1st April, 2012 – In-person meetups for MS aspirants are in my perspective quite an interesting affair. The case this time was pretty similar when some members over MS in MIS Fall 2012 group on Facebook organized a meet at Candies, Bandra and around 25 people turned up. The intended audience – obviously MIS (Management Information Systems) aspirants. And for our readers and future aspirants, who are still not sure about making MIS as their career option, check this study here.
Coming back, having been three times at Candies, located at Pali Naka, Bandra West over a period of 2 years for casual and business meets, I can surely say one thing – amongst the various places I have been for a meet, Candies is the best. The meet had a rough start owing to the fact that the restaurant staff intervened and insisted that all the people may not just occupy their logistics but consume some of the sandwiches, pastries and ice creams they offer. And their orders were promptly followed by the group.
Let me roll out the minutes of the meetup as I remember. We had an initial round of introduction followed by the most important topic – who has what all ADMITS from universities and what they intend to make their destination. We later split up the members into smaller groups based on their destination university for discussion. Soon the real important discussions began in 5 groups formed – CMU, UTD, Eller, UB, TAMU and Washington University.
As it turned out, the conversation now became quite interesting as it became university-specific suiting every member’s interest. Topics discussed were future prospects, per credit/quarter fees, pros & cons of education loans, possible accommodation options with monthly rent, research work undergoing in university, GA/TA/RA if available and the most important – average salary package of students passing out from the university. Another important topic I remember was the right time to resign in our respective companies. My group survey found that only 2-3 people had already resigned amongst the 15-20 people who were working with a company in the group. So that was a relief for me to know that that a majority of them haven’t resigned yet! I just thought I am too late for doing that and might land in trouble.
Unfortunately for me, the groups at the meetup were not of universities to which I had applied or had received an ADMIT. I had applied to mix breed of universities for CS (SJSU, RIT, GWU) and MIS (NEU, UB, NYU Poly). So I was more of a listener hanging my ears in every group and I guess listening indeed helped as I had to cover the event eventually on a blog.
The meet was not only a good source of networking but seriously cleared a lot of doubts and concerns the members had. It also brought all members at the same level by clearing all fallacies which people had initially, particularly the VISA affair. Well if not completely, definitely to an extent. Finally we had a group photograph which definitely looks picture-perfect!
Check the pics below ... Comments are welcome.
Coming back, having been three times at Candies, located at Pali Naka, Bandra West over a period of 2 years for casual and business meets, I can surely say one thing – amongst the various places I have been for a meet, Candies is the best. The meet had a rough start owing to the fact that the restaurant staff intervened and insisted that all the people may not just occupy their logistics but consume some of the sandwiches, pastries and ice creams they offer. And their orders were promptly followed by the group.
Let me roll out the minutes of the meetup as I remember. We had an initial round of introduction followed by the most important topic – who has what all ADMITS from universities and what they intend to make their destination. We later split up the members into smaller groups based on their destination university for discussion. Soon the real important discussions began in 5 groups formed – CMU, UTD, Eller, UB, TAMU and Washington University.
As it turned out, the conversation now became quite interesting as it became university-specific suiting every member’s interest. Topics discussed were future prospects, per credit/quarter fees, pros & cons of education loans, possible accommodation options with monthly rent, research work undergoing in university, GA/TA/RA if available and the most important – average salary package of students passing out from the university. Another important topic I remember was the right time to resign in our respective companies. My group survey found that only 2-3 people had already resigned amongst the 15-20 people who were working with a company in the group. So that was a relief for me to know that that a majority of them haven’t resigned yet! I just thought I am too late for doing that and might land in trouble.
Unfortunately for me, the groups at the meetup were not of universities to which I had applied or had received an ADMIT. I had applied to mix breed of universities for CS (SJSU, RIT, GWU) and MIS (NEU, UB, NYU Poly). So I was more of a listener hanging my ears in every group and I guess listening indeed helped as I had to cover the event eventually on a blog.
The meet was not only a good source of networking but seriously cleared a lot of doubts and concerns the members had. It also brought all members at the same level by clearing all fallacies which people had initially, particularly the VISA affair. Well if not completely, definitely to an extent.
Finally we had a group photograph which definitely looks picture-perfect!Check the pics below ... Comments are welcome.
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