ETC featured in Chronicle of Higher Education
Although the snow and ice that crippled Atlanta earlier this month caused SPSU to postpone the ribbon-cutting ceremony for the newly opened Engineering Technology Center to a later date not yet finalized, the gleaming new building was featured in the online version of The Chronicle of Higher Education. To see this mention, CLICK HERE

Dean Ray tapped for ABET's new Academic Advisory Council
ABET, Inc., the recognized accreditor for college and university programs in applied science, computing, engineering and technology, recently established a new vehicle for enhancing its communications with the academic community and invited Dr. Jeff Ray, dean of SPSU’s School of Engineering Technology and Management, to be part of this effort.

Dean Ray is one of 15 academic leaders appointed to the newly formed Academic Advisory Council (AAC), which will provide ABET with direct access to the viewpoints of the faculty and administrators who oversee ABET-accredited programs and feedback about proposed ABET initiatives, procedures and policies.

Alumni Association awards funds to to student competition teams
The Alumni Association Board, with funding from the SPSU Foundation and a gift from the Lawrence and Cecelia Johnson Endowment, awarded a total of $48,650 to nine campus student competition teams this year. All the funding from the SPSU Foundation and the Alumni Association was provided by private contributions from alumni, friends and supporters of the university.

The following teams received allocations:

• Alternative Powered Vehicle Team – $7,900
• Associated Schools of Construction Team – $7,000
• Autonomous Underwater Vehicle Team – $7,000
• Concrete Canoe Team – $8,500
• Formula SAE Team – $9,900
• IEEE-Southeast Conference Competition Team – $800
• National Electrical Contractors Association Team – $2,000
• SPSU Information Security Association Team – $550
• Steel Bridge Team – $5,000

Graduate accounting student is first at SPSU to pass the entire CPA exam
The relatively new accounting program at SPSU has received big news during the break between the fall and spring semester.

Sonal Doshi, a graduate assistant in accounting who is enrolled in SPSU’s new graduate program in accounting, has become the first SPSU student from either the bachelor or master of science in accounting programs to pass all four sections of the Uniform CPA Examination in order to get licensed as a certified public accountant.

“This is great news and a testament to the rigor and education standards of our accounting program and Ms. Doshi’s education at SPSU,” said Dr. Jeff Ray, dean of the School of Engineering Technology and Management. “There is still much work to achieve in implementing the accounting curricula. Thanks to everyone for making the program a success.”

Meanwhile, other students in the accounting program also received word this month that they successfully passed the Certified Fraud Examination and the Certified Forensic Accountant Examination.

Electrical engineering student receives scholarship

In December, Paul Reimers, president of the Atlanta Chapter of the Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association (AFCEA), presented a $2,500 scholarship check to SPSU sophomore Al Joseph Luck, an electrical engineering major. Also participating in the check presentation was Dr. Lance Crimm, program coordinator for electrical engineering.

Luck is on the executive board of SPSU’s National Society of Black Engineers chapter and is a member of the SPSU Honors Council. He spent eight years in the U.S. Army as an avionic and aircraft technician and spent considerable time in service overseas.

AFCEA International is a non-profit association serving the military, government, industry and academia as an ethical forum for advancing professional knowledge and relationships in the fields of communications, IT, intelligence and global security.

CET students receive scholarships
Two seniors in the civil engineering technology program, Bryan Sartin and Oluwabiyi Oladapo are the recipients of scholarships from the Georgia Chapter of the International Concrete Repair Institute (IRCI). The awards were presented on Dec. 9 by Nathaniel Jones (center), IRCI scholarship chairman.

The scholarships were awarded based on the students’ interest, education and experience in concrete technology, materials, design or construction. Sartin and Oladapo will give a 20-30-minute presentation on their work at an upcoming IRCI chapter luncheon meeting.

IT's HelpDesk beefs up services
Although the staff of the SPSU Division of Information Technology (DoIT) that supports individual computer users has not increased during the past year, the number of work-order tickets for desktop support resolved and closed by HelpDesk technicians this fall has risen by more than 120 percent in comparison to the same period last fall.

By replacing an in-house ticketing system with a more sophisticated commercial system called WebHelpDesk and enabling technicians to focus on more specialized tasks, DoIT has streamlined HelpDesk operations and improved its communications considerably, according to Dave Parham, director of IT Tech Support.

“Our goal is to have human beings answer 100 percent of the calls people make to the HelpDesk,” he said. “We’re at 90-95 percent now, during normal work hours and, as a result, we’re able to resolve a lot more problems immediately over the phone rather than having to dispatch a technician.”

With the new WebHelpDesk system, Parham says, requests are automatically routed to the most appropriate work groups for handling. Technicians have been divided into two groups, one of which deals primarily with lab support and the other with faculty/staff desktop issues. “This has allowed technicians to become more proficient in dealing with specific issues,” he notes.

DoIT is also able to focus more energy on classroom support than it has in the past and is hoping to add a technician position dedicated to this area, Parham said. “We’ve gotten good responses from people around campus regarding our improved turn-around time,” he says, noting that the changes “are not happening as quickly as I would like, but progress is being made. We’re headed in the right direction.”

CSE to offer accelerated training program in HIT for IT professionals
In addition to the undergraduate certificate in health information technology (HIT) that the School of Computing and Software Engineering (CSE) will begin offering this year, CSE is launching a pilot accelerated training program in HIT.

The program will be offered beginning Jan. 24 through the Extended University and in collaboration with Consort Systems and Endurance Business Professionals, LLC. Each of the three course modules is three weeks long.

Designed to alleviate a severe shortage of professionals who understand both the healthcare industry and information technology, the program is aimed at individuals with a background in information technology.

For more information on the program, CLICK HERE.

Volume 4, Issue 2
January 26, 2011