Embracing Diversity: 71% Non-Engineers, Over 60% with Work Experience, and 47% Female Students
BILKULONLINE
Ahmedabad, July 2: The new batch of MICA, Ahmedabad, continues to practice diversity, with 71% of the batch coming from a non-engineering background, comprising lawyers, architects, dentists, chartered accountants, a flying cadet, a doctor and a national level cricketer.
In terms of gender ratio, 47% percent of the incoming batch across all three programmes ~ flagship PGDM-C and PGDM, Crafting Creative Communications (CCC), and Fellow Programme in Management (FPM) are females, whereas 53% are male students.
Prof. Githa Heggde, Dean, MICA, said, “At MICA, we celebrate diversity. The MICA admission process has always facilitated bringing a very interesting mix of diversity across various categories to the campus. This year, in the PGP class of 206 students, we have a host of students with varied professional degrees including architects, lawyers, dentists, chartered accountants and a Doctor. We also have a few students with postgraduate degrees in international journalism, sports management, and economics. We do take pride in our uniquely designed entrance test, MICAT, which tests analytical and creative skills, attracting diverse students without any preference or quota.”
Of 235 students across all three programmes, 110 are female students, whereas 125 are male students. Out of 206 students from the PGP batch, 90 are female students and 116 are male students. For the CCC programme, 18 out of the batch of 24 students are girls, whereas the FPM batch has 2 female scholars and 3 male scholars.
About 80% of the PGP class comprises students in the age group of 21-25 years. As many as 62 percent from across all programmes come with prior work experience. Thus, the number of fresh-
out-of-college students in the batch is 38%.
Prof. Ruchi Tewari and Prof. Taral Pathak, Co-Chairs of Admissions at MICA, said, “With 71% non-engineers in this batch, this shifting trend is a healthy sign indicating that students across all domains are equally competitive to make it to a premium B-school. We also take pride and take credit for this healthy mix of students because our only merit-based admissions through the MICAT (MICA’s indigenous exam) not only checks for analytical skills but scientifically assesses their creative skills which is the need of the hour. The result says it all – with no artificial systematic filters, students from extremely diverse academic and professional backgrounds are today a part of the MICA learner cohort.”
The highest number of students are from Maharashtra (46), Delhi (31), Gujarat (27), Uttar
Pradesh (25), and others. Interestingly, the batch also has one student from Tripura and 2 from Assam. The institute has students from various disciplines like MBBS, Pharma, Architecture, Dentistry, Design, Law, and Finance.