The Report of visit to USA by COEP Director

(7th July 2008 -20th July 2008)

Prof. A. D. Sahasrabudhe, Director, COEP visited USA between 7th July 2008 and 20th July 2008 on the invitation of COEP Charitable Foundation (an alumni association of COEP in USA). The visit began from New Jersey (7th July), proceeding to New York (9th July), Cleveland (10th July), San Francisco (11th and 12th July), Phoenix (13th July), Los Angeles (14th July), San Jose (15th July), Seattle (16th and 17th July), Chicago (18th and 19th July). Prof. A. A. Sawant, Head, Computer Engineering and IT who was already in USA on personal leave joined Prof. Sahasrabudhe on 10th July (in Cleveland) and was available for visits till 17th July (Seattle). Prof. C. V. Joshi, HoD, E & TC who had been to San Francisco for presenting a paper in an International Conference was also available in meetings with alumni on 12th July and 15th July. The prime objective of this visit was to have interaction with a large number of COEP alumni settled in USA, to inform them about the status of autonomy awarded to the college, the progress made by the institute in terms of academics, administration, governance and finances with the help of eminent members of the Board of Governors, seeking financial help from the alumni in the development of institute, requesting the alumni for raising an endowment fund, visiting Universities, laboratories and having meetings with academicians from renowned universities in the US for understanding their best practices, seeking their help for identifying possible faculty for COEP, explore possibilities of long term academic engagements, and visits to a few industrial and research organizations at various places in the US.

Meetings with Alumni

COEP Alumni Meeting 8th July, East Brunswick NJ :

A meeting of alumni in the New Jersey region was held in the evening of 8th July. Following 9 alumni attended the meeting.

NAME COEP BATCH DEPT
Deepak Konale 1996 E&TC
Sameer Joshi 1996 Mechanical
Prajna Khisty (Vandana Deokar) 1991 Electrical
Anjali Nandedkar 1977 Metallurgy
Narayan Deshpande 1961 Mechanical
Ravi Bhatkal 1988 Mechanical
Shitalkumar Vibhute 1994 Mechanical
Omkar Paratkar 1992 Civil
Ajit Srivastava 1994 Civil

A presentation was made by the Director about the progress made by the institute during the last two years followed by a question answer session. Mrs. Anjali Nandedkar and Mr. Srivastava also talked about COEP foundation and Technocraft competition. Everyone appealed to the alumni to contribute liberally.

COEP Alumni Meeting 9th July, Hopewell Junction, NY :

A meeting of alumni in the New York region was held in the evening of 9th July. Following alumni attended the meeting.

NAME COEP BATCH DEPT
Prakash Mahajan 1968 Electrical
Rahul Terdalkar 2003 Mechanical
Rohit Takalkar 1999 Metallurgy
Sudhir Takalkar 1975 Mechanical
Anjali Nandedkar 1977 Metallurgy

Director talked about the progress at COEP and difficulties in getting quality faculty. He appealed to alumni for creating an endowment fund to get excellent faculty and retain them by way of additional remuneration. Anjali Nandedkar described the projects conducted by COEP Charitable Foundation. Alumni decided to support several initiatives by the Foundation. Alumni will inform and involve other alumni who could not attend the meeting on a week day. Alumni decided to have a get together in August.

Spoke to Mr Srikrishna Athawale an alumnus of 1947 batch (Ph 301-230-1962). He has promised to donate to the cause of COEP.

COEP Alumni Meeting in DDS Finance, Cleveland, 10th July:

Prof. Sawant had already reached Cleveland and joined the visits to various places thereafter.

There was a meeting with Mr. Ashok and Rajanee Shendure. Mr. Gaonkar and Mr. Patil in DDS Finance, Cleveland, a company owned by Shendures. Director explained about the progress of COEP and sought help from the alumni. Mr. Shendure was happy about the progress made by COEP in the last two years and promised to donate towards either the girls hostel or entrepreneurship institute. He also informed about another alumnus of COEP, Prof. Vijay Sathe and arranged a meeting with him in Los Angeles.

Meeting with alumni in San Francisco 11th July :

On 11th July morning met with Nickhil Jakatdar, BE Electrical from COEP and one who has had successes in many start ups. The COEP’s march towards excellence was very much appreciated by him who has promised to help the cause of COEP.

In the afternoon met with Prof. Thomas Kailath in the Stanford University. There was a detailed discussion about present condition of COEP, past, present and challenges ahead. He was appreciative of the efforts made by COEP and its Board of Governors. He also indicated that more than trying to force every faculty to do PhD, we need highly committed and motivated teachers who can shape the careers of students. He gave the example of his teachers in COEP, none of whom were PhDs, but did a wonderful job of teaching fundamentals, which motivated young students to take to research. He mentioned the name of Prof. Aiyya in particular. He further felt that rather than supporting a Chair Professor’s position, he would be more interested in funding an endowment through which faculty and students at Masters or Bachelors level could be motivated to take socially relevant projects.
Prof. Kailath was informed about the involvement of COEP students in Jal Dindi Yatra for creating awareness about avoiding pollution of Mula and Mutha rivers in Pune and similar environment related projects being undertaken by students. He was appreciative of such efforts.

Thereafter, met with Prof. Haresh Shah, who informed the visiting team about the educational system in NTU and India and how NTU is engaged in transforming itself to achieve excellence. He also informed that Mr. P G Shirke and himself will be willing to fund substantially once the institute provides a white paper on its needs and how it would implement various programmes.

In the late evening met with Mr. Sandeep Johri, VP, HP and many alumni at his residence over a dinner. Prof. Thomas Kailath also attended the meeting. Alumni were informed about various academic achievements of the institute and how institute has been progressing to achieve all-round excellence.

COEP Foundation Board meeting 12th July, Hewlett Packard :

On 12th July morning there was a COEP Foundation Board meeting in HP premises. Various issues relating to the activities of COEP foundation and how funds could be generated were discussed. One of the ideas that cropped up in the meeting was to initiate a fund raising drive for faculty endowment through dollar a day, 2- dollars a day or 3-dollars a day campaign in which large number of relatively young alumni could participate.

COEP Alumni meeting in San Francisco:

Later in the evening, there was a grand alumni meet in Hotel Madhuban. Following alumni attended the meeting.

Sr no Name of the Alumni
1 Aarti Johri
2 Amit Mulay
3 Amit Sirsamkar
4 Amol Khanolkar
5 Anand Aravindan
6 Archis Apte
7 Ashwin Iyer
8 Avanti Ketkar
9 Chaitanya Karlekar
10 Chris Lawrence
11 Deepti Bhadkamkar
12 Devasish Saha
13 Farooq Billimoria
14 Ganesh Talele
15 Jyoti Shirolikar
16 Kalpana Mulay
17 Kieran Gonsalves
18 Koustubh Oka
19 Mandar Waghmode
20 Mangesh Honwad
21 Mohit Gundecha
22 Narsi Narasimhan
23 Neelkanth Patwardhan
24 Nitin Mhaske
25 Nitin Salunke
26 Parag Panse
27 Parag Saxena
28 Paritosh Ambekar
29 Pooja Saha
30 Prajakta Dhavali
31 Prajakta Joshi
32 Prajakta Taralekar
33 Prakash Bavdhane
34 Pratibha Athavale
35 Praveen Shah
36 Pushkar Chhajed
37 Rajat Dani
38 Rajesh Patki
39 Sameer Deshmukh
40 Sameer Vaidya
41 Sanjay Popli
42 Santosh Rao
43 Satyajit Patwardhan
44 Shirish Joshi
45 Shrikant Janolkar
46 Snehal Shinde
47 Sriram Subramanian
48 Suneel Joshi
49 Suruchi Wagh
50 Sushil Choudhari
51 Tejal Goyani
52 Vinay Kakade
53 Yashomati Godbole
54 Yuvraj Kelkar
55 Virendra Vase

Alumni were informed in detail about the reforms undertaken in administration, governance and academics at COEP. A number of queries were answered.

Mr. Sandeep Johri also spoke about the activities of COEP foundation. In particular, he mentioned about the creation of an endowment fund for the COEP and how a Metallurgy fellowship has come into existence with the generous contribution from Mr. Sanjeev Deshpande. The goal for 2008 is to raise $500,000 for the endowment to fund 10 academic fellowships. He then informed that Mrs. Kailath and Prof. Kailath were kind enough to challenge the alumni to a matching grant for upto $100,000 towards the endowment. The response of the alumni to the challenge was in true COEP spirit and pledges from almost everyone in attendance for a total of approx $87,500 were raised on the spot. In the next few days, the pledges surpassed $108,000.

COEP Alumni Meeting in Phoenix on 13th July:

A meeting of the alumni was arranged over a lunch at the residence of Mr. Vijay Wakharkar.
Following were present in the meeting.

Vijay Wakharkar (81 Metallurgy),
Nachiket Raravikar (97 Metallurgy)
Amol Jadhav (99 Metallyury0
Rahul Panat, (97 Mechanical)
Anirudh Vengurlekar (98 Metallurgy)
Sanjeev Kulkarni (83 Mechanical)
Anand Inamdar

Director made the presentation about the progress made by COEP during the last couple of years and appealed to the alumni for funding the endowment for the cause of their alma mater. The success storey of on line live lectures from IIT Bombay to get quality education for COEP students was narrated. Similar effort by Mr. Narendra Kale in offering an elective course on entrepreneurship development from Chicago was unique. Mr. Nachiket Raravikar was keen to offer an elective course on nanotechnology to the students of COEP in a similar manner from Phoenix.

There was a dinner meeting with Dr. Jagdish Singh, former Vice President of Motorola. He was informed about the institute’s present status and how COEP was looking to its alumni for funding towards the cause of building a new girls hostel building and for getting and retaining good faculty.

Meeting with alumni in Los Angeles on 14th July :

Met Dr Mahesh Chugani 1987 (E and TC) at the airport who escorted the visiting team to the office of Dr. C. K. N. Patel. There was a discussion meeting with Dr. C. K. N. Patel about the administrative and academic practices introduced in COEP. He informed the visiting team how one can be innovative and different and create a niche for achieving excellence. In particular, he stressed the need for giving importance to both teaching and research and about facilitating faculty to do research and consultancy by being liberal in course load allocation. He also emphasized the need for contract appointment of all faculty and only the best be taken on regular tenure, based on quality and excellence.

In the evening of 14th July, there was a meeting with Prof. Vijay Sathe an alumnus of COEP and Professor of Management, in the Peter F. Drucker and Masatoshi Ito Graduate School of Management. He narrated how Claremont Graduate University though small is different and has created a niche for itself and compared it with COEP. He was informed about the various reforms undertaken in COEP and sought his help and guidance.


Meetings with Alumni in San Jose on 15th July :

Mr. Sameer Vaidya accompanied for a lunch meeting with Mr. Gidu Shroff, former Vice President of Intel. There was a discussion about COEP’s present status and how alumni need to help the institute. Mr. Gidu Shroff promised to help the institute.

In the afternoon there was a meeting with Mr. Mohit Gundecha and Ms. Suruchi Wagh.

In the evening, there was a meeting with Mr. Arun Athavale (1971) and Mrs. Athavale (1977) over the dinner. Mrs. C. V. Joshi and Ms. Prajakta Joshi also joined the dinner along with Mr. Sameer Vaidya. After learning about the strides made by COEP post autonomy, Mr. Arun Athavale discussed about how we can contact alumni and novel methods of fund raising. He promised to help in this endeavour of fund raising.


Meetings with alumni in Seattle on 16th and 17th July :

The visiting team was received at the airport by Dr. Vijay Bhat (1961 BE, Mechanical) formerly with Boeing on the 16th July. In the afternoon, he escorted the team to Microsoft at Redmond and had a meeting with Mr. Devindra Chainani. A meeting of alumni was arranged in Microsoft, but very few alumni turned up. Visited a few facilities of Microsoft and rescheduled the meeting of alumni for the next day (17/7/2008).

During the dinner at the residence of Dr. Vijay Bhat, there was a meeting with Mangala Desai Lonkar (1981 Mechanical) and Rajeev Lonkar (1978 Electrical). A presentation of COEP was made and everyone present agreed to support the cause of COEP.

COEP Alumni Meeting on 17th July, in Microsoft:

A meeting with alumni of COEP in Microsoft was arranged in the afternoon of 17th July. Following attended the meeting.

Aditi Kumthekar
Amit Zunzurwad
Sonia Parandekar
Sandeep Shahane
Ajey Shah
Manisha Pawar
Deepak Patil
Pankaj Gupta
Amit Fulay
Devnidra Chaianani

A presentation about COEP was made. There was a discussion about how all COEP alumni in Microsoft would be networked and how they can contribute towards their alma mater. Many of them involved in the development of state-of-the-art technologies agreed to deliver either part of the course or a lecture or two over video conferencing mode to COEP students. There was a very good interaction and most of those present made pledges towards COEP endowment fund.

Aniket Patankar, Jayant Boptakar and Anupam Joshi could not attend the meeting. Alumni of COEP from Microsoft promised to contact all those who could not make it to the meeting and inform them about COEP’s progress.

On 18th July, Prof. Sawant returned to Los Angeles and Director proceeded to Chicago. Mr. Narendra Kale received the Director at the airport and took to his residence.

COEP alumni meeting in Chicago on 19th July

A meeting of alumni was arranged in the evening of 19th July. Following alumni attended the meeting.

Milind Jogalekar
Dhananjay Kale
Kaustubh Bhalerao
Aditya Sathaye
Narendra Kale
Mrunal Salunkhe
Gautam Sampath
Anirudha Narawane
Sailesh Venakatraman

A presentation about COEP was made by the Director. Mr. Narendra Kale also informed about the entrepreneurship course taken by him from Chicago for the students of COEP and how meritorious COEPians made him feel proud and engage himself in setting up Bhau Institute of Entrepreneurship and Leadership. Most of the alumni appreciated the efforts made to improve the situation in COEP. All of them pledged towards the COEP endowment fund. Dinner was arranged at home by Mrs. Nanda Kale for all alumni.
Mr. Narendra Kale suggested that COEP should appoint a young MBA graduate as Executive Assistant so that alumni relations could be handled effectively.

Later, Dr Kaustubh narrated about his change over from a Civil Engineer to an Agricultural Bio technologist. He gave an excellent presentation of his work and courses he is handling at Illionis Institute of Technology. He has agreed to offer a course on Biology for students of COEP from Chicago.




Visit to Universities and Meetings with Professors and Deans

Columbia University

A visit to Columbia University was arranged in the forenoon of 8th July 2008. A meeting with Dr. Vijay Modi, Professor and Chair, Mechanical Engineering was arranged by Prof. Ashok Misra, Director IIT Bombay. A meeting was held with Dr. Arvind Narayanswamy, an alumnus of IIT Madras and MIT and faculty of mechanical engineering at Columbia University. Director visited the laboratories of departments of Mechanical Engineering, Earth and Environmental Engineering and Biomedical Engineering of Columbia University to see their facilities. Discussed about the course curriculum and credit structure of the University. Learnt about the energy related interdisciplinary programme launched by the University and possible collaboration with COEP. University has an excellent biosciences group. Visited their state-of-the-art facilities.

Rutgers University

In the afternoon of 8/7/2008 visited Rutgers University with Dr. Ravi Bhatkal and had a meeting with Prof. Yogesh Jaluria, Professor of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and Dean of Engineering. There was a discussion about possible collaboration for exchange of faculty and students of COEP during summer vacation with partial funding from the University of Rutgers. Also visited the Department of Biomedical Engineering (Prof. Prabhas Moghe), Department of Material Science and Engineering and Centre for Ceramic Research. The manufacturing of fiber optic cable facility was also visited.

Arizona State University
In the afternoon of 13th July visited the departments of mechanical engineering, metallurgy, material science and biosciences of Arizona State University. In particular there was a good interaction with Dr. Kaushal Rege of the department of biosciences. He has agreed to visit COEP during his India visit and deliver lectures for faculty and students of COEP.

University of California Los Angeles

On 14th July afternoon, Prof. Patel introduced the team to Dr. Richard Wesel, Dean Student Admissions at UCLA.
This was followed by a meeting with Dr. Richard Wesel, which focused on the admission process, UG curricula, teaching learning methodology, industry-institute interaction and various best practices at UCLA. He appreciated the COEP’s efforts in industry-institute interaction by way of a number of live industry projects. Thereafter, visited UCLA laboratories.

Drucker School of Management, Claremont Graduate University

On 14th July evening Mr Kedar Sawant drove the team to the Drucker School of Management, Claremont Graduate University, where Prof. Vijay Sathe, an alumnus of COEP is a Professor of Management and Corporate Entrepreneurship. Prof. Sathe happens to be a third generation of COEPian. A meeting with Prof. Vijay Sathe was arranged by Mr. Ashok Shendure. Prof. Sathe showed the team entire campus of Claremont Graduate University which is a university with a difference. There was a discussion about the Bhau Institute of Entrepreneurship and Leadership being set up at COEP. He appreciated the idea and assured all possible help to this cause.

Washington University

Visited Washington University campus and the campus book store on 17th July evening.

Kellogg School of Management

On 19th July visited the Kellogg School of Management along with Mr. Narendra Kale. There was a very fruitful meeting with Dr. Deepak Jain, Dean of Kellogg School of Management. He was informed about the Bhau Institute of Entrepreneurship and Leadership and requested his help and guidance. He has kindly agreed to help in all possible ways for the development of Institute of entrepreneurship.


Visit to R & D organizations and Industries

On the morning of 9th July 2008 visited a start up company called “Solid State Cooling Systems” (http://sscooling.com/) who have launched a number of innovative solid state cooing devices using thermo-electric effect of Bismuth based semi conductor material which could be a replacement to Freon based cooling systems. This has low power consumption and very effective temperature control making it an attractive technology for space and medical applications. Met Dr. Lloyd Young, President, Lloyd Wright, CTO and Mr. Vishesh Nandedkar, Assoc. Mechanical Engineer who spent more than 2 hours explaining how the start up was initiated and their success story. A tour of the manufacturing and R & D facility was arranged thereafter.

Visited the Morse Telegraphy and Art Museum in New York accompanied by Dr. Nandedkar and family on 9th July.

On 12th July a visit to the Hewlett Packard facilities was arranged by Mr. Sandeep Johri.

On 14th July afternoon, Prof. C. K. N. Patel arranged a tour of Pranalytica with the state-of-the-art laser machines.

On 17th morning, a visit to Boeing was arranged by Dr. Vijay Bhat. It was an unique experience of seeing the world’s biggest building and entire manufacturing and assembly line facility of Boeing.

In the afternoon of 17th July, a meeting with Dr. Sailesh Chutani, an IIT alumnus and researcher at Microsoft was arranged by Mr. Devindra. There was a discussion about possible research collaboration between COEP and Microsoft. There is funding available from Microsoft in a variety of areas such as education and research. He will put us in contact with Mr. Anand of Microsoft, Bangalore. Later a tour of Microsoft facilities was undertaken including visit to the Microsoft museum, Microsoft store and gymnasium.

On 20th morning visited Chinmaya Mission, Chicago along with the family of Kale and met many Indians. In the evening of 20th July left for India after a successful US visit in generating enthusiasm amongst alumni towards the cause of their alma mater.

Conclusion:

The visit to USA by the Director and senior faculty has been useful in bridging the information gap between the alumni and the institute, understanding the alumni viewpoint on many issues concerning the institute. The efforts put in by the institute’s Board of Governors and Administration in creating excellent facilities, ambience, work culture, training and motivating faculty was appreciated. There has been great enthusiasm amongst alumni to help their alma mater in various ways. Alumni working in Universities and research labs and industries have agreed to float electives, deliver lectures on the state-of-the-art topics for the benefit of COEP students. Some alumni have agreed to act as mentors for students for Technocraft booth competition, Robotics competition etc. An amount of US$ 208,000 was pledged by the alumni during the visit itself. The alumni have promised to continue their effort in fund raising. This needs to be channelised effectively by opening an office for endowment fund in the institute with the appointment of a young MBA. All the alumni are required to be kept in constant touch so that they are aware of positive happenings in the institute and there is no communication gap. It is expected that by continuing similar visits by a few more senior faculty, the motivation levels of alumni may be further enhanced and endowment fund raised.

The visit to various Universities, R & D labs also helped in understanding the academic practices in US universities and there are possibilities of further engagements with a few Universities for starting joint research, faculty and student exchange programmes.