Learning Through Industry Interface Projects
Industry interface projects are an integral part of the curriculum of the Global Masters of Business Administration GMBA program at S.P. Jain School of Global Management, which has campuses in Singapore and Dubai. The GMBA is a one-year full-time residential program, where students spend six months each in Singapore and Dubai, completing one project at each location. The first project, which is undertaken in Singapore, is called the Applied Research Project ARP and is an “inquiry based” field research project. It provides an opportunity to the students to apply their knowledge of market research, quantitative techniques, and other subjects that they learn in the first semester. This is an independent project without any involvement of a client organization. The second project, which is undertaken in Dubai, is called the Action Learning Project ALP. Fresh teams are formed to undertake this client-based project, and there is no relationship between the topics and teams of ARPs and ALPs. Over a period of the last seven years, more than 250 students have undertaken about 100 ARPs and 100 ALPs with 50 client organizations in the areas of logistics and supply chain management. In this paper I discuss the structure of these projects and learnings from undertaking these projects at two locations.
Determinants of Internship Effectiveness: An Exploratory Model
Despite the growing popularity of internships, surprisingly little research has investigated causes of their effectiveness. We combine the findings from these studies with insights from the personn...
Parboiled rice effluent: A wastewater niche for microalgae and cyanobacteria with growth coupled to comprehensive remediation and phosphorus biofertilization
Abstract The potential of microalgae and cyanobacteria for bioremediation of wastewater by nutrient uptake combined with simultaneous biomass production is a well recognized perception of today's world. The present study illustrates the treatment of a highly polluted wastewater generated during parboiling of paddy in rice mill industries, widely operational in developing countries where rice is the staple food crop, with the help of microalgal and cyanobacterial isolates capable of growing at high rates in parboiled rice mill effluent (RME). This endeavor leads to comprehensive bioremediation of the said effluent and subsequent use of the harvested biomass as slow release phosphorus biofertilizers and the treated effluent for crop irrigation. The RME-acclimatized algal consortium demonstrated highest growth in terms of fresh weight and greatest remediation efficiency at the end of 36 days' treatment of RME, with 93.9% phosphorus and 100% ammonia-nitrogen removal, 98.7%, 91.6% and 93.5% reduction in biological oxygen demand, chemical oxygen demand and total dissolved solid, respectively, and an increment of 186 ± 0.3 mg L − 1 dissolved oxygen, bringing down the pollutants level well below the discharge limits suggested by Central Pollution Control Board, India. Additionally, microalgae in the consortium aggregated in clumps spontaneously in presence of the filaments of Phormidium sp. facilitating easy harvest. The RME-acclimatized algal consortium demonstrated highest accumulation of polyphosphate (poly-P) (0.76 ± 0.01% of dry weight) as well as highest release of phosphorus in non-sterile soil emphasizing the essential role of soil phosphorus solubilizing organisms to leach soluble phosphorus from the insoluble poly-P present in the biomass. The rice seedlings watered with treated RME also showed improved growth effect on shoot height and leaf width. The study results establish the suitability of RME as an excellent growth media for microalgae and cyanobacteria.