "With SWAYAM Plus, we are empowering individuals to upskill and reskill, improving their career prospects and contributing to India's knowledge economy," he explained.

The Union Ministry of Education established SWAYAM, a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) platform that provides educational opportunities to a large number of learners, in 2017 and had an enrollment of 72 lakh by the end of 2023.

In line with the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020, the SWAYAM Plus platform will now provide courses that address industry needs and improve learners' employability.
Developed in conjunction with industry leaders, such as

SWAYAM Plus, developed by L&T, Microsoft, Cisco, and others, includes unique features such as multilingual content, AI-enabled advice, credit recognition, and employment routes.
According to Pradhan, SWAYAM Plus is primarily concerned with creating an ecosystem for all players in professional and career development, including students, course providers, industry, academics, and strategic partners.

He stated, "The platform's other objectives include enabling a mechanism that provides credit recognition for high-quality certifications and courses offered by the best industry and academia partners; reaching a large learner base by catering to learning across the country, with a focus on reaching learners from tiers 2 and 3 towns and rural areas; and offering employment-focused courses based on learner needs -- across chosen disciplines with options to learn through
"SWAYAM Plus also envisions bringing in features such as access to mentorship, scholarships and job placements as value-added services in due course of time, thus building a digital ecosystem for learners to pursue upskilling and re-skilling at all levels, namely certificate, diploma or degree," he went on to say.

Higher Education Secretary K Sanjay Murthy invited industry executives and subject matter experts from colleges and institutes to contribute courses on specific verticals that will be certified by IIT-Madras.

"A variety of institutional structures will be in place to review such suggestions in order to ensure need-based and timely replies. "The content will be available in 12 major Indian languages," Murthy stated.