Dear Teachers and Parents,
Fascinating Right!! Listen to My Video- https://youtu.be/NjqLMgcDJhs
Do You agree?
Ravi Saripalle
Dear Friends and Students,
If possible, read the above article which was published on
March 15th, 2001 by the Economic Times! I was only a 3-year-experienced Senior
Software Engineer, working for Finance Solutions at Wipro Technologies. It was
a proud moment on that day when I saw my article published next to Prof. S
Sadagopan Sir, Founding Director of IIITB from 1999 to 2021, and he taught for
25+ years at IIT Kanpur, IIM Bangalore, and IIT Madras.
While searching for some stuff today, accidentally I found
this paper! Curiously, today I read again both articles—Prof. Sadagopan Sir’s
and mine. How far they are true in today’s context!! Interesting, always,
right?
My topic was, “Tapping In-House Business,” and Prof.
Sadagopan Sir’s was “Is IT Killing other Engineering Disciplines”! By this
time, you would have understood what would have been the content of both and
their reflections to date. Today it is May 12th, 2024! Yes, the topic “Is IT
Killing other Engineering Disciplines” is still valid, but forms are different.
I will not go beyond on this topic in this story, rather I would talk more
about what I wrote and where we are today!
Friends, though 2001 was a meltdown or dotcom burst year,
still in 2001, the majority of Americans didn’t have the Internet. Most people
got online using dial-up connections. Only 7% of Internet users worldwide had
broadband. Most things purchased online were paid for by money order. On the
Internet, print publications were generally navigated using blue hyperlinks.
Font-sizes were rarely bigger than what you'd see in an actual paper. There
were no videos. Ads were small, boxy, and static and generally looked like they
were an afterthought and designed by a gold salesman (vice.com).
In India, if I remember right, the internet service, known as
the Gateway Internet Access Service (GIAS), provided a speed of 9.6 kbit/s
speed, was priced at ₹5,200 for 250 hours for individuals, ₹16,200 for
institutional dial-up SLIP/PPP accounts, and higher for leased line services.
Maybe it might have increased to 50+kbit/s!!
During that time, I wrote this article, saying, “Intranet is
going to be the future tool for an IT Company’s sustenance”! Employees are
internal customers. Intranet is going to be the Company Mart, essential to
engage Employees in the Knowledge Industry. They are powerful communication
tools. Functions like HR, Finance, Marketing, Admin, Sales, etc., should be
totally automated and operated through intranets. Employee referrals, Project
Management, Knowledge Management Workflows should be automated in these
intranet portals.
You know what, many wrote back to me, “a fancy model”! More
maturity is needed to write such stuff! Today after 23 years, what happened to
this? I don’t need to justify again! Do you agree?
Now let me write further! I may or may not live that longer
for another 23 years, but no human being would be involved in mundane/routine
tasks - AI would drive all these functions. AI took 17 years for speech
recognition, 14 years for handwriting recognition, 6 years for image
recognition, 2 years for reading comprehension. But after 23 years, with this
faster pace of learning, AI would handle all tasks which are done by current
Engineering/Non-Engineering graduates.
Do you agree? If so, up for an upgrade, else it becomes an
uphill task to survive!
Ravi Saripalle
Dear
Faculty Friends and Students,
Today,
on the occasion of World Intellectual Property Day, I had the opportunity to
speak at a 2-Day National Workshop on the crucial topic of how Intellectual
Property and Future Research are tied up with Sustainable Development Goals
(SDGs). The 17 UN-listed Goals and 169 Targets should not be violated by a
single IP. If so, we risk opening the door to disaster! Hence, this story
gains even more significance.
Let
me explain in detail. You are all aware of the fascinating story of the Four
Pests Campaign, an initiative launched by China in the late 1950s.
Here's
a breakdown of what happened:
The
Goal: Sparrows were targeted because they
ate grain, including paddy rice. Estimates suggested they consumed around 6.5
kilograms of paddy per year. This can feed more than 60 thousand people
happily.
The
Unintended Consequences: While
sparrows do eat grain, they also prey on insects that damage crops. Eradicating
the sparrows (which killed more than 30 lakhs sparrows) led to a surge
in these insect populations, causing even greater grain loss (which led to
4.5 crore people dying of hunger).
The
Ecological Disaster: The Four Pests
Campaign (Rats, Flies, Mosquitoes, Sparrows) resulted in a significant decline
in sparrow populations and a rise in insect pests. This had a negative impact
on agriculture and the ecosystem.
So,
while the initial goal of the campaign was to improve food security, it
backfired and led to ecological damage.
Food
Security is only the tip of the iceberg! If
we don’t properly inspire our students using Design Thinking in conjunction
with the Sustainable Development Goals Philosophy, if students choose the
wrong set of career/research goals and ideology, all 17 Sustainable
Development Goals and 169 targets will be affected.
The
unwanted competition for Ranks, the declining ethics in human beings, lack of
trust and commitment, ambitious
targets and package goals, and fancy Lifestyle goals would affect this deep
thinking.
Can
we rise above like an Eagle flying beyond the cloud when the storm comes?
Design Thinking with SDGs would give that strength to the individual to fly beyond the AI storm. Do you agree?
So,
what is my appeal to you today?
A Special Campaign/Education is needed in the education system, especially for
8th to UG, focusing on Design Thinking (Human-Centered Approach to a particular
problem) for SDGs. This combo should drive research goals for faculty and
industry, projects for students, ethical teachings for school children, and so
on.
Stay
Tuned. I will be talking more on this topic in the future. Wishing all
responsible education leaders respond to this world cause.
Dr.
Ravi Saripalle
Dear Institutional Leaders, Parents or Responsible Relatives or
a Convinced Student
Over the past 14 years, I've been exploring a fundamental
question: What is the most impactful gift an institution or parent can offer to
a student, son, or daughter aged 12-24? Let's evaluate various options:
But do any of these gifts connect to
their natural intelligence?
Do they help identify individual strengths, guide in career planning, or create hope?
Is there a gift that AI can never replace?
Yes, I propose a potential game-changer:
ü Gift Form: A
Simple Letter
ü Style: Epistolatory
Format Letter (a letter written in the style of a personal correspondence)
ü Content:
o
A brief
reflection on the individual's performance/status over the past year,
highlighting their achievements.
o A reminder of the
individual's strengths based on their natural intelligence assessment.
o
An anecdote on
Design Thinking or an Empathetic Situation, fostering a Design Mindset.
ü Impact: This
gift can bring hope and happiness to the Individual for lifetime!
ü Super Impact:
Organizing a Design Thinking workshop exclusively for the same intelligence and
age group students to aid in career planning.
Do You agree? Do you have questions and
comments? If you are interested, I am ready to assist you in this process.
Please read the detailed proposal at https://rb.gy/fgvvkm and write to me at sdindia2020@gmail.com
You can also follow me on:
Dr. Ravi Saripalle
