This Kerala-based start-up is upskilling college students in vernacular

NEW DELHI: Bridging the gap between early job-seekers and recruiters, Joseph E. George, 24 is running a business model that sets students from rural areas on the path to a lucrative career.

His start-up Avodha, an e-learning platform, is facilitating placements to college students, especially studying in tier-2 and tier-3 cities. Born in the middle of the pandemic, the Kochi-based start-up teaches job-oriented courses in regional languages and finds the right job opportunities for these students.

Realising a huge gap in the availability of skilled labour, George launched the company at the peak of the pandemic in June 2020. Since then, Avodha has placed 70,000 skilled graduates through an automated decision-making process in various thriving industrial areas.

“The problem is that there is a huge lack of skilled labour in the job market. My clients in Kochi were looking for skill-based professionals. Kochi does not have a lot of skilled labour in software despite the market demand. Whereas jobs which require relatively less skill work like BPO, and sales are in abundance,” he explained.

Starting with three courses offered only in Kerala, the company has now expanded to 23 different vocational short-term upskilling courses taught in six regional languages throughout India. Apart from English, the online course material is available in Hindi, Malayalam, Tamil, Telugu, and Kannada. The courses, he said, will soon be taught in Gujarati and Marathi as well.

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In under a year, the company has expanded its operation to almost all major cities, catering to major recruiters like Infosys and Tata Consultancy Service, as well as micro, small and medium enterprises. The start-up also placed its students at public-sector banks like the State Bank of India and Bank of Baroda. George claims to have a turnover of over 3 million US dollars and he heads a team of around 500 employees.

Courses in regional languages

As higher educational institutes under the National Education Policy, or NEP 2020 are beginning to embrace education in the vernacular languages, George has already garnered high enrolment in his regional language programmes.

To make the students job-ready, they first need to be upskilled, he said. Based on extensive market research and data collection, the company has curated courses for fields in which the job vacancies are the highest. Since the company deals with students from remote parts of the country, upskilling courses in regional languages has been the most viable option.

Based on extensive market research and data collection, the company has curated courses for fields in which the job vacancies are the highest.

“There are studies that tell us that a learner can retain knowledge best when taught in their mother tongue. We are catering to large numbers of students in government colleges and small private colleges. Most of these students come from rural areas. It is necessary that we provide education in the language they are comfortable in. For student’s benefit, my start-up teaches in vernacular languages,” George explained.

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Currently, Avodha offers three-month certification courses in areas like medical coding, hospital management, full-stack development, ethical hacking and Python. Besides software courses, it offers online hardware courses like mobile, laptop and air-conditioner repair engineering. Students pay Rs. 2,800 for these courses that are tailored to the industry demands, said George.

“While deciding the course collection, the idea was to have exposure to all the sectors. We offer courses in game development which is an up-and-coming sector. Courses like hospital management picked up popularity when COVID-19 hit the world. It has exposed us to the need for management in the medical industry. We have a course in the stock market that has received great responses from recruiters like Banks of Baroda and SBI. Medical coding is witnessing a boom after a lot of the medical transcription work from around the world has been outsourced to India,” he explained.

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Through the application of data analytics, his team collects data to focus on the core areas where freshers have the best chance of landing jobs. “This is not through empirical evidence, but we rely on data science. So, we search Google for jobs and we collect the data to understand which areas have the maximum job vacancies and in which area,” he explained. “At Avodha, we keep away from any form of fancy courses that sound good for marketing like IoT [Internet of Things], Tableau etc. They sound attractive but there are very few job opportunities in them,” he added.

Challenge of campus placements

Even though the e-learning platform offers soft skills that are essential to increase employability, according to George, the placement of such students must be done strategically.

“Someone who is struggling with English cannot be employed in the corporate sector which can be uncomfortable for the students. Students from small towns who can speak decent English are still easily intimidated by large corporate culture,” he elaborated. Often students quit even before the probation period ends.

Women students, coming from rural areas face other obstacles. “There are cultural inhibitions which prevent women candidates from relocating for their jobs. It is challenging because it is difficult to place them in high vacancy sectors like software and data science because these are usually in metro cities,” said George.

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Data from the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MOSPI) from January 2020 shows a falling trend in female participation in the workforce. In June 2020, it had fallen to just 15.5 percent in urban areas – the lowest in three years. The World Bank estimates that India’s female labour participation rate was 20.3 percent in 2019, down from 26 percent in 2005.

There are cultural inhibitions that prevent women candidates from relocating for their jobs.

Another challenge that impedes the upskilling process is the lack of resources like laptops and the internet to access online classes. “To remedy that, we have built Avodha Learning Centre. We have tied up with local cybercafés, schools, and colleges for computer labs. The operation is quite extensive right now,” said George.

Moreover, the platform allows flexibility to switch from one course to another provided they do not exceed 30 percent of the course curriculum. “This helps students find the right fit and find their passion which is important. The duration of the course is three months, but we allow a free-of-cost extension if they request it,” he said.

Start-up business model

The company generates revenue on an income sharing model wherein the students do not have to pay the entire fees for their education during their learning period but can pay the fees once they get a job that pays a salary. The student pays Rs. 10,000 only if they get jobs in the preferred domain and stay in the job for at least three months.

“We have also helped students get unpaid internships, but they are not required to pay us money. These students pay only for the course they take,” said George.

Based on stellar placements in Tamil Nadu and Kerala, colleges are eager to collaborate, said George. “Our presence in these two states is relatively stronger. We show our placement records to colleges. In my experience, skill-based jobs have comparatively higher job retention. Also, we primarily focus on the sectors where there are lots of vacancies so that we are confident that we can place our students,” he added.

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With a considerable network of partner companies in sectors like sales, banking and finance, software, and hardware, Avodha also conducts placement drives in these colleges. “Our target is generally colleges which do not have a placement cell, or the placements are not high. For many students, these colleges are just meant for earning a degree as there is no concept of placements. We are focusing more on government colleges compared to private ones,” said George, who is particularly ecstatic about the company’s recent collaboration with Nizam College in Hyderabad.

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