Innovative Course on Digital Marketing

Sri Aurobindo Centre for Arts and Communication is offering a Postgraduate Diploma in Digital Marketing Communication, in partnership with Digiqom, a leading digital marketing agency. This innovative course provides students with the knowledge needed to develop new ways of creating and delivering information over digital media networks along with business innovation and strategic application to support them.

In this new era of digital media and online communication, marketing managers, advertising executives and media professionals must have multifaceted talents in order to combine creative flair with technological skills and strategic business thinking.

The PG Diploma course in Digital Marketing Communication prepares the future generation of media professionals who will exploit the fast changing world of online and digital media. Students will learn what it takes to manage online social communities, undertake campaigns, and maximize audience engagement in the digital media space.

The program focuses on:

• Online storytelling and effective content creation for online media
• The business of digital media (revenue models and effective marketing strategies)
• The power and scope of social media to create communities and distribution networks

Program Structure

The program will build up a foundation of creative skills in visual and written communication and technically innovative solutions for creating social media communities and online campaigns. In addition, it the program will focus on honing the strategic thinking and managerial thought process needed to make a career in the digital space.

Students will also study the convergence of old and new communication technologies in India and around the world to better understand the driving forces behind this digital media revolution. This is key knowledge for anyone looking to advance his or her career through the use of social media innovation.

The program will emphasize on the practical application of knowledge. From learning how to use the social media platforms like Twitter, Linkedin, Google+, Pinterest, Facebook etc, to optimizing audience interaction, creating points of interaction and designing viral marketing programs, the students will go through a journey and learn to integrate online, offline and mobile marketing strategies for the purpose.

In the last term of the program, students will undergo an intensive field placement in a digital media company. In their internship period, they will be required to use their acquired skills on job and will continue to pursue their coursework in parallel.

For more information, go to: Sri Aurobindo Centre for Arts and Communication

The case for social media in Indian schools

The recent episode of the bullying video going viral in Delhi has only made the case for social media in schools stronger, in my opinion.

Just think about it. If a student hadn’t recorded the incident and circulated the video, would the nasty case have been viewed by thousands or even treated with the seriousness that it deserves? Or would it have been brushed under the carpet like countless bullying episodes that take place in our schools on a daily basis.

Remember the eleven-year-old girl who died in Kolkata last year after being bullied by seniors? Were the bullies taken to task? No. Instead parents unleashed their fury on the school’s principal. None of the newspapers named or shamed the bullies who slipped away into the comforting cover of anonymity. Some punishment that.

Instead of banning mobile phones and treating social media tools such as WhatsApp and Facebook as a detriment, schools and educators in India (and elsewhere) need to educate students about using social media in a positive way. While it’s true that there are many dangers online, there are risks offline as well. Parents and educators need to make children aware of these dangers and help them use social media and mobile phones to enrich their lives and also, in cases such as bullying and harassment, make them more secure.

Social media, when used correctly, can be a powerful tool. It's time to educate our children.

A stamp of approval

Sharon Bamford, Chief Executive of the Association of MBAs (AMBA), was in Delhi recently to speak at a global accreditation conference. The UK-based organisation accredits programmes at 190 business schools in over 70 different countries. Sharon spoke with me about the AMBA accreditation process and global quality standards for Indian business schools.

Debeshi: All of a sudden, leading business schools in India are scrambling for international accreditation. Why, in your opinion, has this happened?

Sharon: India has taken its place at the top table in terms of global politics, global companies and global leaders - it is now important that India's top business schools are recognised for their global standards in research and teaching.

Sharon Bamford: accreditation is key

Accreditation differs from rankings in that it is audited to ensure compliance. Our accreditation in particular, is not about imposing irrelevant foreign standards on a school, but ensuring key quality indicators are benchmarked globally and the programmes we accredit are relevant for the context and the Market, thus, ensuring impact. We regard it as a developmental and consultative process and schools feed back to us that the process was as important as receiving the accreditation itself.

Globalisation requires not only a global mindset, but global knowledge and the skills to operate in a global marketplace. India's top schools already have outstanding international partnerships with schools who hold international accreditations, but to be an equal partner it is important that India's schools also benchmark themselves against these global quality standards.

India has the opportunity to attract international students to its top business schools, but this discerning market will require assurances of standards, not just in the teaching and learning, but in aspects of pastoral care, alumni relations, industry links, to name but a few.

Indian graduates are taking global leadership roles and need to be cognizant of the recognition of their qualifications on the world stage - an international accreditation of their programme is.

Debeshi: When awarding AMBA accreditation, what are the things that are taken into account?

Sharon: A critical element for us is the three years of relevant work experience, which we see as the cornerstone of a quality MBA. In India we accredit the MBA that new graduates sign up for as the equivalent of a Masters in Management, and the Executive and Part Time MBAs as an MBA. We look for international experience, which can be given in a variety of ways that suit the school and its students and we require minimum cohort size of at least 20 and at least 50% of the faculty to have PhD's, thus ensuring the quality and relevance of the learning for the student. The programme should also have been running for a certain number of years.

We originated as an organisation 'by MBAs, for MBAs' so a prospective student signing up for an AMBA accredited MBA can be assured of a qualification that is recognised internationally and is rigorous and relevant.

Debeshi: How does accreditation from an international agency such as yours improve prospects of domestic business schools?

Sharon: Business school graduates are increasingly mobile and even a very good school might not be recognised by employers around the world. An international accreditation articulates that the school meets global quality standards and that the school belongs to an elite 'club'. An employer in Australia may not have heard of an Indian school, but they would understand that if that school had met the same quality standards as Queensland University of Technology, for example, they would be able to set the candidates qualifications in the context of a quality school from their own environment.

We are also an MBA membership organisation and the alumni from all of 190 accredited schools across the world provides an outstanding network.

Debeshi: Which are the Indian b-schools that have been awarded AMBA accreditation?

Sharon: IIM Lucknow, IIM Kozikhode, SP Jain and MDI Gurgaon are the Indian schools with AMBA accreditation.

Debeshi: Any new updates/developments that you would like to share with my readers?

Sharon: I was invited to speak at the first global accreditation conference here in Delhi, but have extended my visit to meet with our schools and also with candidate schools that are going through the accreditation process.

The Indian alumni from our accredited schools that have returned to India are also important to us and we running an MBA Refresher, delivered by international and Indian faculty in August this year. Part of our mission is to maintain the professionalism of the MBA through continuous professional development.

Trinity College Dublin plans big for India

Professor Jane Ohlmeyer, VP of Global Relations at Trinity College Dublin, one of Ireland’s oldest universities was recently in New Delhi as part of the university’s ongoing deepening engagement with India. Apart from being at the cutting edge of research, technology and innovation, Trinity recently has had Bollywood on campus with the filming of Ek Tha Tiger. Jane Ohlmeyer spoke to me at length about the university’s plans for India.

Professor Jane Ohlmeyer with Salman Khan: Bollywood calling

Debeshi: Can you elaborate on why you are visiting New Delhi

Jane: We are visiting to do a number of things: to raise the visibility of Trinity College Dublin, the University of Dublin in India; to nurture high level collaborations with leading Indian universities; and to promote our postgraduate and undergraduate courses to prospective Indian students.

Debeshi: What are Trinity College Dublin's plans for India?

Jane: Trinity has extensive research collaborations in India.  Here are a few examples.

Civil Engineering: A scholarship scheme for the exchange of students of taught Masters courses and research collaboration between consortium members has been developed by the Department of Civil, Structural and Environmental Engineering at Trinity College Dublin, the University of Dublin and a number of Institutes of Technology, National Institutes of Technology and universities in northern India.

Trinity’s Adjunct Professor Ravindra Dhir and Associate Professor Roger West, of TrinityHaus, the Michael McNamara Centre for Construction Innovation and Sustainability at Trinity, have  developed the initiatives:

The Ireland-Indian Initiative in Civil Engineering (I3CE@TCD) sets out to foster links between Trinity and a select number of high level Indian academic institutions to facilitate the exchange of staff and postgraduate students in the delivery of the MSc/MTech taught course programmes. It will allow Indian or Irish students to spend one year in the partner institution with full credit towards their degree.  Indian students from partner institutions who are accepted to attend for an academic year in Trinity will be awarded a scholarship.  Dissertations will be co-supervised with a corresponding academic in the partner institution.

As part of this process, Memoranda of Understanding have just been signed between Trinity College and the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi and Thapar University,Patiala. MTech Internship students are currently in Trinity College Dublin researching composite bamboo columns for structural use, in collaboration with Professor Suresh Bhalla of IIT Delhi, supported by the Faculty of Engineering, Mathematics and Science at Trinity.

The Ireland-India Concrete Research Initiative (IICRI), is developing collaborations in research with such partner institutions, including joint funding and supervision of PhD students. There is a significant challenge for both countries in developing more sustainable concrete, essential to infrastructural, commercial and domestic building projects. The use of greener alternative cements in concrete leads to changes in the durability characteristics which have relevance for both life-cycle costings and the carbon footprint associated with infrastructural development. The consortium of Civil Engineering at Trinity and its Indian partners aim to share expertise, knowledge, resources and facilities in order to disseminate the necessary innovations to allow Irish and Indian engineers to take advantage of more sustainable concrete materials with confidence in the future.

Trinity College Dublin’s Professor of Experimental Brain Research, Shane O’Mara recently visited the National Institute for Mental Health and Neuroscience, NIMHANS, in Bangalore, in order to teach in a Department of Science and Technology (India) sponsored school in the Neurobiology of Learning and Memory. A competition was held to bring students from all over India to participate in a special teaching programme involving faculty from all over India, and from the USA and Ireland.

The school was organised jointly by Professor of Neurogenetics, Mani Ramaswami for Trinity College Dublin, the University of Dublin, and Professor B S Shankaranarayana.  Twenty-five students were selected for the programme, coming to Bangalore from as far afield as New Delhi, Bhopal, Calcutta and other locations. Professor O’Mara taught on two topics: a) the functions of the hippocampal formation in learning, memory and amnesia, and b) the neural coding of memories by ensemble activity in the brain.

In addition to his teaching at NIMHANS, Professor O’Mara also visited Professor Shona Chatterji, at the National Centre for Biotechnological Sciences, NCBS with whom he has established a Science Foundation Ireland-funded research programme. A research student will visit Professor O’Mara’s laboratory for six months during the course of 2012 to avail of advanced training in the use of the TCIN 7T magnetic resonance imaging system. An exciting experimental programme has been devised and joint publications between TCIN and NCBS are expected.

Trinity College Dublin, the University of Dublin’s arts and humanities research institute, the Trinity Long Room Hub, has a Memorandum of Understanding with the Jawaharlal Nehru Institute of Advanced Student (JNIAS), Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), New Delhi. It facilitates a bilateral exchange programme whereby two fellows from each institution annually spends up to three months in the partner institution.  There they contribute to the research environment of the host, via research presentations and one-on-one meetings, and carry out their own research. Scholars named to the programme for 2012 are Professor Eunan O'Halpin (TCD), Peter Arnds (TCD) and Jyoti Atwal (JNU). 

In the first instance, the programme is focused on the arts and humanities, but scholars outside of these agreements can be facilitated by agreement between the institutions. 

 

Debeshi: How many international students are there on campus? How many of these are from India?

Jane: Today it has a vibrant community of 17,000 students representing 122 nationalities, and a wide range of social backgrounds, age-groups and cultures.  About 10% of our students are from non-EU countries, including India. We have 140 Indian students at Trinity, 45 of whom are undergraduates and the rest are postgraduates.  These students are studying a wide range of subjects: Engineering, English Literature, Economics, Computer Science, Medicine, Business and Medicine.   We are keen to increase the number of Indian students studying at Trinity and in August will advertise scholarships for postgraduate and undergraduate study.

Debeshi: Any other interesting updates you would like to share with our readers.

Jane: The Bollywood film, Ek Ta Tiger, which stars Salman Khan and Katrina Kaif was filmed in Trinity in September 2011 and has a Trinity story line.  The film will be launched on 15 August 2012 and we plan a range of activities in Delhi and other Indian cities around the time of the launch.

Watch this space for more!