Epilogue To FDP

It was an exhaustive, full of knowledge sharing & truly enriching 12 days of organising and attending the First Faculty Development Programme on Entrepreneurship Development at GNDU College, Jalandhar. There were 65 registration in total out of which 44 took the initiative and participated in this journey. The participants were a mix lot ranging from Commerce, Business Management, Chemistry, Computer Sciences, English Literature, Electronics, Punjabi and other technical subjects. There were lot of discussions perpetuated by resource persons with divergent yet experienced and mature outlook. The basic objective of 12 days programme was to ignite the spirit of entrepreneurship among participating teachers and to motivate them to foster entrepreneurship among their students. We believe it was a platform where everybody participated, shared their ideas, their fears and their apprehensions regarding entrepreneurship. Certainly, as a teacher, I believe in removing cobwebs first and then shaping others' minds. The objectives seemed to be achieved when new emerging ideas were suggested by participants in sessions on business idea generation and evaluation.

To strengthen the knowledge base,as I shared with you the idea of generating a documentary evidence of this programme, I am sharing with you the list of topics for all of you to write an article/case study/research paper.The standardized formats should be used for writing your contribution. Two participants will take one topic each and you will suggest me the name of topic along with  your participant codes (also mentioned on your certificate) by commenting on this blog post. For example- If you want to take first topic and your particpant codes are FDP001 & FDP002- you should mention in comment to this post: Topic No. 1- FDP001, FDP002. All this material will be compiled in form of a book and will be released in due course of time. The topics will be allotted on first cum first serve basis. The topics can be taken by 25th January, 2014. Once the list of participants taking respective topics will be finalized, I will upload it on blog by end of this month. So, make your groups, finalsise the topics and communicate it on blog asap.For any help regarding any topic, please feel free to comment on the post mentioning your problem & surely, the group/myself will help you out or else you can mail me at edcgnduc@gmail.com

This is just the beginning! We all have to go a long way. The success will be measured in terms of actual new ideas generated by our students and by number of business ventures floated by our own students. Those students whom we teach, guide and mentor on everyday basis and they look towards us for their future growth. Indeed they should! We have to keep this flame alive now in some or other manner whereby we create that desired entrepreneurial ecosystem. We can do it by creating similar platforms for faculty and students enrichment and development on routine basis whereby some tangible output must be achieved. I was amazed by the excitement and response showed by many of participants in organizing workshops, seminars, camps for students and faculty in their respective colleges. it will be a great networking exercise. We can achieve it by walking on following steps in a phased manner:-

Phase 1 : Setting up Entrepreneurship Cells (E-CELL) in each college in doaba region under the ambit of EDC of GNDU College, Jalandhar

Phase 2: Organise at least one activity ( Entrepreneurship Awareness Camp, Business Plan Competition, One Day  Entrepreneurs' Meet, FDP or any other) every year by each E-CELL. EDC will support any such activity through resource persons or financial help or study material or in any other manner.

Phase 3: Foster real entrepreneurship by helping students of different streams to come ahead and establish Real Ventures with or without capital expenditure.

We are also looking for expert articles in form of blog posts for this blog. I hereby invite all of you to share your thoughts and comments on this blog.

We are planning for our next activity in March, 2014 for which the details will be shared soon.

Looking forward to hear from you soon and once again thanks to all of you,

Your Friend

Dr. Ashish Arora