A snail was once climbing a mango tree in winter. A grasshopper laughed at the snail and told the snail that there were no mangoes on the tree in winter. Mangoes come only in summer. The snail had patiently replied to him that by the time he will reach up there on the tree, there will be summer.
This story is not about the patience of the snail. But, it is a story of metacognition. The Snail knows that it knows. It is a story of self-awareness, acceptance and perseverance. It is the story of a snail that knows one’s limitations, is aware of where it wants to go, is working hard to reach there and is enjoying the journey.
This sums up the student engagement that we are trying to build at the Ahmedabad University. We aim to provide a platform to our students where they can relax, unwind, debate, deliberate, reflect, immerse and collaborate in co-curricular and extracurricular activities to know that they know. It is not an easy process since it just not about going on a stage to say a few words or sing a song or cook a dish. That is too simple and pretty obvious too. But the real challenge is to let the students know what happens to them when they go on that stage and are they happy about it? Or what is their top most feeling when they sit down with a blind person and read a book to him/her or take part in a debate or clay modelling workshop? Can they define that feeling? Can they be in that feeling? Can they learn something from that feeling? And lastly, can they turn that feeling into action for self and others?
For us, this is when engagement comes because it is rooted in self-awareness, empathy, resilience, camaraderie, reflection, expression and action. The students become engaged because they want to. They become engaged because they see that in this process they are the givers and also the takers. They become engaged because there is a realisation like the one that Po Panda (in Kungfu Panda) has: “There is no secret sauce”. The only thing that matters is one’s own self. We believe that this is a very big driver for our students that the only propeller is not outside them but inside them.
This realisation has led to a world of literature, quiz, drama, theatre, films, music, dance, debates, fine arts, social service, food, sports, fitness, photography, creative writing, entrepreneurship and a lot more through the 20 thriving student clubs at the University.
These clubs allow our students to express themselves, to hone their skills, to be self-aware and to be drivers of change.
The focus of student engagement at our University is to provide meaningful and engaging opportunities to our students to not only relax, rejuvenate and unwind from the rigours of their academic life but also give them a platform to develop a repertoire that would help them in their future endeavours. It refers to creating student-led cohesive & collaborative environment which would foster in them the spirit of entrepreneurship, social action, innovation, self-awareness and creative expression.
Going back to our snail’s anecdote, just as the snail starts in winter, our students also start this journey of self-realisation and deep learning right from their first year and it goes on till the last year of their studies and beyond (till they reach their summer and get their own mangoes!!) It is a continuous process of knowing and doing and learning. This is what differentiates us from the rest.
‘Dance won’t leave you even if you do…’
This undeniably describes the Dance Club’s mission and vision. Established in 2016, the Dance Club is a platform for fledgling and proficient dancers alike. The club members train non-dancers, transforming them into confident ones, their purpose being to motivate and to inspire dancers to let go of their trepidations. The Club organises a plethora of events to encourage and celebrate the diversity dance has to offer. It aims to help develop skills like team building, effective communication, strategising, and time management through dance and movement.
Contact Details
Name: Bhavya Nair (Club Secretary)
Email Id: [email protected]
Club Email Id: [email protected]
The word ‘Design’ may have many definitions, however, the ability to use Design as an expressive tool as well as a process to develop solutions is what the Design Club aims to explore. The book sitting beside you, the phone in your hand, the sign outside your window, the website you are browsing, all of these items have been carefully and thoughtfully executed by designers. Therefore, the Club aims to promote ‘Design Thinking’ as a concept and a way of life. In line with the multidisciplinary learning environment of Ahmedabad University, the Club is helping members discover ways in which design could be explored across disciplines.
Contact Details
Name: Diya Varma (Club Secretary)
Email Id: [email protected]
Club Email Id: [email protected]
The Entrepreneurs’ Club curates a platform for aspiring student entrepreneurs from across Schools to deliver experiences of exploration, experimentation, and innovation through boosting networking and a risk-taking attitude. The Club seeks to build a robust community of young entrepreneurs who discover industrial voids and challenge themselves to fill those with revolutionary ideas.
Contact Details
Name: Varshita Mehta (Club Secretary)
Email Id: [email protected]
Club Email Id: [email protected]
The Environment Club is committed to spreading awareness regarding developments in the environment and climate, creating opportunities for the student community to engage on issues and solutions to our environmental challenges, and encouraging behavioural change for a sustainable planet. Keeping a positive, optimistic and inquisitive outlook, we strive to motivate each other to give back to nature, and attempt to forge a symbiotic relationship with our planet, rather than an exploitative one.
Contact Details
Name: Rozat Rangawala (Club Secretary)
Email Id: [email protected]
Club Email Id: [email protected]
Films are not just stories but a visual medium that reflects society as a whole from the past till the present. The Film Appreciation Club recognises that art holds the proverbial mirror to society, and in this spirit, it aims to give students a chance to look beyond what is on the screen to critically engage and analyse its various aspects (cinematography, screenplay production design, sound, staging, and lighting) that come together to make a good film. The Club regularly holds film-screenings, workshops, and free-wheeling discussions on movies that matter to not only develop film literacy but also to understand the objectives and the ideological aspects of a film that contribute to moving a culture forward.
Contact Details
Name: Yashi Desai (Club Secretary)
Email Id: [email protected]
Club Email Id: [email protected]
The Fine Arts Club is a platform where we introduce different art forms to creative minds and to those in the initial phase of exploring arts. The Club is working towards creating a broad platform where the participants learn about art and experience the diversity of various art forms. Every year, the Club organises contemporary artistic events and workshops highlighting various art forms not just using paints and brushes but also paper, clay, waste materials, and more. Our vision is to break gender stereotypes associated with the field of art.
Contact Details
Name: Aanshita Chaudhary (Club Secretary)
Email Id: [email protected]
Club Email Id: [email protected]
Through the Fitness Club, we make sure that our members are fit, both mentally and physically. The vision is to spread the spirit of fitness across the University. The Club hosts different exciting events every week that test the physical and mental fitness levels of participants. Wednesday Vlogs introduces committee members to the University fraternity and helps them increase their reach to motivate everyone. We understand that sharing information is vital and we do so not only through our social media handles but also our journal, ‘Fitfluential’. The mission is to encourage people to not only look at fitness as a habit but to develop and inculcate it as a lifestyle. We believe that, ‘Fitness is not about being better than someone else, it’s about being better than who you used to be’.
Contact Details
Name: Ananya Surana (Club Secretary)
Email Id: [email protected]
Club Email Id: [email protected]
The Food and Nutrition Club is a place where people come together to explore and share their love for food. The vision of the Club is to unite all foodies irrespective of gender, age, and background, to indulge in a wholesome experience of food, cooking, and nutrition. The Club aims to develop a feeling of fondness and appreciation for self-cooked food among the youth along with learning how to complement food with nutrition. The events organised not only widen the knowledge of club members but also encourage them to think of converting their passion for food into a career in the food industry.
Contact Details
Name: Dinil Shah (Club Secretary)
Email Id: [email protected]
Club Email Id: [email protected]
The Heritage Club aims to create a space where people from different cultural backgrounds can come forward and share with others what they feel is their heritage. It works towards breaking the traditional view of only architecture and monuments being heritage, and to acknowledge, understand, and share about multiple facets of heritage, right from grandma's recipes, old photographs, Gulzar's poems, Panchtantra stories to festivals, rituals, sculptures, and paintings.
Contact Details
Name: Swati Pariath (Club Secretary)
Email Id: [email protected]
Club Email Id: [email protected]
Ahmedabad University’s Literary Club, Abhivaykt, is an assemblage of diverse people who like to celebrate literature and the joy of reading and writing. The Club’s membership spans many artistic disciplines, but majorly, literature. It is a quintessential place to connect with those who share a love for any literature and is home to all who see stories as the essence of life. The committee organises competitions, activities, and festivals that bring students from various disciplines together, and foster and accentuate the true spirit of literature.
Contact Details
Name: Ayushi Bhandari (Club Secretary)
Email Id: [email protected]
Club Email Id: [email protected]
The Music Club aims at recasting the melody and rhythms in the direction of a collaborative hymn of accomplishment, contentment, gratification and spiritual oneness. By representing the artistic and cultural potential the Club holds, music will lead all feet to fall in an evolving and united floor. The Club not only focuses on providing the best source of entertainment to their audience but also is keen in helping the evolving talents by conducting regular workshops in different genres. With the joint effort of various composers, lyricists, singers, and instrumentalists, our objective is to shape looming artists into presenting a finer form of the art of music.
Contact Details
Name: Rohan Shah (Club Secretary)
Email Id: [email protected]
Club Email Id: [email protected]
Students at the Photography Club are self-driven enthusiasts who strive to inspire and help discover people’s talents through art. We capture moments and expressions, and give them meaning. The Club aims to fuel creative minds with ideas, thoughts, inspiration, and the desire to execute. It strives to provide opportunities for students to amalgamate photography with other forms of art. We also wish to engage with students and create a holistic experience of learning and joy in art, especially with the heritage of Ahmedabad.
Contact Details
Name: Khushi Chauhan (Club Secretary)
Email Id: [email protected]
Club Email Id: [email protected]
The Programming Club aims to help young growing minds to change the world around them with their understanding of Science, Technology, and Mathematics. Our vision is to help students identify and develop innovative skills with assured guidance and proper mentoring to develop them into future innovators. We are devoted to creating a sincere coding culture and a community that believes in fostering the spirit of collaboration, competition, and curiosity. The Club’s contribution in developing a thriving culture ranges from conducting activities, AMA sessions, and talks that fill the gap between theoretical knowledge and practical real-world cases to alumni interactions, coding contests, and hands-on workshops that help acquire and develop skills.
Contact Details
Name: Kushal Patel (Club Secretary)
Email Id: [email protected]
Club Email Id: [email protected]
Woody Allen once said, “Some drink deeply from the river of knowledge, but others only gargle.”
The Quiz Club or Les Quizerables, as we like to call ourselves, is a community of quiz-buffs with a never-ending thirst for information. The intent behind the Club is to introduce non-quizzers to the fun and the thrill of quizzing as well as motivate quizzing enthusiasts to challenge themselves. The Club has gripping quizzing sets and innovative formats catering to a variety of interests ranging from business quizzes to popular culture quizzes. We also encourage our members to participate in national-level external quizzing events, like Tata Crucible. Win or lose, the purpose is to celebrate curiosity, discovery, and knowledge. Always.
Contact Details
Name: Mohit Manghani (Club Secretary)
Email Id: [email protected]
Club Email Id: [email protected]
The Robotics Club offers students a stimulating environment to explore robotics and innovate, promoting collaboration across disciplines. Our mission is to encourage active participation in regional and international robotics competitions, preparing our members to represent Ahmedabad University on prestigious platforms. We aspire to foster a community of passionate learners, driving them to become technology leaders and innovative problem solvers.
Contact Details
Name: Aarsha Shah (Club Secretary)
Email Id: [email protected]
Club Email Id: [email protected]
The Sports Club encourages and invites students at the University to participate in various sports events, workshops and tournaments conducted by us throughout the year. The Club aims to develop a sporting culture at the University and works on providing enough opportunities for the students to learn, develop and inculcate the spirit of sportsmanship and teamwork in every aspect of their life. We strongly believe that, ‘Harder the battle, sweeter the victory’.
Contact Details
Name: Satvik Yadav (Club Secretary)
Email Id: [email protected]
Club Email Id: [email protected]
The Social Service Forum aims at moulding young minds who are the future of the country by inculcating in them a sense of volunteerism, empathy, responsibility, and generosity. The Club Members dedicatedly work on social challenges by organising various engaging events like, ‘Destigmatising Menstruation’, ‘Rape Culture’, and ‘Anubhav’.
Contact Details
Name: Priyansh Agrawal (Club Secretary)
Email Id: [email protected]
Club Email Id: [email protected]
A magazine is the manifestation of expressions and ideas. The Student Magazine Club aims to create an environment where people are fearless in the pursuit of their thoughts, expressions, and identity. Redefining the traditional scopes of a magazine, through our magazine ‘Pehchaan’, we would want to encourage every student of Ahmedabad University to voice their opinions and promote a culture that portrays sensitivity towards the multifarious facets of the modern world. We also aim to open discussions within the student body on various social and political issues through which we want to initiate a process whereby our students get a chance to retrospect and understand their own identity and indulge in personal growth. Join us if capturing stories is your forte.
Contact Details
Name: Nirja Sukhadia (Club Secretary)
Email Id: [email protected]
Club Email Id: [email protected]
At the management club, we commit to empowering the community to lead, organise, network, and embrace the manager within, regardless of their background. With the help of simulation-based events, expert sessions, and various collaborations within and outside the University, we constantly explore unconventional managerial concepts. We take immense pride in its flagship events like Corporate Triathlon, Union Budget, and Spectrum. The Club actively strives to showcase the importance of multi-tasking and to develop a diverse prowess. It also enhances its visibility on social media platforms to build a more comprehensive network, opening up new opportunities for the students to explore. Multi-tasking is the new trend. We nurture it.
Contact Details
Name: Sahil Shah (Club Secretary)
Email Id: [email protected]
Club Email Id: [email protected]
We aim to spread awareness about the true meaning of theatre in our University. We encourage members to participate in national-level competitions like the Indian National Theatre and organise events like Rangmanch and Spotlight, be as much off-stage as on-stage at all such events. Workshops with eminent theatre artists and collaboration events like Mancharades are just a few of the enthralling events that we host annually. If you are passionate about writing, digital content creation, graphic designing, acting, directing, editing, or photography, this is the perfect place to house your talent. Work with like-minded people and broaden the spectrum of your knowledge at the Theatre Club.
Contact Details
Name: Khushi Dhruva (Club Secretary)
Email Id: [email protected]
Club Email Id: [email protected]