* The entire campus is abuzz with the bidding rigmarole for the fifth term elective courses. Bidding system is used to choose the electives and is followed by most of the big b-schools across the world. Bidding is because there are fewer seats per course than the number of students. The bidding system is a very fair system and allows one to choose the subjects one wants to specialize in and bid for them. Each student is allotted 4000 points and he can use these points in whichever fashion he wants, subject to two conditions – he has to complete 16 courses and specialize in one concentration (take six subjects under this concentration) to get the degree. The downside of bidding is that a student may not necessarily get an opportunity to do a course he wants to do. Given that there are fewer seats, students would bid gratuitously high numbers for favorite subjects taking the clearing price to high levels. Sanity will return only after the first experience, sometime during the Term 6 bids, hopefully. Till then it is madness here……..

* Strategic Analysis of Information Technology course, which ended today, was very good. The Prof., though not all liked him, was quite good as well. The course was not so much about knowing IT as about the understanding of the business dimensions of IT industry and investments in IT. He had a different model of teaching. He had given assignments to various groups and each group would make a presentation on a topic ranging from strategy of Cisco and Intel to Google and E-bay valuations. There were about 15 presentations. Most of what we learnt was from the presentations made by the groups. The Prof would end each class summing up what was presented and explaining how we need to appreciate the entire world of IT. He was indeed a messiah for IT ignorant people like me.