Tad Leithead to give commencement address Aug. 4
SPSU will hold its 104th Commencement on Sat., Aug. 4, at 10 a.m. in the Gymnasium. Tad Leithead, chairman of the Atlanta Regional Commission (ARC) and the Cumberland Community Improvement District, will deliver the commencement address.

SPSU will confer 202 undergraduate and graduate degrees during the ceremony, 151 of them to undergraduates and 51 to graduate students.

In addition to his role in the ARC, Leithead is the president and CEO of Tad Leithead Advisors, a governmental relations and consulting firm. He was elected to chair the ARC – a 39-member board that steers planning and development for the 10-county Atlanta region – in 2009 and has been a member of the board since 2000. He was chair of the ARC’s Transportation and Air Quality Committee from 2007-09.

Greenhouse, solar-panel construction begins: New educational tools to result
Construction has begun on a new SPSU greenhouse beside the Engineering Technology Center (ETC), and two sets of new solar panels have been installed to power it, thanks to a grant from the city of Marietta.

Marietta Power and Water, SPSU’s electrical service provider, contacted the university about a grant for a small teaching installation on campus. The utility company had a small amount of grant money and used it to benefit the university’s students and faculty. The grant paid for two-thirds of the cost of the solar panels.

The roof of the ETC has a new set of solar panels that are rated at 10 kW (equivalent to 170 household light bulbs). An additional 5 kW set (equivalent to 85 household light bulbs) has been installed beside the greenhouse. Together they will provide the structure with lights, heat (in the winter) and electricity. The panels – 6 feet high, 42 feet long, 7 1/2 feet wide – are capable of supplying all the electrical power the greenhouse will need during daylight hours.

Dr. Tom Nelson, dean of the School of Arts and Sciences, said “because the greenhouse and solar panels are readily accessible, they will provide opportunities for student research on alternative energy and also educational opportunities for classes and community workshops.”

“The solar panels on the roof of the ETC provide an operational laboratory for students and faculty as we further develop courses and programs in renewable energy engineering technologies,” said Dr. Jeff Ray, dean of the School of Engineering Technology and Management. “The collaboration between the university and its external partners is one of our highlighted achievements at SPSU.”

The landscape around the greenhouse and solar panels will be designed to match the landscaping around the ETC. Students in the biology, biotechnology and environmental science programs will benefit from the greenhouse.

SPSU’s economic impact estimated at $198M
SPSU’s impact on Georgia in fiscal year 2011 totals more than $198 million, according to a newly released study by the Board of Regents.

The previous report, based on fiscal year 2010 data, placed SPSU’s economic impact at $192 million. The current report’s data represent an increase of more than 3.5 percent in the university’s economic impact over the last 12 months and a 20 percent increase in the last 24 months.

The numbers in the report were calculated based on sales, gross regional product, income and full- or part-time jobs. SPSU provides an economic influence to its surrounding community, contributing 1,826 jobs and adding millions of dollars to the local and regional economy in personal services, construction expenditures and student spending.

The study determined that the economic impact to the state of Georgia by all 35 institutions in the University System of Georgia totaled $13.2 billion in fiscal year 2011. The study also indicated that Georgia’s public higher education system generated nearly 132,000 full- and part-time jobs.

The full report – produced by the Selig Center for Economic Growth in the University of Georgia’s Terry College of Business for the Board of Regents’ Office of Economic Development – is available at http://www.usg.edu/economic_development/documents/PS-USGImpact2011.pdf

ECET faculty active at ASEE Annual Conference
The chair of the Electrical and Computer Engineering Technology (ECET) department, Dr. Austin Asgill, and several other members of his department played active roles in the 2012 American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE) annual conference, held June 10-13 in San Antonio, Texas.

Dr. Asgill was chosen during the conference to serve as the 2012-13 chair of the board of directors of the Tau Alpha Pi (TAP) Engineering Technology National Honor Society. He has served as a TAP board member since 2010. He also co-authored and presented a paper titled “Creating a Seamless Pipeline into B.S. Degree Programs for Place-Bound ET Students via State-Wide 2+2 Articulation Agreement.”

In addition, ECET Prof. Pam Frinzi presented a paper that she co-authored with Prof. Scott Larisch, “Low-residency Delivery of a BSEET Articulation Program,” and a paper co-authored with Dr. Becky Rutherfoord titled “Women’s Campus Leadership Seminar Program.”

Assistant Prof. Craig Chin presented a paper on an “Evaluation of Cooperative Learning Assignments as a Supplement to Homework to Improve Student Learning”; and Associate Prof. Florian Misoc and Assistant Prof. Jeff Wagner presented “An Overview of Existing Power Electronics Courses,” a poster they co-authored.

In other news involving the ECET department, Dr. Misoc served as the keynote speaker at the first Electronics Engineering Technology Convocation held at Pittsburg State University in Pittsburg, Kan., earlier this summer. The theme of the convocation was “Modern Power and the EET Curriculum”; and Dr. Asgill’s presentation was titled “Southern Polytechnic State University’s Renewable Energy Curriculum and Current Issues.”

Dr. Misoc is also on the Scientific Committee for the 8th International Conference on Industrial Power Engineering, sponsored by the European Union’s Sustainable Energy program.

Have news to share?
If your department has an upcoming event or other news to share with the campus community, please send an e-mail with all the pertinent information to Diane Payne (dpayne@spsu.edu). To be considered for use in a specific issue of the SPSU Hornet’s Nest, a news item must be submitted no less than four weeks before the date of the issue.

Volume 5, Issue 27
July 25, 2012