PALS (Pan IIT Leadership Series), an initiative of the IITAIIC  (IIT Alumni Industry Interaction Centre), Chennai,  has been, over the past 5 years, serving the community in augmenting engineering education in Chennai region.  The Pan IIT Alumni of the PALS program work closely with IIT Madras, the local Engineering Colleges, Industry and Alumni, through a series of events that run through the academic year, to help add value to the engineering education experienced by students of the Engineering Institutions in the region.  Their programs range from Campus Lectures, Industry Visits, Department Visits, Innovation Competitions, Faculty Development Programs and In-depth Workshops and Seminars spaced through the Academic Year.

For the Academic Year 2016-17, that has just got underway, PALS team is working with over 20 Engineering Colleges, located in Chennai region and Trichy-Salem region.  With the growing spread of PALS programs, in a new development this year, they are supported by an Industry Executive Committee formed of members from over 12 Industries.  The support from IIT Alumni and IIT Madras Faculty and Administration has also been growing.

PALS will kick-start its activities this academic year, with an Inauguration event on Saturday, 30th July 2016, at the Central Lecture Theatre (CLT) from 09:30AM.  Dr.  Bhaskar Ramamurthi, Director IIT Madras, has kindly agreed to inaugurate the PALS activities and talk on ‘Relevance of PALS to its stakeholders’.  This will be followed by a talk by Mr. M M Murugappan , Vice Chairman of the Murugappa Corporate Board on ‘Industry Academia Collaboration for Better Engineers’,  and then by a talk by Dr. G. Viswanathan, the Founder-Chancellor of VIT University on ‘Recalibration of Engineering Education for the Future’. The function will be attended by representatives of PALS’ Partner Institutions, as well as of other institutions invited by PALS. Representatives of PALS’ recently formed Industry Executive Committee will attend the function. PALS will also be inviting IITAIIC members and other industry representatives to the function.