Malle is coming like rain....sic!!

Real-life exam jokey to make you ROFL!!

Huch Meshtru Sridhar Sachidananda class nalli 1 hour paata madtane- Paper is -Media Management (100 marks) Unit 4 - Economics of Film Production and Distribution -- topic of the day "ROYALTY" -- 1 hour lecture and discussion followed by Q&A session (with ppt) and Googling allowed. 

2 weeks later mid-sem exam nalli Huch Meshtru Sachidananda prashne kelathane-- 

PART B

Write short notes on the following:

1. xxxxxx

2. xxxxx

3.Royalty (5 marks each) 

(about one page of relevant points expected. Easy score) 

 Joker Magalu baritaale answer book nalli 2 page note on Royalty:

'Om ganeshaiah namaha' 

Royalty:

Royalty means King and Queens (Raja/Rani). In older days they are very rich and famous. they will live in palase and marry many many time. they will eat only non-veg. they will fight a wars....they will go anywhere I want.......etc.etc..etc.....

Huch Mestru Sachidananda self-suicided !!

Luv

Prof. Iron Man 

Welcome home!! NMKRVeeeeeee.....!!!!

Welcome back home to Bangalore NMKRVCWDoJMC!!

Did you survive Delhi? Did you enjoy Delhi?

We shall, as soon as we meet next convene a postmortem meeting to critical analyze all things about the Delhi Study tour that went wrong and those that went right. Let's sit and discuss threadbare all things good, bad, ugly. We welcome all types of feedback- positive, negative.

For a change, I will remain shut and listen to all that you children have to say without arguing a single point. Anything you say is OK. Be unafraid.

Personally I feel that it was a great trip.

Issues with food, hotel accommodation, delays in sightseeing, Delhi city traffic congestion, very little free time to visit relatives and friends there, my own temperamental outbursts when students go missing from the group--which happened a lot on the first two days-- all did mar the fun side of the tour a bit sometimes. Yes. I am truly apologetic for my short-tempered outbursts. Please forgive me. I have learned to be more patient since then.

After the first day, I retired to the backseat and let Prof. Manoj who is a more mature, balanced and patient leader handle the group. I got busy with the nitty-gritties: arranging for hot food to be served on time, bus arriving on time, hot water for baths, keeping the air-conditioning temperature comfortable, arranging bedding for all, managing the local tour operator, planning the next day's sightseeing and industry visits, working out the unplanned costs, raising the money for it from my family here in Bangalore...etc.

Sharada Ma'm was busy with organizing curriculum activities - Sansad Bhavan, News X studio visit etc..

When we travel nearly 2500 km from home on a train and spend four days in a humongous and unsafe metro, one needs to anticipate such problems and be capable of resolving issues as they crop up.

We- the Faculty traveling with you, did just that. We slogged day and night, spent thousands from our pockets, spent many many sleepless nights to ensure that you children remain safe and get the most of this trip - education-wise, entertainment-wise.

Manoj Sir, Sharada Ma'm and I were very clear in our minds on the following priorities:

1) Student safety
2) Student comfort
3) Curriculum activities
4) Relevant Sightseeing
5) Shopping & free time

Throughout the trip, this order of priorities never changed. It was frozen before we even boarded the first
train in Bangalore on Rajyotsava night. At no cost would I risk student safety and health for cheap entertainment and street food.

I am a maniac when it comes to mission-criticality. I meditate for days on these things and plan, rehearse scene-by-scene those things that are well. like you guys say: "Must & Should". And believe me when I say, that whatever I did, I did with your best interests at heart. 

I don't want to deliver a one-hour speech on all the sacrifices we, the Faculty made. Suffice to say that we, all of us together, WON! When we landed on the Yeshwathpur railway platform and your parents came rushing to hug and kiss you, I almost cried....

The relief and happiness in having their beloved children safely back in their arms after 9 worrisome days glowing on their faces.....moved me to tears.

This relief came after a seven hour wait, courtesy Indian Railways and its inefficient staff. Our train arrived unduly late --in the wee hours of Monday morning instead of the scheduled arrival on late evening Sunday.

I have never been a father in my life. But I now know the pain in a father's heart when he hears the sobs of his beloved child on the phone, saying she is tired, hungry, sleepy and homesick and the blasted train stuck in a god forsaken place near Hindupur, AP, has not moved an inch in 4 hours.

Like I averred earlier, all said and done...WE WON!! 

This reminds me of a German football coach's interview on TV after Germany won the FIFA World Cup. I watched it years ago.

The anchor asked Coach Frank Beckenbeur: "What was your motto, you guiding principle, in this year's FIFA cup tournament? What helped you win and become world champions?"

Coach Frankie says: "I told the boys again and again in the locker room, on the field, during playoffs, at dinner, in Church, on the plane and before the final match-- ---If we win, I tell the world YOU DID IT!!--- If we lose, I tell the world-- I DID IT."

Enjoy your Deepavali...

Lots of luv

An exhausted, but very happy, Prof. Iron Man.

Serious Questions yield Funny Answers....

Good Morning NMKRVeeeeeeeee!!!

Yesterday was a mirthful day for my colleague Prof. Manoj and I. We spent the better part of the day evaluating your mid-semester examination answer books.

Manoj Sir and I, we enjoy this…yes? It’s great fun…reading your answers that is…. Many of them are downright hilarious!

Halt! My intention in writing this post is not to mock you and your earnest efforts to perform well in your examinations. Without going into the humiliating details, here’s some good advice for you:

I am yet to meet a student or trainee in my 21-year adventurous work life who really wishes to fail a test. All of you have done well, given your 100% and you have been rewarded for you sincerity. That’s the good news.

But excellence comes at a heavy price. One has to ‘prepare well’ and ‘perform under pressure’ to score well in exams and life. That is a lesson which is self-taught. No professor can do justice to you and that topic of discussion in a classroom environment. We can only aspire to inspire.

Life experiences & failure are the greatest of all teachers. It’s not ‘what’ you learn here in college that matters when you march forward into a career …..but ‘how’ you learn it.

What is your attitude? Do you just want another degree? Or do you want to succeed in life for now and forever? Attitude is everything. With the right attitude, YOU CAN achieve the impossible!

Well, I did! (Psst! Pls don’t tell anyone. I was worse than most of you….lazy, arrogant, stupid. But my life changed when I changed.)

What Manoj Sir and I summarized after poring through reams and reams of answer sheets is that we are indeed blessed with a super-diligent batch of students this academic year. But tad confused.

Confusion usually occurs when you are performing under pressure. But if you have prepared well for the battle, then your self-confidence ensures you Win. Preparation is the key to success.

(Do you know that Manoj Sir spends 3 hours each morning reading 5 news dailies and catching up with the latest news updates on TV and websites before he comes to class to lecture you? Every single day!)

Preparing for exams has less to do with ‘mugging it all up’. At a Master’s level, that does not help much because the questions require intellectual discussion rather than thoughtless reproduction of over-stated facts and theories. All that is just the foundation we lay.

The foundations for my 1-BHK thatched hut in JP Nagar and your dream mansion….are structurally the same. In class, Manoj Sir and I endeavor to lay that strong foundation, for you to architect & build your dream palace on.

Go ahead! Be brave me lovelies, me hearties! Dare to think differently!

 We wish to test your understanding of the subject matter, not your memory. We want you to give the world “fresh perspective”.

And technique.., if you master the techniques of performing under pressure, you are a winner for life. What my learned colleague and I observed is most of you believe that ‘writing a lot…long answers..’ earns you more marks.

Sorry Ma’m!! Good technique is saying a lot by saying less.

Evaluators look for PERTINENT POINTS  in your answer. If all the relevant points are discussed adequately in your answer, you score well. You don’t get more marks for recreating Ramayana!!

That said, all of life is like answering a 100-mark Media Studies question paper. From time to time Life throws difficult situations at you and the only person you need to answer to …..is yourself. Questions like:

1.      Is this what I really want?

2.      Can I do it?

3.      Why am I here saying and doing all these things?

4.      Is it just my ‘Karma’? Or do I do it because I love doing it?

5.      Who are these people around me?

6.      Why am I with them?

7.      When should I do this?

8.      Have I done it before?

9.      How do I do this?

10.  Can I do it better? How?

When you find the right answers to these simplistic questions my babies, YOU RULE!! YOU ROCK!!

Prof. Manoj joins me is wishing you all the very best for your futures. We are forever there for you. Don’t you ever forget that!

Lots of Luv

Prof. Iron Man

Examination evaluation:Trials and tribulation...

Nothing's done until the paperwork's done!! 

 

This corporate whine-line is just as relevant to me today as a lecturer, as it was four years ago as a corporate project manager.

 My celebration following invigilation duty completion was premature--I that realize now. "If you do good work, you will be rewarded with more work," my top-boss at Satyam Computers once averred. 

What usually follows is grueling answer book evaluation...poring over reams of answer papers in a desperate bid to find meaning, relevance and authenticity in the piles of pedantic rubbish!

But once in a while I do chance upon a gem-of-an-answer, neatly scripted, precise, relevant and displaying mature views besides memorized facts. It occurs in the worst of answer books too! A fleeting spark of intelligence, akin to a shooting star across a cloudless night sky. One just has to be perceptive and of course; very, very imaginative to make sense of it all :).

So it came to pass that today-- a national holiday spent in august company -- the respected Controller of Examinations (CoE)-- was a day well spent. 

How? Well, answer books are great feedback given to a teacher by his class.

 "To Sir"...they screamed out...  with a lot of love, hate, apathy, ignorance, confusion, misunderstanding, ambition, desire to excel, amazing comprehension, surprising ingenuity... and many more such mixed feelings associated with the effect of MY lectures on the impressionable, young minds in Senior class.

By some vague correlation I could figure out what each of my children in Senior class thinks of my lectures and how they feel about me as a person.  One simply needs to read with his inner eye and introspect.

Thanks guys for being kind to me. I guess all of you fared well this exam season (all over 50% scores) !?! Hey that's a new high class average!! Congrats, me hearties and celebrate! The ordeal is over for now. 

End-sem me jo bhi hoga...dekha jaye ga...

----

Coming soon to a department near you.....!!!! Results of the Mid-Sem papers !!! 

Enjoy your student life to the hilt! You might never get it back.

Lotsa Luv

Prof. Iron Man

Of Playing Pollyanna & Being Helpful Hannah...

It's not just the macho mustache that took shaving...when I joined as a Prof. in a women's college but my sizable male ego too...

Egoistic people dubiously don larger-than-life self-images...big Dreamworks lifetimes. They promise only what they cannot deliver and then fall flat on their faces. Grandiosity certainly has its failings. They are often delusive to the point of delirium.

Ask me. I am a walking-talking specimen. A living lie.

First week on Campus, I was entrusted a task. Plan a study tour to Delhi and arrange to meet the First Citizen of India: His Excellency The President.

Task assigned by my trusting HoD.

In less than 24 hours, I change the plan. Why not the cynosure of the global eye?: Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi ji instead? I discuss it with Departmental colleagues...they concur. Typically me..I hype it and drum up unmanageable expectations among students and others. In less than 48 hours I have an UnDeliverable on my hands.

Desperate calls to PMO, Request mails and over two dozen follow-up actions in the next 8 weeks. But in vain. Even the local MP and highly placed Delhi Babus can do precious little. Regret messages clog my inboxes.

Our PM is on a diplomatic mission the week we spend in Delhi. And postponement is ruled out. Train reservations, hotel bookings all done and dusted !!

Now I walk the hallowed corridors of the College, tail firmly tucked between me legs :(

People are forgiving of my tendency to over-promise and under-deliver. But am I ?

Rashtrapati ji is also busy that week. That's rubbing salt into my festering wounds.

Be that as it may. Rest goes well with the grand plan. Lots of fun, shopping, sight-seeing, selfie-taking, delectable dishes, lovely weather forecast for the week, fun-on-rails etc. all for an amazing price astutely costed by yours truly.

Chin up chappies!! U can't win 'em all!!

Let's make the most of what we have managed to bag and count our blessings rather than play blame-games. I am more human than most. Because, as I often admit, given my fool-hardy adventurousness, I am more imperfect than most.

Delhi !! Here we come!! The Lipstick Brigade !!

Happy Dasara to all.

Luv

Prof. Iron Man

Thinking out-of-the-box and the eternal paradox...

Good Moooornnninnnggg NMKRVeeeeee!!

If you are wondering what all the hype and hoopla is all about...here goes.

We, the Faculty of NMKRVDOJMC met up with Shri D P Nagaraj, Hon. Jt. Secretary, RSST, yesterday evening.

To my surprise he was nothing like I had imagined. During the 20 minute meeting DPN Sir seemed interested, receptive and supportive. He intently listened to our pitch for a Media School and our request for a Trust-mandated PR cell for NMKRVCW (and RV Group)....for 10 minutes. And then...

DPN Sir gave us sagely advise. Without quoting him word for word, what he said was something to this effect....

"Numbers, budgets, projections, benefits, MoUs...?? ..I don't see or hear you presenting any of them? Go do your homework before you come to me again."

I learnt a good lesson then. Numbers speak louder than poetry. Ideas are cheap, putting them to work can be prohibitive.Unless my research is water-tight, I won't get very far with my pet projects. So, it's back to the drawing board for us.

DPN Sir also taught class with examples. "Take Univ C for that matter, they have 16000 students on land which is 1/10th the area of what RSST owns in Bangalore. But they are doing better because they think out-of-the-box. Gender-specificity is an obsolete business game-plan. We need to include a large market of male outliers" ......Very True.

But the paradox is how many of us NMKRVCW Faculty & Students think like DPN Sir? How many of us dare to be bigger, better? We can; if we mind...it's really not so difficult. What's deficient is the willingness to change.

Change processes, products, technology...NOT people. They are our greatest asset. In doing so...we don't trample egos. But we vote for change nevertheless. Some may refuse to join us, many others might jump on to our bandwagon.

If we are relentless in our pursuit of excellence. Each of our 30 plus departments will be a Centre of Excellence (CoE). I know that sounds like a pipe-dream today. But as I always say...today is the first day of the rest of my life....Change is the only Constant in the Universe.

Good Luck with your exams. Happy Dasara!!

Luv

Prof. Iron Man