In a first, IIT Kharagpur alumni foundation to fund overseas internships

In a first for the institute, IIT Kharagpur (IIT KGP)'s US Alumni Foundation has offered funded foreign internships to students. Around 14 students have been selected and will receive an amount upto $3000 each to pursue high quality international research and summer internships at reputed global universities such as University of Cambridge, University of Columbia, and MIT, among others.

As many as 14 students from various disciplines and at various levels of study at IIT Kharagpur have been awarded scholarships by the IIT Kharagpur Foundation (IITKGPF) of USA, to pursue research or internships at renowned academic institutions abroad. The grants were made available as part of the IIT KGP Foundation's 'Award Program for International Internships', which was launched in early March this year.

Under the scheme, IITKGPF, a non-profit organization headquartered at Nebraska, offers up to $3000 per student as monetary support to exceedingly meritorious students who wish to pursue high-quality international research and professional internships. The scholarship is disbursed through direct payments for eligible expenses like airfare, stay and so on. Partially funded students are also eligible for the scholarship.

As per IIT KGP students, the move would boost applications since lack of grants used to impact the same.

"Internships are expensive and stipends given by foreign laboratories or universities are often not enough to cover living and travel costs. Many are unable to pursue internships not because their projects are not good, but because there are so few grants available and the competition for them is intense," said Kaustav Brahma, B.Tech student at the Department of Electronics and Electrical Communications Engineering, who has received the scholarship for his internship at MIT this year.

All the applications for the program are received and screened by the IIT KGP Office of International Relations, while a committee constituted of five Deans of IIT KGP, together with the president of the Foundation, makes the final awards.

According to IIT KGP, the selection process takes into account the reputation of the host Institution, the quality of the proposed research or professional internship and the academic standing of the candidate.

Among the institutions where the IIT KGP students have received invitation to pursue their internships this year are the University of Cambridge, UK; University of Columbia; MIT; Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany; Albert-Ludwigs- Universitaet Freiburg, Germany; Carnegie-Mellon; University of Chicago and the California Institute of Technology.

Meanwhile, the number of awards will vary from year to year, based on fund availability, and the quality of the internships.