The EDEX Expo 2012, Sri Lanka's largest Education and Career Exhibition held at the BMICH last weekend was filled mostly by Advanced Level students and busloads of students from various schools.
Conducted for the 9th consecutive year EDEX has now become very popular among parents and students alike as the students mostly who do not get opportunities to enter local universities can select their higher studies and training for their future career as a large number of local and international universities, educational, professional and training institutions were represented at this exhibition.
Adapting to the present global trend and realizing the need for environmental conservation, the organizers of EDEX called upon all the exhibitors to think 'green' to support sustainable living through 'green thinking' as a core value.
Kamal Abeysinghe, Chairman, EDEX told the Business Times that there were more than 300 stall holders, both local and international. When they started nine years ago there were only around 15,000 visitors but today, he said, visitors have swelled to a massive over 50,000.
When asked that it would be best, if the EDEX organizers could arrange to provide adequate information to the schools individually, Mr Abeysinghe said it would be impossible at the present juncture as they are a volunteer NGO where whatever profits are ploughed back to offer better service and organizing these exhibitions involves tremendous hard work.
He said that to help the students to choose an appropriate career path they collect data of the students on a questionnaire - 'The Career Key' which would determine the best career path for the students to follow.
When it was pointed out that the rural Sinhala-only talented students are at a disadvantage due to their lack of English knowledge, Mr Abeysinghe said that the only way out to overcome this disadvantage is for the government to provide the necessary English knowledge for the students as it would be mandatory on the part of the government as the government maintains the bulk of the schools in the country. |
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