Sri Lanka Telecom (SLT) Training Centre held its annual Award Ceremony for its 9th batch of BTEC HND Diploma holders at the BMICH Colombo on Wednesday, 30th August 2017. Prof. Ajantha Dharmasiri, Director and the Chairman of the Board of Management, PIM and the President of IPM Sri Lanka, graced the occasion as the Guest of Honour. Mr. P.G. Kumarasinghe Sirisena, the Chairman of SLT, Ms. L.P.I.M. Hissalle, the Chief Human Resource Officer of SLT, Ms. M. De S.K. Jayalath, General Manager/Training & Development of SLT graced the occasion with other distinguished guests and invitees.

SLT Training Centre conferred the Pearson BTEC Level 5 HND Diploma in Electrical and Electronic Engineering (QCF) to a batch of thirty one students, who have successfully completed the BTEC HND Diploma course. Ms. M.A.P. Chathurya was awarded the Gold Medal for “the Best Student” for her outstanding academic performance during the 2 years of study at SLT Training Centre.

Pearson BTEC HND Diploma is a globally recognized prestigious qualification, which will give students a key competency and advantage when applying for jobs or further studies, both in Sri Lanka as well as abroad. With this qualification in hand, students will find it easy to obtain admission to the 3rd year of B.Eng. degree programmes in over 100 countries including UK, USA and Australia.

In his message, Mr. P.G.Kumarasinghe Sirisena stated that “at the SLT Training Centre, development of Human Resources is looked at from a broader perspective and is aimed not only for our organisation but for the International arena. To this end the Centre offers internationally recognized programmes. In 2017 the Training Centre became affiliated to the University of Hertfordshire UK and began delivering Engineering Degree Programmes as part of its efforts to improve the quality and standards of the programmes offered. From a global perspective, Electrical & Electronic engineering has become one of the key areas in terms of a country’s socio-economic development whilst achieving digital economic goals.”

Mr. Dileepa Wijesundera, Group CEO of SLT has sent his congratulations to the diploma holders through his message and stated, “Millennials are very sensitive to changes happening in the digital world. Therefore they are well able to identify the opportunities and challenges in a given situation. As such, these 31 young diploma holders have an important role to play in leading their future organizations into the digital future.”

Mr. Wijesundera also stated that, “The job market today is highly competitive and the telecommunication market is more turbulent than ever before. The skill set the market requires is not only that which comes through academic training. That is why university systems worldwide are working hard to equip their students with practical skills needed in the market. We truly believe in supporting the enhancement and upgrading of knowledge across the country irrespective of ethnic diversity and language barriers through the enabling of modern ICT infrastructure to realize the full potential of a knowledge based economy.”

Guest of Honour, Prof. Ajantha Dharmasiri congratulated the batch of diploma holders recognizing them as future Digital leaders and addressed the gathering highlighting the impacts of Digitalization across the world. He mentioned that “Excellence is all about being exceptionally good. When applied to enterprises, it involves exceptional achievements in a consistent manner. That’s what should make the Sri Lanka Telecom Training Centre in the forefront of harnessing digital experts. Digitalization is disruptively directing the entire globe towards different approaches to results. Hence the expertise on digitalization is increasingly coming into the limelight with more emphasis on technology and people factors as the cutting-edge capabilities to compete. Digitalization has become a wave spreading across the world, revealing multiple varieties. This power to unveil not only transforms human outreach and actions, but also changes our conceptions; about which we are, about our uses and about human horizons for sense-making. In fact, technology has always been an enhancer of our work. From adding machine to the advanced computer, this was the case.”

SLT Training Centre conducts the BTEC HND Diploma course in Electrical and Electronic Engineering in collaboration with Pearson, UK’s largest awarding body, which is regulated by Ofqual (England), SQA Accreditation (Scotland), CCEA Accreditation (Northern Ireland) and Qualifications Wales (Wales). This is a 2 year fulltime course; the first one and half years focus on imparting academic knowledge at the SLT Training Centre while the balance six months comprise of invaluable industrial training at either SLT or other reputed organizations.