J-Term Blog From Argentina
Editor’s Note: All during U.Va.’s J-Term we will be publishing blog posts from various U.Va. students and faculty studying abroad. The below post comes from a U.Va. course being taught in Argentina during the J-Term. For an archive of all 10 blog posts from this class, click here.
BIENVENIDOS A MENDOZA!
Monday, Dec. 29, 2008
Everyone is here in Mendoza! Seven students arrived on Saturday 12/27 to explore the city prior to the J-term class starting. My family (wife Elaine, 4 year old daughter Julia, and 17 month old son Linwood) and I arrived on Sunday 12/28. Everyone else – nine students and my co-class leader Michael Ledwith – arrived today. Why are we all converging on the wine capitol of Argentina, Mendoza, a city of about 850,000 people located in a hot, dry semi-desert, in its December summer heat?
To learn, of course (you can tell that an instructor, not a student, is writing the blog today!). We are all here for the first year of the SYS 481, a J-term class focused on applying systems engineering skills on real projects with real clients in Mendoza.
We will be here for about 11 days, during which time students will gain a fuller understanding of the cultural differences between the U.S. and Argentina in engineering and business while expanding their knowledge of systems engineering concepts through working on projects with two local companies. Two teams will work at Pasrai, a small, Mendozan family-owned olive oil manufacturer while two other teams will work at AltaVista, a large wine producer.
The projects include:
- Improving how Pasrai handles tour groups – how can they design the tourist experience to better meet Pasrai’s objectives?
- Developing a data management system for Pasrai from which Pasrai can easily extract relevant information to inform decisions and contact customers
- Optimizing space and logistics of AltaVista’s inventory (500.000 bottles of 15+ references) in their 3,500 square meters new bottling facility
- Analyzing and revising of AltaVista’s export procedure, with a focus on reducing the time between when an order is placed and when the wine is shipped.
Students will be writing this blog for the remainder of the trip, during which time you will learn more about each of the projects.
As for today, here is what we did: (Click here for a map of our locations underlined below)
Morning
Group of students who arrived early was thwarted from paragliding due to high winds – they will try again another day!
1:00
Bus arrived from airport with nine students and Michael, after checking-in at El Portal Hotel, we ate our first group meal together (at La Mira)
3:45
Down Time
5:00
We met at El Portal Hotel rooftop, formed project teams, and set the teams off to find “KATO café” a la “The Amazing Race” (all of the teams made it!)
5:30
Worked in teams to prepare for all-day client meetings tomorrow
8:30
Dinner at Ana Bistro
11:00
Let’s get some rest… or stay out and enjoy yourself… or hit the rooftop for a quick dip in the pool (right)
Tomorrow is a big day, as each team will be meeting with their client for the entire day. Their goal: leave the day with a full, well-defined understanding of the client’s problem on which they are working.
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Patti and Doug Sutton | January 1, 2009 @ 11:59 am
Great update!
Look forward to hearing more.
The Suttons