FAST FACTS
Location: Kattankulathur, Chennai
Other campuses: Ramapuram, Vadapalani, Modinagar
Dean: Dr. Jayshree Suresh
Approval/Accreditation: AICTE approved, NAAC accredited
Flagship programme: MBA
Student intake: 720 Fees
(full course): Rs. 4.25 lakhs
Board & lodging (two years): 1.24 lakhs + food (approx Rs 24,000 for 2 years)
Admission test cut-offs: SRMEE: 60; MAT: 52
Full-time faculty: 55 (Prof; 7, Asst. prof; 48
Faculty with industry experience (over 10 years): 6
Average placement salary: Rs. 2.5 lakhs
Top recruiters: Accenture, ABN-Amro, Ashok Leyland
Conferences: No info available
Student Activities: COMMUNE (annual festival), ISAGE
Web site: www.srmuniv.ac.in
Other programme: PhD 48 months (minimum)

EVERYTHING about SRM seems larger than life. The campus, the diversity of schools, size of the faculty, and the number of students. The Institute of Management is housed in a huge two building block with four floors; the top floor was still under construction when we visited. The school started out as a department at the engineering college. When the SRM group obtained a deemed university status, the management school was hived off as a separate entity, though it still maintains the umbilical tie with the parent school.

With two more satellite campuses offering management programmes and nearly 1,500 students on the rolls, the institute must ideally move towards securing an independent status within the university. This will help ease the academic and administrative processes since the faculty is unique for all. “We are moving in that direction,” Dr. Jayashree Suresh, Dean, Institute of Management informs us.

While they have an online content management system, the curriculum is still not completely online. Neither is the facility to submit assignments, online. If implemented, both would make life easier for students and faculty, as well as improve the measurement of deliverables. 

“Attempts are being made to make the learning process more interactive, even though the predominant mode of teaching, that is, lecturing remains,” say students. “One project, praised by many students is the stock trading project, wherein students were offered Rs. 2,000 as corpus to trade under the guidance and supervision of faculty, but the buy/sell decisions were their own. Some made over a Rs. 1 lakh in the process,” says Dr. Jayashree with lots of glee. Student indeed would like more projects like this one as part of their curriculum, some of them said.

In terms of numbers, the faculty is adequate, but seems skewed towards those with less than 10 years of work experience. “It’s almost impossible to get good faculty with adequate industry experience, though the institute offers incentives over and above the revised pay scales,” admits Dr. Jayshree. A tertiary degree is another area of concern. Some faculty members have registered at SRM’s own PhD programme. But research is still very nascent at SRM, agrees Dr. Jayashree. Bringing in the culture of research is a difficult task. With a large batch size, teaching is indeed time-consuming.

Campus life is slightly restricted and the ethos of Chennai, does make it a bit more conservative. The college offers a pick-up and service from the city centre, located a two-hour drive away. It is self-contained but most facilities are shared with different schools.