B-school review: Acharya Inst of Management & Sciences

Earlier this month Careers360 issued the top 50 B-school rankings in the country. Starting today we feature reviews of 25 top institutes along with vital information students should be aware of when choosing their B-school.

Acharya Institute of Management and Sciences, Bangalore: Equal opportunity for all

Begun with a focus on helping less privileged aspirants, the Acharya Institute of Management Studies (AIMS) admits 50 per cent of its students through Karnataka PGCET and the rest through the AIMS test. While PGCET students pay Rs 1 lakh as fees, the rest have to shell out a hefty sum of Rs 5 lakhs for the two-year degree.

The extra fees cover a laptop, a two-month SAP course and a foreign study tour. PGCET students can avail of these by paying extra. In addition, 10 deserving students receive scholarships that waive the entire fee of Rs 1 lakh. A language lab with a qualified voice and accent trainer helps students improve their English communication skills.

Being affiliated to Bangalore University, the institute does not have the autonomy of modifying or developing its course structure and curriculum, and the curriculum revision is done only once every three years at the university level.

Most of the students specialise in Marketing, Finance or HR. Students are taken for a diagnostic outbound training in the first semester.

Other than case studies, live projects and industrial visits, there are industry specific "augmentation" courses (for a week or so) to help student prepare for a specific industry / job profile.

AIMS has streamlined its development focus in different areas by setting up five centres of excellence, one each in the areas of Research, Entrepreneurship, International Liaison and Training & Development. Of these, entrepreneurship under the leadership of Prof K Ranganathan is the most active.

"Prof Ranganathan motivated and guided me to become one of the four Stanford-IIMB certified entrepreneurship faculty at the campus," says Indranil Matsuddi, OB & HR faculty. "We have the leeway to earn extra income by teaching at training programmes," adds Asst Prof Veena KN.

AIMS was recently given the award "Best College in India for Entrepreneurship Education in 2008" by NITIE, Mumbai. Their six-member advisory council, comprises entrepreneurs who guide budding entrepreneurs on campus and also give students live projects to work on.

A student recently won the business plan competition at IIM-Indore for her plan for automating areca nut peeling. She also helped the innovator set up the business, which achieved a turnover of Rs 2 crore in just two years.

The entrepreneurship cell also motivated the institute's support staff to start an organisation called Sphoorthikiran, an example of microfinance, entrepreneurship and cooperative society, rolled into one. It collects small amounts of money from all members, and also generates revenue by selling products on a commission basis. The  income is used to give soft loans to members in their hour of need.

The institute recently acquired four acres of adjoining land which would help it to build a residential campus for students. Students say, many of them joined AIMS after coming to know that the faculty has good industry experience. 

"I came to know that the syllabus gets finished here unlike many other institutes," a student informs us.