Academicians and Industry leaders enthral school students as ISBF wraps up iASPIRE 2021 Summer School Workshop
New Delhi: Indian School of Business & Finance (ISBF), New Delhi, one of the five featured teaching centres of the London School of Economics & Political Science (LSE) and an affiliate institution to the University of London (UOL), brought the 2nd edition of iASPIRE, their annual Career Counseling Summer School workshop to a close, with leading academia and industry leaders enthralling over 55 high-school students from India and abroad with deep insights into career and skill development choices in several high-growth and high-paying sectors related to Economics, Finance and Management (EMF). The final week of iASPIRE 2021, was conducted on the 10th & 11th of July, 2021.
Among prominent names who conducted workshops were Dr Chetan Ghate, Professor of Economics at Indian Statistical Institute New Delhi; Ms Shalini Mittal, Associate Economic Analyst at Asian Development Bank; Dr James Abdey, Associate Academic Director for the University of London Programmes at LSE and Visiting Lecturer at ISBF; Mr Sameer Pathak from Emaar Global Team; Ms Saigeeta Bhargava, Director and Lead Actuary at PricewaterhouseCoopers and Ms Pallavi Malani, Managing Director & Partner at Boston Consulting Group (BCG).
iASPIRE 2021 also saw students from outside India participate, including from Abu Dhabi and Malaysia. They received valuable tips and guidance from the esteemed guest speakers on the critical aspects of career and skill development.
In continuation with the first week of iASPIRE 2021 summer school workshop, this second weekend- series had nine sessions that enlightened the students about opportunities in Policymaking, Actuarial Science, Data Science, Marketing & Strategy, and Consulting. Students got an insight into the necessary skills needed to get into the specific sectors and that of the market’s current scenario.
The two-weekend Summer School Workshop culminated with a Hackathon competition where students from 25 schools from all over the world participated enthusiastically. Students were divided into nine teams (5 in each group) and were asked to present their creative ideas on various topics like Vision 2030 & Sustainable Development Goals. The basic agenda of this competition was to teach the students the meaning of collaboration and the importance of teamwork.
“Choosing to pursue economics is not a shortcut but a 10-year slog of investment to develop skills. One must figure and pursue a career that intrigues you. It depends on how good you are at it.” said Dr Chetan Ghate, one of India’s leading macroeconomists, Professor at ISI and Member, Editorial Advisory Board for the Reserve Bank of India.
Professor James Abdey of LSE in his session on Data Science shared, “Top specialized skills one should possess for being a data scientist are – Data Analysis, Python, Business Intelligence and many more whereas top baseline skills should be – Communication, Analytical, MS Excel, Research, Planning and Writing.”
On the other hand, Sameer Pathak from the Emaar Global team, speaking on careers in Marketing & Strategy opined, “It’s not necessary to study marketing to get into the field. Anyone with good interpersonal skills can do that, however, I would recommend you to read about marketing & finance since it gives you a good insight into the industry.”
Consulting as a career was addressed by Pallavi Malani from BCG who said, “Consulting is actually a process of advising business and government on their most critical issues and it helps in personal growth as well as get attractive remuneration in a career as a consultant”
The final session of the second and final weekend of the programme took place on Monday, 12th July, culminating in a closing ceremony where students were given awards for their participation in the workshop. Here students were marked and graded in the same format as LSE does for its students and were provided Certificates of Recognition accordingly.