Business Executives teach science students

Business & Student Month at the Faculty of Science and Engineering

This month, about 200 students at the Faculty of Science and Engineering will have a lecture given by a business executive. During the Business & Student Month (Bedrijf&Studentmaand), the Bachelor’s students get case studies from current business practices; and companies like Philips Drachten and Atos get the opportunity to show potential future employees what it is like to work with them.

The students are in the second or third year of their Bachelor’s programme. Science Bachelor’s involved vary from Chemical Engineering and Mathematics and Computing Science. The lectures are organized by the Faculty’s Groningen Engineering Business Center (GEBC), which is in close contact with the world of business.

Straight from Business Practice
“We get good responses from both sides. The companies want to present themselves to the students, but they also like to hear students’ take on various matters. For their part, the students get up-to-date stories from business practice. Both sides win, actually,” says Esther Vertelman, a coordinator at GEBC. “Of course, our students get practical experience in their practicals, and their regular lectures mention a lot of practical examples. Naturally, our lecturers and researchers have their own contacts with businesses. But this is often ad hoc and depends on the networks of the lecturers. This initiative aims to make guest lectures a structural part of the teaching programme.”

How do you design electric shavers for manufacturing?
The Business & Student Month runs until the end of March. In one of the lectures, students of Industrial Engineering and Management are taught by the company Philips in Drachten as part of their course unit in Design and Construction. In this lecture, Philips explain the customizable design of their shavers and how they created a platform architecture for a specific group of these products.

Next year, the GEBC will run another Business & Student Month. You can find out more information from Esther Vertelman by contacting the GEBC secretariat at gebc@rug.nl or 050 36 37396 .