************************************************************************************************************
When I started teaching Physics at IIT KGP in 1965, there were six sections, each having about 30 students. And compulsory Physics for Engg students ran to what we now call 5 semesters. The number of sections remained the same, with the number of students gradually increasing. However, the number of Physics semesters for engineers dropped down in a converging series...5 to 4 to 3 to 2 to just 1 in 1999, as Engg departments came up with more and more of their own courses.
And then we got a new Director from IIT Kanpur which had long ago imported the system of mammoth classes in huge class rooms...from the US. And IIT KNP had what was popularly known as L-4...a lecture hall that could accommodate 500 students.
IIT KGP didn't have this culture nor such huge halls. We just had the creepy Raman and Bhatnagar Auditoriums, each of which could accommodate about 100 students comfortably. But their sound system was atrocious and they were not L-4s by any stretch of imagination.
But our Diro insisted that we bundle up all our first years into just 2 sections in each of which we could squeeze 200 students like sardines in tins...the strength around the turn of the century. And predictions were that the intake would be rising exponentially...it was 700 when I retired in 2005...and is 1300 now.
Many other departments liked the new Diro's idea for the simple reason that many teachers could now be relieved happily from the headache of teaching and can concentrate on their research.
But Physics Department resisted his new idea till the Diro visited us in our H. N. Bose Seminar Room and injected it...with the lollipops of overhead projectors and mikes and an unlimited supply of free tracing sheets and sketch pens...and a promise to build an entirely new lecture hall complex soon, much bigger than their L - 4s.
The complex took all of 5 years to be inaugurated...
Soon after the decision was made, I cornered our HoD in his den and asked him if I was going to be one of the two sacrificial goats who would be forced to teach these 2 Jumbo sections.
And he said, "Of course...I was told so"
Then I made it a condition that I should be allowed to choose the teacher for the other section since it is the same syllabus and same contents and same Question Paper. Our HoD agreed heartily and I chose Prof RSS...sadly no more.
RSS and I met up in Harry's and over a couple of cups of tea I suggested to him that, in view of the poor infrastructure of the two stone-age auditoriums, we would encourage our students to bunk our classes so that only the few who were genuinely interested in Physics would attend them.
RSS agreed and I told him that the trick to do it would be to write up a Lecture Notes-cum-Problems Sheet so that the book would be available, for anyone who wanted to read it, on the first day of the semester. They could buy it, read it, solve its problems and bunk our classes.
And we won't take attendance...daily or spot...or conduct surprise or scheduled quizzes at all...we would just show them our cinema on our OHPs.
RSS agreed that the title of the book would be:
"Lecture Notes on Waves, Wave Optics and Elements of Wave Mechanics"
I offered to write the first two parts, and he the last part. And that I would do the entire keyboarding on my PC equipped with the latest Word (6.something) with its horrible Equation Editor.
I didn't care for its primitive Drawing Editor.
And we had 9 months to get it up...a 270-page Text with Problems Sheet and more than hundred Figures that I would be drawing by hand...phew!
We finished the job in 8.999 months.
And Thacker agreed to get it offset-printed in Calcutta and sell it to our First Years on Day 1 of their Registration...on a no-profit, no-loss basis:
http://gpsastry.blogspot.in/2010/04/thackers-and-harrys.html
I was happy with the book...it was good-looking and there were no missing pages. And the binding was tight.
I had taken immense trouble to see that it was perfect.
For all of 2 years no complaint came from any student. That meant that the book passed through the fidgety fingers of about 500 students.
And then in the book's 3rd year, one day a freshman named Aga (ECE) met me in the corridor soon after the class was over and showed me an involved diagram in crystal optics and said that the polarization states were wrongly drawn...they were interchanged.
And I could see at once that he was as right as death.
And I announced Aga's correction in the next class and made it in the next edition.
Somehow I did not feel humiliated...I felt happy. I told Aga that a mistake like that meant that the drawing was original and not topoed from Jenkins and White (who had messed up an important Table on what I used to call the Qualitative Analysis of Polarization...like the horrendous Chemistry Tables of Caven in the Chemistry Lab at our AU)
Here is more about this crazy guy:
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
Google Gleanings:
************************************************************************************************************
When I started teaching Physics at IIT KGP in 1965, there were six sections, each having about 30 students. And compulsory Physics for Engg students ran to what we now call 5 semesters. The number of sections remained the same, with the number of students gradually increasing. However, the number of Physics semesters for engineers dropped down in a converging series...5 to 4 to 3 to 2 to just 1 in 1999, as Engg departments came up with more and more of their own courses.
And then we got a new Director from IIT Kanpur which had long ago imported the system of mammoth classes in huge class rooms...from the US. And IIT KNP had what was popularly known as L-4...a lecture hall that could accommodate 500 students.
IIT KGP didn't have this culture nor such huge halls. We just had the creepy Raman and Bhatnagar Auditoriums, each of which could accommodate about 100 students comfortably. But their sound system was atrocious and they were not L-4s by any stretch of imagination.
But our Diro insisted that we bundle up all our first years into just 2 sections in each of which we could squeeze 200 students like sardines in tins...the strength around the turn of the century. And predictions were that the intake would be rising exponentially...it was 700 when I retired in 2005...and is 1300 now.
Many other departments liked the new Diro's idea for the simple reason that many teachers could now be relieved happily from the headache of teaching and can concentrate on their research.
But Physics Department resisted his new idea till the Diro visited us in our H. N. Bose Seminar Room and injected it...with the lollipops of overhead projectors and mikes and an unlimited supply of free tracing sheets and sketch pens...and a promise to build an entirely new lecture hall complex soon, much bigger than their L - 4s.
The complex took all of 5 years to be inaugurated...
Soon after the decision was made, I cornered our HoD in his den and asked him if I was going to be one of the two sacrificial goats who would be forced to teach these 2 Jumbo sections.
And he said, "Of course...I was told so"
Then I made it a condition that I should be allowed to choose the teacher for the other section since it is the same syllabus and same contents and same Question Paper. Our HoD agreed heartily and I chose Prof RSS...sadly no more.
RSS and I met up in Harry's and over a couple of cups of tea I suggested to him that, in view of the poor infrastructure of the two stone-age auditoriums, we would encourage our students to bunk our classes so that only the few who were genuinely interested in Physics would attend them.
RSS agreed and I told him that the trick to do it would be to write up a Lecture Notes-cum-Problems Sheet so that the book would be available, for anyone who wanted to read it, on the first day of the semester. They could buy it, read it, solve its problems and bunk our classes.
And we won't take attendance...daily or spot...or conduct surprise or scheduled quizzes at all...we would just show them our cinema on our OHPs.
RSS agreed that the title of the book would be:
"Lecture Notes on Waves, Wave Optics and Elements of Wave Mechanics"
I offered to write the first two parts, and he the last part. And that I would do the entire keyboarding on my PC equipped with the latest Word (6.something) with its horrible Equation Editor.
I didn't care for its primitive Drawing Editor.
And we had 9 months to get it up...a 270-page Text with Problems Sheet and more than hundred Figures that I would be drawing by hand...phew!
We finished the job in 8.999 months.
And Thacker agreed to get it offset-printed in Calcutta and sell it to our First Years on Day 1 of their Registration...on a no-profit, no-loss basis:
http://gpsastry.blogspot.in/2010/04/thackers-and-harrys.html
I was happy with the book...it was good-looking and there were no missing pages. And the binding was tight.
I had taken immense trouble to see that it was perfect.
For all of 2 years no complaint came from any student. That meant that the book passed through the fidgety fingers of about 500 students.
And then in the book's 3rd year, one day a freshman named Aga (ECE) met me in the corridor soon after the class was over and showed me an involved diagram in crystal optics and said that the polarization states were wrongly drawn...they were interchanged.
And I could see at once that he was as right as death.
And I announced Aga's correction in the next class and made it in the next edition.
Somehow I did not feel humiliated...I felt happy. I told Aga that a mistake like that meant that the drawing was original and not topoed from Jenkins and White (who had messed up an important Table on what I used to call the Qualitative Analysis of Polarization...like the horrendous Chemistry Tables of Caven in the Chemistry Lab at our AU)
Here is more about this crazy guy:
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
"Dear Professor Sastry,
How are you?? I don't know whether you will remember me, but I was in your Physics class at KGP in Spring 2002 - which remains one of the finest classes I have ever participated in. Just by chance, I happened to search Google with your name and came across your blog from which I took your email address. Where are you these days? Hyderabad? After IIT, I sold my soul to the devil and worked with a management consulting company in Mumbai for 2 yrs. Unlike Faust, however, I was able to recover my soul and I decided not to go for an MBA. Right now, I am pursuing a PhD in Anthropology at Yale University and intend to research controversies over science in India - most probably those surrounding genetically modified crops..."
How are you?? I don't know whether you will remember me, but I was in your Physics class at KGP in Spring 2002 - which remains one of the finest classes I have ever participated in. Just by chance, I happened to search Google with your name and came across your blog from which I took your email address. Where are you these days? Hyderabad? After IIT, I sold my soul to the devil and worked with a management consulting company in Mumbai for 2 yrs. Unlike Faust, however, I was able to recover my soul and I decided not to go for an MBA. Right now, I am pursuing a PhD in Anthropology at Yale University and intend to research controversies over science in India - most probably those surrounding genetically modified crops..."
Aga
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
Google Gleanings:
Yale Anthro Ph.D. students Cortesi, Aga, and Osterhoudt honored with fellowships and prizes
"Aniket Aga was one of the toppers in his batch of Electronics at IIT
Kharagpur. That is no mean feat considering that many top All India
Rankers of IIT-JEE join the Electronics department and competition is
super-tough. So it was surprising when one of his favorite subjects
during his B. Tech. was a subject called “Human Behaviour in
Organizations”. While most people showed obvious disinterest on such
“forced-upon” electives, Aniket loved this subject and regularly used to
have lengthy discussions with the course Professor.
After his B. Tech., Aniket joined McKinsey Inc. at their Bombay
office and stayed there for 1 year. Then he decided to do something
completely radical – he started a Ph D on a completely unrelated topic –
Organizational Behaviour at University of Southern California. Later, in
2009, when USC denied his wish to write his dissertation on an Indian
topic, he refused to comply with that. Instead he switched to Yale
University and is currently working on his thesis there.
************************************************************************************************************
No comments:
Post a Comment