Paradox'22

PARADOX'22

Student Festival

Organised by the students of IITM BS Degree Program at the IIT Madras Campus

20th, 21st & 22nd May 2022

1500+ Programming & Data Science students of IIT Madras attended the first on-campus three day festival, which was fully curated and organised by the students. This was a huge platform for interaction between fellow students, faculty, industry experts, and companies.

Paradox '22 also marked the formal distribution of provisional diploma certificates to 101 students, including 17 students from families of income less than ₹1 lakh per annum.

Sports

As an icebreaker and warm-up to the three day festival, a whole series of games (chess, table tennis, box cricket, football 5s, etc.) were organised where students competed against each other. On day two, over 700 participants woke up early for a 5km run / walk exploring the beautiful, green IIT Madras campus. The fastest runner completed the five kilometres in 19 minutes and 38 seconds! The much awaited faculty vs students cricket match on day two drew in a lot of spectators cheering on while the faculty team went ahead to win the match.

Interactive Sessions

The Director of IIT Madras, Prof. V.Kamakoti, formally addressed the gathering of 1500+ students at the SAC Auditorium and with that began a series of formal and informal interactive sessions with the faculty and instructors of the BS Degree program. This was also a platform where students with the 10 best projects were selected to present them to a larger audience for discussion and feedback.

Being a unique program with students of all age groups and of varying educational / professional backgrounds, students were able to learn a lot from meeting and interacting each other as well.

Cultural Events

Cultural events during the IITM Paradox included competitive events and entertainment events. Students who participated in competitive events such as Controversia (Debate), Qutopia (Quiz) and Hack-o-pitch were evaluated by a panel of judges and mentors who picked the winners and also gave valuable feedback for all participants and spectators to learn from.

The evenings were for unwinding. Students from across the country put on a wonderful display of their talents on stage in the form of open mic, music and dance. On day two, all faculty and students joined in for a festive dinner under the stars at the open air theatre, and enjoyed the late night screening of a movie together.

Workshops

Apart from the talks and project presentations, spanning over two days, there were a total of nine professional workshops conducted at different seminar halls that the students could pick to attend. These workshops were conducted by IIT Madras Faculty. Over a hundred students signed up for and attended each of these workshops.

Company Discussions

Day three was marked with Placement Cell interaction, sessions by IITM Incubation Cell, IITM Research Park, panel discussions and Q&A sessions.

The panel discussion titled "Is Data the eternal fuel?" was attended by industry leaders in the field of data science and data analytics from IBM Client Innovation Center India, Renault Nissan Technology and Business Center India, Walmart Global Tech India, Capgemini, TCS, Latent view. The Q&A session that followed with the topic of "Careers in Data Science" were answered by leaders from Tech Mahindra, Infosys Springboard Program, Aditya Birla Management Corporation Pvt Ltd, L&T Construction, Power Transmission & Distribution, Tiger Analytics, Walmart Labs India.

Additionally, Startups by IITM BS degree students were showcased and judged in an exhibit by professors and industry experts.