Friday, December 5, 2008

How Frozen Pizza Is Made

An interesting video on how frozen pizza is made.

(via kottke) A blog well worth reading!

Leadership

The class is coming to the conclusion of it's first semester of year 2. As the calendar year comes to a close, thoughts turn to our trip (see previous post) and graduation.

Some of the benefits of non-core courses in the second year is more emphasis on class participation and less on finals and midterms. I really prefer this way of instruction. This encourages students to prepare, to participate and the think more out-of-the-box about concepts rather than learn them by rote and write them down on an exam for marks.

Leadership is the first class that we have finished this semester. I really wanted to enjoy this class, but unfortunately I didn`t get out of it what I wanted. The amount of reading was quite voluminous with at least six HBR articles to read each class. I don`t mind doing the reading, if it is beneficial, but doing the readings and not following up in class was frustrating for me.

This is a subject matter that is difficult to cover in just 32 hours. Hitting the high points and delving into a few important points would have been more beneficial than trying to cover it all and then expecting the class to go into the depths on their own.

Overall, I enjoyed the class, but I don`t think that I got out of it what I wanted. This feedback has been provided to the instructor and I hope that the class improves for the next class.

International Trip - The Decision

Before there was 1 - there was 4: Hong Kong/Beijing; Hong Kong/Tokyo; Santiago/Buenos Aires; Dubai/Bangalore.

The Dubai/Bangalore trip was popular however there were two drawbacks: the time to be spent in the air and the school was finding it difficult to find a tour operator. However, the school said that if the class voted for that trip, the would work something out. This trip got a boost earlier that day when a manager from Emirates Cargo came to talk to us about his company and what it is like to travel to and visit Dubai.

The Santiago/Buenos Aires team brought in a case of wine to help "smooth" the voting. The Hong Kong/Tokyo team had a member that was willing to pay for all drinks on the flights! All is fair in the voting process apparently.

The rules were set out - simple majority of votes wins. There were 35 students casting votes - first group to 18 votes wins.

ROUND 1
Hong Kong/Beijing dropped out of the voting. There was a general feeling that this trip was two cities in one country although vastly different.

ROUND 2
Dubai/Bangalore dropped out.

Down to South America and Asia. The bidding war went up when it was pointed out that there may be free drinks on international flights and promises of fully paid nights out were flying all over the place.

FINAL ROUND

Hong Kong/Tokyo is the WINNER!!!

Everyone is very excited and looking forward to the trip - not just because it is the culmination of two years of seriously hard work.