Odisha is bringing artificial intelligence into the core of its work-linked undergraduate programme. The state’s Higher Education Department will introduce ‘AI for All’ as a value-added course (VAC) for students of the Apprenticeship Embedded Degree Programme (AEDP) from the 2026-27 academic session, where it will take the place of the Good Citizenship course in the second semester.
Director of Higher Education Kali Prasanna Mahapatra has asked registrars and principals of the participating higher education institutions to put the academic and administrative arrangements in place so that the course runs during the current session.
Same curriculum, new cohort
The course is not being built from scratch. It mirrors the ‘AI for All’ paper that Odisha already offers as a Skill Enhancement Course (SEC) to second-semester students outside the AEDP stream. “Institutions have been directed to ensure its timely implementation during the current academic session,” Mahapatra said, according to PTI.
The department says the aim is to give apprenticeship-track students foundational AI knowledge and practical, workplace-relevant skills before they enter the industry component of their degree.
Why it matters for AEDP students
AEDP is an employment-oriented degree model that pairs two years of classroom study with a year of stipend-based apprenticeship training. Adding AI literacy before that apprenticeship year is meant to make students more job-ready in workplaces that are rapidly adopting AI tools.
The programme has scaled quickly. It started in 2025-26 in around 30 institutions with two subjects, and in 2026-27 it covers 81 institutions and 11 subjects: Commerce, Home Science, Economics, History, English, Zoology, Mathematics, Library Science, Chemistry, Geology and Botany. The state has also set a target of bringing at least 10,000 undergraduates under apprenticeship, internship and community-engagement initiatives this academic year.
Part of a wider AI skilling push
The move builds on Odisha’s broader effort to embed AI and digital skills across higher education. In September, the Higher Education Department signed agreements with CSRBOX, the Nandi Foundation and Odisha Knowledge Corporation Limited on skilling, employability, AI education and entrepreneurship, and launched an online ‘AI Course for All’ with NASSCOM aimed at more than one lakh students and faculty members. A separate partnership with IBM and CSRBOX is expected to train over 1.25 lakh students in AI, digital literacy, design thinking and project management, with a focus on 107 institutions in remote and aspirational districts.
For a state trying to tie undergraduate education more closely to industry, folding AI literacy into the apprenticeship pathway is a practical next step, and one that other states running work-integrated degrees under NEP 2020 are likely to watch.
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