Jeff Jones wins men's Coach of the Year honor
SPSU men’s basketball head coach, Jeff Jones, has been named the 2010 Southern States Athletic Conference (SSAC) Men’s Coach of the Year for 2010. The award includes all men’s sports and was presented to him at the annual SSAC Awards Banquet May 25 in Montgomery, Ala.

Jones, in his fifth year as head coach, led the Hornets through an incredible season. The team was named co-champions of the SSAC, won the SSAC conference tournament title, advanced to the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics tournament, and reached its semi finals for the first time in SPSU history. The team also had a winning streak throughout the month of January, losing just one out of 10 games.

As an added bonus, Coach Jones reached his 100th career victory at SPSU, coaching the team to a 29-6 overall record.

Jones began his coaching career in 1990 as an assistant coach at Missouri Valley College in Marshall, Mo. Prior to his arrival at SPSU, Jones spent five seasons with Kennesaw State University as an assistant coach where he helped lead the team to the 2004 NCAA Division II National Championship.

ETCMA professor wins best paper award
Dr. Matthew McCool in the department of English, Technical Communication and Media Arts won the James M. Lufkin Award for Best Paper from the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) for his paper,“The logical problem of linguistic categorization and online taxonomies for global audiences.” The IEEE committee chose his paper for its innovative subject, approach and thoroughness.

He will receive the award at the annual IEEE Conference in the Netherlands on July 8.

SPSU Alumni Association welcomes new board members
The SPSU Alumni Association welcomes three new members to the board: Robert L. Graham (BS ’05) of the Georgia Department of Transportation, Aakash Shah (BS ’06) of Shaw Industries and Heather Giroux (BS ’05).

These members will serve until July 2011 and are joining current board members:

• Alda Stephens, President
• Craig Sloan, Vice President
• Kevin Payne, Secretary
• Robert Bledsoe, Treasurer
• Tim Moss, Past President
• Floyd "Snuffy" Smith, Board Member Emeritus
• Brian Adams
• Wayne Brown
• Derick Davis
• Matt Henderson
• R. Gene Morris
• Brandon Nichols
• Sharon Perry
• Ben Phillips
• Ray Pinkerton

Professors present at Teaching Fellows session
Drs. Keith Hopper and Laura Palmer, of the department of English, Technical Communication and Media Arts, delivered presentations at the summer session of the Governor's Teaching Fellows on May 13. Dr. Hopper presented a summary of his published paper on technology integration in higher education, stressing the need for a cohesive campus technology.

Together they presented, “Hitchhiker's guide to a first online course,” which contrasted the theoretical with practical aspects of online instruction, including favorite strategies, tools and techniques.

Teaching academy for distance learning
SPSU helps faculty improve their teaching by providing professional development opportunities. One of these opportunities is the Teaching Academy for Distance Learning (TADL). This year six members of the School of Computing and Software Engineering completed TADL; they were Drs. Patrick Bobbie, Venu Dasigi, Chih-Cheng Hung, Edward Jung and Jon Preston from the Department of Computer Science and Software Engineering, and Dr. Rich Halstead-Nussloch from the Department of Information Technology. The skills and knowledge professors acquire through TADL will help SPSU further improve the quality of its distance programs.

Two Hornet’s named to NAIA All American team
The National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics announced it's baseball All-American teams last week which included two SPSU Hornets: Jono Waugh (Second Team) and David Hardin (Honorable Mention Team).

Waugh, a senior from Oxford, Ala., led the Hornets with a .403 batting average and 87 runs scored in 2010 to earn him a second team selection. He was also named the 2010 Southern States Athletic Conference Player of the Year.

Hardin, a senior from Marietta, Ga., was nearly unbeaten on the mound for the Hornets in 2010 with a 10-1 record which landed him a spot on this year’s honorable mention team. He logged 86.2 innings pitched and led the team with a 2.39 earned run average.

New women's head coach
Laquanda Dawkins has been selected as SPSU's new head women’s basketball coach. “Laquanda brings a strong academic/athletic philosophy to our program,” commented athletic director Karl Staber. “We are very excited to have her join our staff.”

Coach Dawkins comes to Southern Poly from Winthrop University in Rock Hill, S.C., where she spent four years as the Assistant Women’s Basketball Coach. She has also served as the Assistant Women’s Basketball Coach at Florida International University and the University of Iowa.

She is originally from Shelby, NC, and a graduate of the University of North Carolina where she was a four year member of the Tar Heel Women’s Basketball team.

Division of Engineering organizes summer camp
The Division of Engineering is organizing an Aerospace Engineering Summer Camp for ages 12-18 that will run from July 26-30. The camp will teach how aircraft fly, the basic components of aircrafts, helicopters, and spaceships, and how to design, build and fly models. On the last day the camp will culminate with a flight competition and prizes. The registration fee is $50 and includes aircraft construction material.

To register, contact Dr. Adeel Khalid at akhalid2@spsu.edu or 678-915-7241 with name, age, e-mail, school, grade and telephone number.

Construction management professors speak to General Services Administration
SPSU’s Construction Management department conducted a half day forum last week for all estimators in the northeast and southeast parts of the country (Region 4). The forum covered topices that included flawed quantity estimates, unbalanced bidding strategies, green construction and strategies for reducing estimating errors.  The Forum was organized by the Design and Construction Department of GSA that provides site selection and project support for the US General Services Administraion. 

Kirsten Neff PE and LEED AP and Amber Lawson organized this forum on behalf of Southeast Sunbelt Region 4 of US GSA.

Volume 3, Issue 12
June 16, 2010