Passion Beyond Teaching

Assoc Prof Sourav S Bhowmick
Tenure so far with SCSE: 17 years
Area of discipline/ research interest: Data management, data analytics, computational social science, network biology

A little about Prof Sourav Bhowmick
I am an Associate Professor in the School of Computer Science and Engineering (SCSE), Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. I lead the  Data Management Research Group at NTU (DANTE). I am also the Research Group Lead of Data Management & Analytics Group in SCSE. In the past, I have been a Visiting Associate Professor (2007-2013) at the Biological Engineering Division, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), USA and a Senior Visiting Professor at Fudan University (2013). My core research expertise is in the field of data management and analytics. I am more excited to solving problems not within the mainstream of this field that require new perspectives instead of yet another solution to traditional data management and analytics problems. Consequently, my research interest is multi-disciplinary in flavour, focusing primarily on developing novel paradigms, algorithms, technology, and software to improve efficiency of software as well as humans.

Rewards of being a professor at NTU and teaching philosophy       
The most rewarding part in NTU is educating students. In NTU, we get diverse quality of students at all levels. I could choose the easy way out by lowering the bar to keep students happy (especially the weaker ones) but it is always a challenge to maintain high standard and rigor in education while ensuring that it benefits and keeps our students engaged.

Many of my students over the years have complained that I set high standard and expectations from them and sometimes to the extent that some of my undergraduate students “hate” to take my course. But it is also rewarding to see that many of these students benefit from it once they join the workforce. As one of my former undergraduate student quoted recently “I hated database modules so much, no matter how I studied, I was bound to get grade C. I did not excel well in my University grades at all. I used to hate the test and exam questions the professor sets. Until I graduated from the University, I realized how crucial database knowledge is. I thank Professor Sourav for always setting such tough and critical thinking kind of database questions, be it test or exam, I appreciate his way of teaching only after I have graduated.” I don’t think any other reward tops this as nothing is more rewarding than the positive impact a professor can have on the lives of their students! 

For my graduate students, the rule I set is simple: quality over quantity. I expect them to pick up the skills of thinking out-of-the-box and undertake research that does not follow the mass "In my group, we do not work on problems that are addressed or being addressed by many peers.  Some of my former students complained during their doctoral days “Why do you set such high standard? My friends are publishing in lesser competitive venues and graduating with a PhD degree from here!” These same students have now not only become successful entrepreneurs and academics in good universities but they also realize the benefits of the standard I have set and demand the same from their own students.

I follow the philosophy that students are expected to contribute to learning by asking questions and making relevant comments in class. Furthermore, in any software-based class trial-and-error plays a part in the pedagogy. Hence, I encourage them to learn by making mistakes. I focus on interactivity and engagement to facilitate learning.  In addition, I encourage students to solve problems independently without seeking for solutions.

Hobbies and interests 
I like to paint (non-digital version) when I don’t want to think about databases and algorithms. I used to explore with water colours, pastels, and sketches when I was a child. In fact, I vaguely remember that I won a few art competitions in my locality back then. However, I stopped painting and drawing when I reached early teen due to academic commitments. Amazingly, I picked it up again after three decades, five year ago. In fact, this was purely accidental. My wife, who started painting before me, egged me to prove that it’s not all talk and that I can really paint. That was how it all started again after a chasm of three decades.

My interest lies in blending realism and expressionism styles of painting related to contemporary global and local issues such as refugee crisis, SG50, et cetera. I have given public exhibitions and talks of my paintings related to refugee crisis to raise funds for humanitarian organizations such as Doctors Without Borders. Some of my paintings have been sold for social causes such as contributions to elderly care and children suffering from rare diseases. 

Art, in my opinion, complements the life of a scientist. To quote Carlo Rubbia, a Nobel prize winner in Physics, “Science for me is very close to art. Scientific discovery is an irrational act. It’s an intuition which turns out to be reality at the end of it – and I see no difference between a scientist developing a marvelous discovery and an artist making a painting.” 

Thoughts on Work Life Balance
There is no fixed schedule for my hobby. I paint whenever I feel like. I do not need to do any balancing act for painting, research, and teaching. I enjoy all of them and when you enjoy something you will always find time to do it. Particularly, in research I focus on quality over quantity and this mantra helps in balancing time. I never attempt to write twenty or more papers a year. Instead, I focus on very few papers every year and spend considerable time in crystallizing them with my students and research staff. In my area, one can rarely publish half a dozen papers per year in our premium venue (SIGMOD). In fact, if one publishes too many papers every year, our research community may question whether that person has made scientific contributions to all these work. Integrity is a premium commodity for a scientist, hard to earn but easy to lose. 

You will find your balance when you enjoy what you do. If you don’t enjoy what you do, you will never find a balance regardless of how much money you make.

One word definition of yourself
Tinkerer.