Thothathri Raman, a four decade plus experienced pioneering Business Journalist founded Standards for Educational Advancement & Accreditation (SEAA) Trust, New Delhi out of a passion for building globally bench-marked peer reviewed quality in world's second largest market for MBA-India!     SEAA Trust was set up in the year 2008 and it is a registered taxpaying non-profit. 

Mission:  Advancing Self-regulation with Accreditation 

Objective:  Helping Higher Education  Institutions (HEI)  to globally benchmark with the best in the class by adopting peer reviewed independent internationally accepted and independently validated accreditation standards offered by select & elite Accreditation  institutions

CONNECTED WITH THE BEST :  All the  top rated International Accreditation agencies have been on our platform year on year  for the past 13 years & we just completed our 14th International Accreditation Conference  on November 22-24, 2021 on a virtual platform. 

Standards for Educational Advancement & Accreditation (SEAA)  Trust

started in 2008 has now is completed its 12 years of International Accreditation Advocacy  experience!  We had  more than 500 schools participating in our advocacy efforts and more than 170 international speakers  presenting from our platform! 

Almost all the Internationally accredited schools had attended one or the  other of our advocacy events! 

A. THOTHATHRI RAMAN 

Thothathri Raman is a globally awarded  quality champion in Higher Education leadership and is a well known name in the field of education  ideation and thought leadership in India.
He is the pioneer in  introducing Business School ranking in the country and also International Accreditation that is transforming B-school education  in powerful ways.  An economist by education and practice, and being a passionate communicator, he has been  impacting strongly on the  Indian education scene  through his interaction with the education leadership in Indian and global fora  for the past two decades.

Mr Thothathri Raman is known to the world of higher education as a international quality champion having pioneered  the scientific Rating and Ranking of business schools  in the year 2000  and later in the year 2008 bringing in the global benchmarks of quality in business education by  introducing international accreditation in India in tandem with world's leading international accreditation agencies including the AACSB, AMBA, EFMD, ACBSP, IACBE, Business Graduates Association, ATHEA and British Accreditation Council.

EDUCATION & CAREER

Mr Raman has  a degree in Economics from Government Arts College Ooty and a post graduate degree in communication from  Alagappa University to enable registering for a PhD in knowledge dissemination that he chose not to complete in order to focus attention on SEAA Trust, New Delhi.  

A former Executive Editor of Business India magazine, Mr Raman has more than four  decades of experience in Business journalism (1979-Now) and he has worked with The Financial Express, Businessworld, The Economic Times, the Business Standard, The Hindu business pages, The Observer of Business and Politics, the Indian Management journal of All India Management Association, HRD Newsletter of the  National HRD Network (NHRDN).  

QUALITY & ADVOCACY

Mr Raman is also a well known face among  the management education  thought leadership being associated with the leading professional bodies such as All India Management Association AIMA, Association of Indian Management Schools AIMS, Education Promotion Society of India (EPSI), Indian Association of Autonomous Business Schools, IAABS, National HRD Network  among others and international bodies like CHEA International Quality Group, Washington, the International Association of E-commerce Consultants Atlanta and Peregrine Academics and Leadership Institute Wyoming. He is also a regular speaker and presenter in major national and international conferences on Higher Education Leadership.

BOOKS &PUBLICATIONS

Mr Raman has written  around 20  book titles  that includes a nationally awarded book on knowledge management and the first e-fiction book of India,  Hope, e-commerce@ love. Besides contributing  chapters to number books authored by eminent management  professors including Dr Pritam Singh, Dr Chaturvedi, Dr Pattanayak,  among others.   An avid traveler, a passion he shares with Smitha, his partner,  the couple completed a 8000 km road journey before the Covid 19 outbreak  to the Indian southern coasts   starting from Delhi. The three week trip was preceded by one to Nepal in December 2018 by road. 

Recipient of Frank V Mastrianna International Education Leader of the Year  of IACBE.Award received at the Annual Conference of IACBE at San Diego in 2014

The Frank V. Mastrianna Education Leader of the Year Award honors individuals who are exemplary higher education leaders and who have made significant contributions to an institution of higher education or a higher education organization

HEF Special Award for Quality in Higher Education

Higher Education Forum, based out of Navi Mumbai  conferred  its Special Award for Quality in Higher Education on A.Thothathri Raman, Chairman of SEAA Trust, New Delhi in 2015 to recognise his work on introducing international quality benchmarks through international accreditation in India.

Education Leader of the year 2015

Higher Education Forum Gujarat Chapter 6th annual conference conferred Education Leader of the year 2018 in September 2018 at Vadodara 

Professional Experience   Business Journalist 41 years (1979 to  NOW)

The Financial Express Kolkatta and Chennai 1979 to 1981
The Business World & Business Standard Chennai (1982)
The Hindu (1983)
The Economic Times (1984-1989) Bangalore
The Observer of Business and Politics (1990 to 1992) Hyderabad and Mumbai
INDIAN MANAGEMENT Journal of AIMA (1996 -2000)
The Business India fortnightly (1992- 2012) Mumbai and Delhi

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