29 Jul - 4 Aug 2023

August is here. A month where sunny and dry days may greet us in the morning but without even a moment’s notice, the pitter-patter of the rains may take one by surprise. A month steeped in the sentiment of unpredictability but with the halo of new promises, and novel adventures. We have sailed through the halfway mark of the year and as we turn the pages of the months bygone, there is so much we have accomplished and celebrated. We gather learnings and strength from each challenge we tackle to gaze into the future with conviction. There is joy, and there is hope, humility and gratitude.

The Krea community has immersed itself in the new academic year, as corridors echo with the sound of footsteps, classrooms burst with enthusiasm, the lounges packed with heads huddled over coursework, and the coffee at Narasimhulu selling like hot cakes. Beyond the classroom, students continue to bring laurels to the University with awards and recognitions in their chosen fields of interest. Faculty members continue to pursue and advance research and learning, setting new milestones. Departments across the University continue to work with fervour, many of them working behind the scenes with diligence. 

And amid the busy schedules and calendar of deadlines, we also take meaningful breaks. On our social media handles, the Communications Team is bringing together a mental well-being series named, Wednesdays for Wellness. At the same time, the HR team at Krea has put together a session on Digital Detox for the community for the upcoming week. 

As we step into a new month, here we are, raising a toast to march on, on our mission to a resilient future, tackling complexities, simplifying narratives, and transforming the world into a better place, one healthy young leader at a time.

Club Rush is an introduction to the Clubs and Societies that the School of Interwoven Arts and Sciences (SIAS) has to offer. The event aims to be a fun and engaging meetup where the existing Clubs and Societies present their vision and agenda to the fresh cohort of 2027. Club Rush is scheduled to be held on 5 August 2023, from 2 pm - 5 pm. Irrespective of the passion or interest one holds, there is a Club or Society, for everyone at Krea.

Of Awards and Recognitions

Congratulations are in order. Ritika Yadav, Cohort of 2024 at IFMR GSB has been announced the winner of Live Project by Tally Solutions. She will be awarded a cash prize of Rs.10,000.

Live Project by Tally Solutions focused on the Big Belly of Indian Businesses: the informal and unregulated sector of businesses exclusively managed by the owners, who manage everything from supply to administration themselves. For ease, they called them the micro businesses. The project entailed preparing a detailed business plan which covered areas that identified the triggers/barriers to, needs of and product scope of product adoption for micro businesses, product proposition and a go-to-market (GTM) plan.

A research paper co-authored by Sayantan Datta, Faculty Teaching Associate, Krea-CWP (Centre for Writing and Pedagogy) with Bishal Kumar Dey, Research Scholar, Homi Bhabha Centre for Science Education, has been published by Doing Sociology. The publication, part of a series titled Pathaan, Meri Jaan...Memoirs, Reflections, Analyses (ed. Gita Chadha). The publication titled Bohot Kuch Hota Hai: Towards a Reparative Reading of Pathaan is an  attempt to read the Shah Rukh Khan blockbuster Pathaan reparatively by squinting through queer eyes, opening up methodological provocations around gaze and ways of seeing, at the risk of being seen as ascribing queerness to what might be otherwise seen as primarily unqueer, or even counter queer. In positing imaginations of militarised collectivities that allow for a reconstitution of identity and a reclamation of power as a putative ‘home’, the authors try to demonstrate how a reparative reading through queer eyes makes way for potential queering. They hope this opens up further possibilities of seeing — and, by way, ascribing —the queer in the unqueer.

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Neha Mishra, Faculty Teaching Associate, Krea-CWP was recently invited by the Centre for Writing Studies, Jindal Global University, Haryana to conduct a workshop on Teaching Writing in the Age of ChatGPT. The session titled, Should Writing Centres Have a Future? Teaching Writing in the Age of ChatGPT held on 28 July focussed on the challenges that generative AI like ChatGPT continue to pose for educators across the world, this session asked and answered some important questions about the future of writing centres in academia. By pointing out not just the limitations of ChatGPT's outputs, but also the gaps in its training mechanisms designed to address such limitations, this session demonstrated the inadequacy of ChatGPT for our fundamental needs as readers-writers. It argued that writing centres and educators in general were more important now than ever, especially in non-native English speaking contexts, in light of ChatGPT's misleading content (often disguised as accurate and factual). The session ended by offering some possible pedagogical uses of ChatGPT.

Team Communications, in collaboration with Aparna Raghavan — in-house counsellor at Krea — recently kicked off Wednesdays for Wellness, a series on social media, to shed light on self-care so that, together, we can weave a tapestry of resilience, embrace the power of personal growth and build better versions of ourselves. Nourishing body, mind and soul; one post at a time! 

This talk by Prof Arumugum Thamizhavel, Chairperson, Department of Condensed Matter Physics and Materials Science at TIFR, Mumbai, held on 28 April 2023 was part of the Krea Physics Talk series. The physical properties exhibited by all the materials depend mainly on the arrangement of atoms in the unit cell. Hence the knowledge of crystal structure is one of the important requirements, be it for basic research or for applied research. As a well-known example, one would think of the high Tc superconductor BSCCO. Depending on the number of Cu-O layers in the high temperature superconductor BSCCO the superconducting transition temperature varies. This talk gave an insight to the crystal structure and the space group.

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This talk by Prof Areejit Samal, Head, Computational Biology Group at The Institute of Mathematical Sciences (IMSc), Chennai held on 3 May 2023 was part of the Krea Biology & Chemistry Talks series.

Characterising the exposome beyond the genome is crucial for understanding the environmental factors influencing human health and disease. In this talk, Prof Samal presented the research his group is conducting towards linking the chemical exposome to health effects via a systematic compilation, curation and exploration of the existing information contained in published toxicological studies on diverse groups of environmental chemicals including endocrine disrupting chemicals, environmental neurotoxicants, human milk contaminants and fragrance chemicals in children’s products.

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Say hello to the newest members of our Krea family

Wishing our colleagues all the best as they move on to their next adventure

Seema Sangita

SIAS Faculty

Sheshu Gudavalli

SC Admin

Rachna B

SIAS Outreach

Vijaya Bharati Chebolu Subramanian

IFMR GSB Faculty

To help the Krea community maximise the benefits that technology brings while minimising the potential damage to our health and wellness, there is a digital detox session scheduled for 11 August on the Sri City campus between 2.00 pm - 4.00 pm. The session will be facilitated by Aparna Raghavan, our in-house counsellor, a seasoned Counselling Psychologist, Behaviour Therapist, and Researcher with a rich background in both teaching and practicing Psychology for more than 12 years. Employees from other locations can join virtually. A zoom link will hit your inbox soon.