Aditi Jalan would not miss college for anything in the world... on Mondays and Fridays. For that is when the 19-year-old gets to spend two hours at a console in the classroom, learning radio jockeying. “My passion is music and on these two days I can pursue it on campus,” smiles the student of Bhawanipur College.

For the likes of 15-year-old Malini Gupta (name changed), pursuit of their passion in school has started much earlier. Malini and gang never miss a meeting of the Fashion Club at Mahadevi Birla Girls High School. Lessons in fashion and fashion designing are a hit with Class IX and X students.

Consoles on campus, style in the syllabus — the times they really are a changin’. And it doesn’t stop with schools introducing new-age modules. “We even try to explain to parents that they should let their child pursue whatever interests her,” says Malini Bhagat, principal, MB Girls.

After all, these pursuits can so easily change into professions these days. Ashok Hall, for instance, has introduced a fashion designing course for Class XI-XII students. “Something like fashion designing opens so many avenues for girls now,” observes Meena Kak, principal, Ashok Hall.

Bhawanipur College was among the first movers when it started a five-month course in disc jockeying some three years ago. It recently launched a course for aspiring radio jockeys — opening up avenues for a professional career or plain pocket money. “Many of our students are playing in leading nightclubs in the city. Many of them have won national competitions,” says Bhavna Hemani, honorary executive secretary, Bhawanipur College.

Catch ’em young is the motto of the moment and schools are doing their bit to get their students off the starting blocks. “I receive hundreds of applications from school students wanting to work as radio jockeys during their vacations,” says radio veteran Jimmy Tangree, voicing “full support” for career-driven campus initiatives.

The attractions of such alternative pursuits range from giving the usual engineer-doctor grind the miss to the glamour of doing what we love, observe teenagers.