Sambalpur: The Odisha State Open University celebrated its third foundation day here on Sunday by signing of four MoUs to expand its activities for job- oriented courses.

The deals were signed with Sambalpur University, Gangadhar Meher University, State Institute of Rural Development (SIRD) and the state Panchayat Raj department and Maharashtra Knowledge Corporation Limited (MKCL), Pune.

Under the agreement students of these universities will get the scope to enrol into the job-oriented courses offered by the open university. The business administration students will get opportunities from MKCL and will be associated to different industries for training and jobs.

On the foundation day, the open university launched its mobile application in Google play store. Now, students can apply for admission using their mobile phones.

Vice-chancellor Srikant Mohapatra said the World Bank had identified the university for a financial aid of Rs 25 crore for equity and excellence in higher education in the state. Commonwealth of Learning (COL), Canada, had assigned the varsity the responsibility for designing and developing resources for multimedia and animation.

Mohapatra said the university has 5500 learners in 25 programmes. Teaching and learning activities are undertaken at 43 study centres located in reputed colleges in Odisha. New programmes have been introduced in media management, rural management and android programming at the diploma and postgraduate diploma level.