The first year students met the faculty in the auditorium at a gathering that is organised every year after the first year admissions and just before the commencement of classes. Heads of Departments of Maths (Dr. Kalyanasundaram), English (Dr.G.Anbalagan), Chemistry and Physics (Dr. Srinivasan), EEE ( Prof. Lakshmana Perumal), ECE (Dr.Chandrasekaran), CSE( Ms. Kalpana), Mechanical (Prof. Jeyadev), Metallurgy (Prof. Venkatakrishnan) and Civil (Dr. Perumal) addressed the new batch and assured them of all facilities needed.

Students were encouraged to pursue a different line of approach to their studies , different from their cover-to-cover rote learning of texts as in the twelfth standard, since that approach does not help in professional studies. They were informed about the anti-ragging measures adopted and assured them that their academic stay would be tension free and ragging free. After the talks, students were introduced to their chief faculty advisors and taken on a tour of the campus.

A couple of students from DAV came up to the Department of English to enquire about ELA. A welcome enthusiasm, indeed. The Department of English is keeping its fingers crossed to get two ad hoc teachers as there are now classes for 8 sections of first years ( 2 Civil, 2 Mechanical and 1 each of the other departments) together with the three third year classes on Communication Skills. The Language Resource Centre is a very busy place now, with one batch after another .

Permission for two ad-hoc lecturers has been given, but they are rather hard to find at Salem. It looks like every M.A. graduate has been absorbed either by Arts and Science Colleges or Government and Private schools and the innumerable small companies established in Salem in the past five years.

Well, I always believe that every new day brings new hopes and new opportunities.