Erudite talks with Alumni-Article 1

Akash Deep (2017-B.Tech-P&I.), Ph.D. student @ UW-Madison

Introduction

• Tell us briefly about yourself.

My name is Akash, and I graduated from IITR in 2017 with a B.Tech. in Production & Industrial Engg., and a minor in Computer Science and Engg. Like many others, when I joined IITR, I also wasn’t sure what was my cup of tea, therefore, (like many) I watched a lot of TV-series and anime in my fresher year. Over the next three years, I was able to zero-in on the future steps.

• Tell us about the University you got enrolled in for further studies.

Right after graduating from IITR, I joined the University of Wisconsin — Madison, and currently, I am a third-year Ph.D. student in the Industrial & Systems Engineering Department. Alongside this, I am also pursuing a Master of Science in Statistics. In short, my research interest is Industrial Analytics — developing methods for better prognosis, diagnosis, and enabling decision-making for smart and connected industrial IoT systems.

The decision to go for Further Studies

• When did you realize that this is what you wanted to do?

It was probably around the end of my second year in IITR that I had decided to have a career in Research/Academia. In my opinion, the key factor in “realizing what I wanted to do” was due to several exploratory activities I ventured into, such as, doing some basic stuff for event organization (in fests and otherwise), attending and learning from some workshops either in the institute or outside, competitive coding, tried a few sports stuff too (failed miserably :p), and experienced the domain of research first-hand by working with some very enthusiastic professors!

• Your motivation for giving higher studies more importance than securing a job through placements?

The critical factors of choosing research as my future profession would be — the avenue to dive as deep as possible in an area of interest. The flexibility to choose an area of interest. It is a rewarding as well as a tremendous learning experience irrespective of the out-come (win-win!). If someone enjoys the idea of knowing things in detail — consider exploring it at least once.

• Things you finally ended up doing to land yourself at a university for further studies?

Research experience by projects in the institute plus a couple of research internships. Looking back, my past research experiences had been totally different from my current interests, therefore, I think it is not necessary to hit the right spot in the first attempt, but continuously exploring for the same is.

• Driving factors for the location and the University you chose?

My research advisors here, alongside the platform of doing several industrial research projects [quite relevant to my field].

Experience

• The contrast between IIT Roorkee and your University?

It would be unfair if I directly compare an institute to a university, therefore, below I provide some distinct differences in the academic practices of IITR and College of Engineering of UW-Mad:

• First, under-grad students here have relatively more flexibility and options to structure their study programs/courses. [Alongside, the process of getting into (or withdrawing from) courses is very convenient, unlike the lines we had to queue in in front of the academic section].
• Second, the courses are designed and evaluated on a more frequent basis — for example, small but (bi)-weekly assignments, two or three mid-terms within a span of 13 weeks, or group projects catering directly to course-learnings — this keeps student hooked throughout the course. In contrast, at IITR, we generally had one mid-term and an end-term which determines 75% of course gradings (usually) — this potentially leads to students learning only during the exams.
• Third, the course contents are significantly (if not completely) determined by the instructor, therefore, quite often I found that some of the course material [in grad level courses] is directly from the recent works of that course — very helpful and relevant!
• Fourth, exposure through student competitions such as BAJA, FSAE, etc. is very good at IITR. It would be great to see them participate in many other such competitions. (Have heard that SAE Aero has recently come up. Nice!).

Concluding Points

• Future plans

I intend to stay in academic research and teaching. Not yet sure where though (maybe IITR, who knows!?)

• Advice to the campus junta

1. Start exploring from day 1! If one does not know the final goal [wrt profession], there possibly can never be a better time to go out and understand so many things that one can do. Take a taste of all and find what you enjoy the most. Even if one knows, there’s no harm in exposing oneself in other domains.
2. A good GPA is always handy.

LinkedIn ID:- https://www.linkedin.com/in/deepakashdeep96/