5 reasons to do an exchange term abroad

It’s been long since I contributed to this blog however this is a very apt occasion to make a comeback by describing the experience of an exchange term. For those uninitiated: PGSEM offers the students a chance (or 2 chances which I’ll explain later) to take one of their term in a foreign university. This is the same as offered to the PGP batch studying along with you and same to the extent that the rank list for choosing universities is common between the PGP and PGSEM students. For e.g. this year’s 2^nd ranker overall was a PGSEMer and he got to choose London Business School for his exchange term.

Anyways, exchange university selection process is a thrill in itself but to keep it short, around the 4^th quarter of your studies, you’re asked to choose if you want to take a quarter abroad. Now by 2 chances I meant that since PGSEM has 10 quarters so they get to opt 2 times for the exchange process (though they can only take 1 exchange term during the course). Based on your 1^st quarter marks, all students, PGP and PGSEM are ranked together and asked to choose the universities in order of the student’s rank. And don’t worry, IIM Bangalore has partnerships with most top institutes in all geographies.

Now coming back to the topic, what are the top 5 reasons for PGSEM students specifically to do an exchange term abroad? Though reasons below might overlap with numerous folks who have taken exchange term at different universities, ones stated below are strictly derived from my experience at NUS Business School, Singapore. Ordered from least important to the most important according to me:

Subject Choice is good reason for taking up an exchange. A lot of schools IIM has tie up with work in a university system and what I found exciting was that at NUS Business School, you have access to the whole university to choose some of the subjects. People can take up 1 subject outside of Business School in any discipline of their choice. Some people picked up Chinese language, some picked Music and so on. I ended up picking a course with school of design and environment out of my interest in Clean Tech. Even the business school would present you a different subject choice simply because they’re a different school with different faculty. To state it another way: It’s not needed that the foreign university is better, it’s better that there is more variety at your disposal.

Networking:  I feel that exchange term drastically increases your network. Especially when you’re a PGSEMer, you’re interacting with your batch mates in classes and to some extent after classes for extracurricular or projects. Being full-time in a hostel with a bunch of MBA students is a totally different experience. The friendships formed when you’re studying together, networking together (read partying) or eating together are fairly more involved. A totally new environment and new country helps your forge several new friendships in a short duration. Also since you’re studying full time, you could pick up even unpaid internships in fields that you’re more interested in and build your network further.

Diversity: Your network is not only large but more Diverse. Going into a foreign university during the exchange term, brings in people from various nationalities and various backgrounds. If two people had the same set of people they knew, the gain in network connections is not that much, but if the set of people are totally from different field and country, you gained a whole new network of friends. However perhaps scoring high on people you know is the least benefit of working in a diverse group. You learn a lot about team work, cultural sensitivity and tacit knowledge about dealing with a variety of people that’s much more valuable.

Career Services: Another important reason for me to choose exchange was for the career services that the exchange school provided. Let me clarify, this doesn’t mean that you’ll be sitting in placements in foreign school. What it means is that you can take help from career services of these schools to improve your profile, get your resume reviewed or even attend presentations from companies you’re interested in.

Taking MBA without work: Lastly but most importantly for a PGSEMer, an exchange term provides an opportunity to take your MBA without work. You’d note I didn’t use the word “Full-time” because for one I can tell is that the number classroom contact hours are exactly the same per subject either ways. What changes is that you’re much more focussed on the subjects and don’t have to switch context too much. If it was to me, I’d say PGSEMers are the most hardened MBA graduates who can balance more than any other full time folks. However at the same time, it’s a pleasant break to be able to concentrate on your subjects full time, pick up more subjects, spend your extra time in extracurricular activities and be a student again.

However at the end of the day, there is opportunity cost involved.  PGSEMers are constrained by their work commitments sometime and cannot take this unpaid break from work. Such long a break might even put your employment at risk. This decision finally rests on the person taking it and s/he has to fix all these. There are some schools which even give scholarships to IIM students and if not totally free, the trip costs reduce drastically.

It was a great experience for me and I hope some of the above reasons resonate with you and you take this exciting opportunity that PGSEM provides you.

A different experience!

Business School education is not all about Leadership, Corporate Strategy, Pricing, Financial models or JIT manufacturing. I believe now a days, many B Schools focuses equally on other important topics like entrepreneurship, international economy and politics, social entrepreneurship et.al. One thing I noticed in the last 1.5+ in B School interacting with students and faculty in IIMB and other B Schools is that, each B School follow roughly some philosophy while designing the curriculum.Likewise IIM Bangalore gives thrust to topics like entrepreneurship, public policy and new venture creation through inclusive business models etc. along with the usual courses. Last quarter, we had an elective course on Social Entrepreneurship by Prof. Trilochan Sastry. Yes, the name may ring a bell to you - he was behind important contributions to the country like Association of Democratic Reforms, Election Watch, Farmer Cooperatives etc.

As part of the course, we had to work with a NGO to understand its activities and get a hands on experience of running an NGO.We decided to work with AKSHARA Foundation as part of this project. After a few discussions with the volunteers at AKSHARA, we decided to focus on a project that they were currently undertaking. Essentially it was to conduct the feasibility study of adding a technological solution to the manual process of ASER.Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) is a manual data collection exercise done by 25000+ volunteers across India under the guidance of Pratham to study the effectiveness of school eduction in Government Schools in Indian Villages.

The learning from projects like these is enormous.We had no clue that such a humongous activity is done every year just to understand the effectiveness of education in India. Even though the volunteers at AKSHARA stressed its importance, we had this question - is it really a required one? The answers were provided when we read former ASER reports that showed the real pathetic condition of Government school education. Its importance was strengthened when we visited a few schools in the villages in Hoskote taluk in Bangalore. We visited few schools in the villages of Muthukadahalli, Karpnahalli,Naganahalli and Sidanpura.It was the first village visit for all of us.We had no clue how different it will be to be in village schools.

The first school that we visited was in size not more than that of a dining hall!! It was a single teacher school. Believe it or not, we noticed the peculiarity of this school - 5 classes(Standard I to V) in a single classroom!

After spending some time with the children, we headed to the next school. It was some what better with two classrooms - Standard I to III in one room and Standard IV to VII in the next room!

Our professor used to stress on one fact that people in rural areas are far more receptive that those in the cities. They don't need freebies, they look for empowerment. This was clearly evident in our interaction with the teachers and children in these schools.We were like the 'School Inspector' visiting each school :) After some interaction with the teachers, each student came to us showcasing their talent in writing, painting, paper crafts and so on...

Personally for me, it was embarrassing as I had no clue on what to expect from these visits and such a welcoming reaction from children! I wished I know to speak Kannada.The more embarrassing fact for me was that - whenever we visited classrooms, we removed our shoes noticing that the children were not wearing anything. We thought it may be a custom not to wear chappals inside classrooms. I never thought at the first instance that they didn't have the financial ability to buy food or dress let alone chappals.
How disconnected am I from the real world!

We also got the opportunity to talk to few parents. It was really interesting to see the importance and enthusiasm they show in their childrens' studies. We noticed the other extreme also - where the family is in a big turmoil, that the children come to school escaping from those or just for the mid day meals.

In another school visit, we ate the mid day meals provided to children. Once again, it was a surprise visit for them; the school authorities didn't get time to prepare a separate meal for us. The children and teacher promised us to prepare payasa and kesari bath during our next visit. How nice of them.....we had to promise in turn, when we will come back!!!