Industry-Institution Interaction – Talks held

• Smt. R. Sreelekha IPS, IG-Crime Branch, Kerala, spoke to the students on Ethics in Management, on January 28.
• Smt. Sunitha Karodt, GM-HR, Orchid Hotels India, Mumbai, made a presentation to the students on the topic preparing for and Facing Interviews, on February 3.
•  Dr. Joe Madrath, Founder and Executive Director, Gramavikas, Orissa, made a presentation to the students on Challenges in Rural Management, on February 12.
• Shri.Anil Kumar Pillai, Senior Manager – Technical Services, Madras Cements, Chennai, interacted with the students on the topic Cement Industry in India, on February 15.
• Shri.N.P. Thirukude, Brand Consultant, Thiruvananthapuram, interacted with the students on Brand Innovation, on February 16.
• Shri. Manish Srivastava, Regional Head (South), Reliance Money, spoke to the students on the topic Training to Meet the Challenges of Finance Management, on February 20.
• Dr.C.Mohankumar, Director, SCMS Institute for Bioscience and Biotech Research and Development, Cochin, made a presentation to the students on Bt Brinjal Research – Is it Abnormal or Extraordinary?, on February 20.

DelPHE project Workshop in Tanzania

The third stake holder workshop of the multi-country research project, DelPHE project, is being organised at the Institute of Finance Management in Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania, between February 23 and 27. Representatives from partner countries, Tanzania, Ghana, India and UK, will be attending the workshop. The workshop will review the learnings from the pilot field work done in the three countries and suggest modifications in the instrument. The data collection template and data collection strategies will also be formalized in these meetings. Academics and experts are expected to attend the conclave.

Dr.Ram Mohan R., Director-Research and Training and Prof. Mercia Selva Malar, HOD-Insurance and Banking, will be representing SCMS-COCHIN, the lead partner.

SCMS-COCHIN wins Innovative B School Award

SCMS-COCHIN has been honoured with the Innovative B School Award, for the year 2009-2010, instituted by Business School Affaire, Mumbai. The award is in recognition of the outstanding innovative leadership of SCMS-COCHIN in Building Academic and Industry Interface.

The award was received by Dr.V.Raman Nair, Director, SCMS-COCHIN, from Shri. Jigmi Yoser Thinley, Prime Minister, Bhutan, at the award ceremony conducted at Taj Lands End, Mumbai on February 12.

Students of SCMS-COCHIN ‘a fabulous lot,’ – Dr. Iyengar

According to Dr.Raghavan Iyengar, Professor, North Carolina Central University, USA, who came down to teach a three credit course on Financial Reporting and Analysis at our campus during last December, under our faculty exchange programme, the students at SCMS-COCHIN are a “fabulous lot.” His feedback on his impressions reads as follows: “I wish to let you know how much I was impressed by the facilities, resources and most of all the students at SCMS-COCHIN. As you may be aware, I have a pre-existing medical condition that makes it hard for me to stand up and deliver lectures for more than an hour or so continuously. But the students’ enthusiasm, dedication, respect for education and high regard for the teachers made me shrug off the pain.

It was truly a delight teaching the students at SCMS-COCHIN. They were a fabulous lot and made my job far too easy.”

Dr.G.P.C.Nayar elected National President

Dr.G.P.C.Nayar, Chairman, SCMS Group, has been elected as the new National President of the Federation of Associations of Private Unaided Professional Colleges in India, at the annual general meeting of the Federation held in Hyderabad on January 6. The Federation has 8600 member colleges spread over 18 states. Dr.Nayar’s unanimous election to the national presidential position was in recognition of his exemplary track record as the founder President of the Kerala Self-financing Engineering College Managements’ Association in establishing the absolute right of the private unaided institutions in Kerala in the matter of admissions and fee fixation. In addition to the Kerala Self-financing Engineering College Managements Association, Dr.Nayar is also the founder President of the Association of Self-financing Management Institutions in Kerala and the Association of Self-financing Technology (MCA) Institutions in Kerala. After taking over charge as the new President, Dr.Nayar said that the AICTE was ignoring the fact that 97 percent of the professional colleges in the country belonged to the private unaided sector. Any action on the part of the AICTE to implement their new stipulations in regard to faculty requirement and new pay scale would result in total chaos in the professional education sector in the country, he pointed out. Around 10.65 lakh students are studying in the unaided professional institutions in India today. The Prime Minister and HRD Minister are well aware of the problem of faculty shortage not only in private institutions but also in Government institutions. It is reported that the Government institutions including IITs and IIMs have 52 per cent shortage in the matter of faculty.

Higher education in focus

India’s higher education system is the third largest in the world, after China and the US. However, the system is limping because of a variety of issues of concern related to funding, management, enhancement of quality, reorientation of the programmes and above all making the system globally competitive. It is estimated that Indians spend approximately $ 5 billion a year for enabling their children to go abroad for higher studies. A natural question that arises in this context is that what prevents India from developing into a global hub for higher studies? Already Asian countries like Japan, China, Singapore, Taiwan, and S. Korea are investing heavily in their higher education system for positioning themselves for leadership. The recent ranking of the world’s top 200 universities by Times Higher Education shows how well these countries are making their progress. The rank list includes 11 universities in Japan, six in China, five in Hong Kong, four in S.Korea, and two each in India and Singapore. Creating a higher education system for the country comparable to the best in the world has now become one of the critical priorities for our nation’s future because knowledge is the real driving force of our economy. We are quite aware of the challenges involved in fulfilling this task. India has a distinct advantage in this respect. We are already producing a large pool of qualified technical manpower. And many of our people find rewarding employment and promising career opportunities abroad. But, competition has become the hallmark of growth world over. Therefore, if we are to increasingly cash on this advantage and at the same time meet the growing domestic demand to support our booming economy, we need to take immediate steps to renovate and rejuvenate our higher education to bring it on par with the best in the world. It was unfortunate that for many decades quality was not a priority for us. It is time that we are competitive in this sector also. In spite of all our drawbacks, India has a few unique advantages over the other Asian countries. For example, the use of English as a primary language for higher education and for research is a plus point of our system. We have a long academic tradition to be proud of. Indian education was the best in the world in the ancient times. Our ancient great centres of learning like Nalanda and Taxila were world-renowned. We do have a few world-class institutions and centres of excellence. They can form the nucleus of our future institutions of excellence. Blindly following the American model will not be the right approach for us to produce the desired result. We may have to create our own academic models appropriate to the needs of our nation and at the same time meeting the global demands and standards. Let us look forward to the recent steps initiated by the Government of India to make the academic system vibrant in order to create a launching pad that will push forward our economic growth.

Dr. G.P.C.Nayar , Chairman, SCMS Group

Sad demise of PGDM student

We deeply mourn

We, the management, faculty, staff and students of SCMS Group of Educational Institutions deeply mourn the sad and untimely demise of PGDM Batch 17 student Manu Chandran, son of  Shri. Padmakumar, Kalakyat House, Mannar, Alapuzha District. He died in a road accident on January 24.

The entire SCMS family joins the bereaved family of the deceased in their hour of grief.

Activities held in Jan @ SSET

Karukutty Kitty

Nisha bags First Rank

Nisha Peter of MCA first Batch from SSET has bagged the University First Rank in the MCA final examination conducted by MG University in October 2009.

Placement cell

Placement activities of 2010 batch of B.Tech. students started off with Infosys Technologies organizing a recruitment drive on January 8 at SSET campus. 22 students drawn from various branches were selected for placement.

HCL Infosystems, Spectrum Softech Solutions, Poornam Info Vision and Galfar Engineering and Contracting SAOG, Oman have scheduled their recruitment programme to be completed before the end of February.

Infosys campus connect programme

Shri. Niju P. Joseph, Assistant Professor(MCA) and Smt. Viji Gopal, Lecturer (CSE), attended the faculty empowerment programme organised by Infosys as part of their campus connect programme, held at Amrita Vidyapeedham, Vallikkavu, Kollam between January 18 and 22.

Staff achievements

• Shri.P. Venu, Associate Professor (ME), presented a paper ‘Global remote quality function deployment object’ at the International Conference on Advances in Industrial Engineering, held at Anna University, Chennai from January.6 and 8. The paper was guided and co-authored by Prof M.Madhavan, Director, SSET.

• Smt. K. Deepa, Assistant Professor-MCA, presented a paper ‘Software refactoring’ at the seminar on ‘Recent advances in computing’ held at U.C. College, Aluva from January 19 to 21.

• Shri Anand Raj Hariharan, Assistant Professor (ME) presented a paper, ‘Thermal mixing analysis of three lobed clover nozzle’ at the International Conference on Materials, Mechanics and Management, held at College of Engineering, Thiruvanathapuram from January 14 to16.

• Smt. Anita G.. Pillai, Associate Professor CE) and Shri B. Manoj Kumar, Assistant. Professor (AU) have obtained MXLA certification in pursuit of excellence in engineering. education through innovations as a part of Mission 10X Programme of  Wipro Technologies.

• Shri B. Manoj Kumar, Assistant Professor (AU) has been included as an expert member on the panel of Arbitrators by Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum, Ernakulam.

• Shri.M. Dhileep, Assistant. Professor (CE) presented three papers at the International Conference on Materials, Mechanics and Management, held at College of Engineering, Thiruvananthapuram, from January 14 to16. They are: (1) Effect of rigid content on mid frequency region of response spectrum, (2) Effect of global and local variations of strength of concrete in dynamic response of machine foundations, and (3) Assessment of seismic pounding hazard for Phuentsholing City.

Students achievements

Sanjay Raj (S6CS) has secured third place in the popular music programme Gandharva Sangeetham of  Kairali TV.

NSS technical cell

An anti narcotics awareness programme was organised for S1 and S2 students on January 21. The function was conducted in collaboration with the evening news paper flash from Kerala Kaumudi Group. Shri. K.Mohanan , Deputy. Commissioner and Shri. Anil Kumar, C.I, both of them from the Excise Department, Government of Kerala, Shri. Mahesh, Bureau Chief, Kerala Kaumudi and Dr. Rajith Kumar, Educational Counselor, NCERT, were the resource persons.

SSTM activities in Jan

SSTM Salver

Papers presented

• Smt. Sharlima, Lecturer, presented a paper titled ‘The effect of dividend announcements on stock returns of selected Indian companies’ at the International conference on  Emerging Financial Markets held at PSGIM, Coimbatore on January 4 and 5.

• Smt.Hasnath Abu, Assistant Professor-MCA, presented a paper  ‘Identifying topical micro logging experts’ at the National Conference on Advanced Computing conducted in U.C.College, Aluva, from January 20 to 22.

Articles published

• An article by Smt.Marianne Simon, Lecturer, titled ‘Addressing the issue of employee obsolescence’ has been published in HRM Review, January2010 issue.

• An article by Smt.Tilly Chacko, Lecturer, titled ‘The best practices of HR in service sector: An SME service industry’ has been published in HRM Review, January 2010 issue.

Paper Presented

Dr.C.K.Rajan, Professor-in-charge, Chair on Global Environment Change, presented a paper on ‘The utility of meteorological data in research,’ at the Users’ Conference on Public Weather Services for Kerala and Lakshadweep, organised by Meteorological Centre, India Meteorological Department, Government of India, Thiruvananthapuram, on January 20.