Siksil Institute of Business and Technology (SIBT) recently celebrated 10 years of providing quality tertiary education to Sri Lankan students. The institute marked the occasion by adopting a new moniker, changing its name from Siksil Institute of Information Technology to SIBT. The change in name reflects SIBT's expansion in terms of several areas in IT and management to SIBT's course offerings.
Reflecting this widened scope is SIBT's Diploma in Business and Technology (DIBT).

This eight month course is targeted at students who have sat their Advanced Level exams and exploring career options. Mr Upul Dassanayake, General Manager, SIBT, explained, 'SIBT recognized the gap that exists in the current tertiary education sector. Educational institutes assume post AL students have a clear idea of what their career options are. This is often not the case. Modern students want to explore the many paths open to them before settling on one that offers the greatest intellectual and professional reward.'

The DIBT's syllabi, centred on 465 lecture hours, is structured to give students a rounded introduction to the foundations of business and information technology, augmenting these with the much needed soft skills - leadership and presentation skills specifically - in order to ensure that SIBT's students meet the ever-increasing standards expected of fresh recruits by the modern labour market.

'We ensure that our course delivery is world-class. Our panel of lecturers are university academics and industry experts, ensuring that a balance between theoretical foundation and practical applications of theory is emphasised to our students. In addition, SIBT's premises include large lecture halls with multimedia and AV facilities, computer labs with internet connections and E-Learning facilities, a large, well-stocked library, and high quality learning material. We are also a very Sri Lankan institute and take it upon ourselves to impart Sri Lankan values to the students who come under our wing', added Mr Dassanayake.

Additionally, the institute's Diploma in Information Technology (DIT) is accredited by the University of Sunderland. This enables students who graduate from the DIT to register for the UK-based university's degree programmes or the University of Colombo's Bachelors in Information Technology (BIT) examinations.

SIBT's additional course offerings include management disciplines such as marketing, Human Resource Management (HRM), computerized accounting, and administration and programming. To provide more pathways to students, SIBT has collaborated with SLIM to conduct their programmes and have so far been able to produce 100% pass rates for PCM exams. SIBT was awarded as the BEST accredited centre by SLIM.

SIBT is a Board of Investment (BOI) approved IT training institute and registered with the Tertiary and Vocational Education Committee on Sri Lanka (TVEC). SIBT is an accredited training institute recognized by The University of Sunderland, SLIM and the Association of Business Executives (ABE), International Computer Driving Licence (ICDL), the Association of Computer Training Organizations (ACTOS), and the Institute of Bankers of Sri Lanka (IBSL).