From bbair at cse.ohio-state.edu Wed Dec 5 08:31:20 2007 From: bbair at cse.ohio-state.edu (Bettina Bair) Date: Wed Dec 5 08:32:03 2007 Subject: [ACM-W] A light at the end of the tunnel? In-Reply-To: <5d1a6f030712050529g773f5e12qaaab6d60c6eeac09@mail.gmail.com> References: <5d1a6f030712050529g773f5e12qaaab6d60c6eeac09@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <5d1a6f030712050531x32b2fc99t88e8916958c89cc@mail.gmail.com> http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/dec2007/tc2007123_368568.htm Girls Dominate the Siemens Competition For the first time in the prestigious national math and science contest's nine-year history, girls were awarded both grand prizes. ..."Siemens Foundation President James Whaley says the percentage of girls entering the competition has increased each year; this year, 48% of the contestants were female. " -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.cse.ohio-state.edu/pipermail/acmw/attachments/20071205/b0b908fc/attachment.html From wang.911 at osu.edu Wed Dec 5 11:59:28 2007 From: wang.911 at osu.edu (Sijia Wang) Date: Wed Dec 5 12:00:11 2007 Subject: [ACM-W] Fwd: Internship Opportunity In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <3f5607170712050859j19396549m880a83ea018de74e@mail.gmail.com> FYI. If you don't know Glenda, you can certainly still look into this. ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Glenda La Rue Date: Dec 5, 2007 11:35 AM Subject: Internship Opportunity To: Glenda La Rue Hello CSE majors, Please see below for an internship opportunity with Ford. If you are planning on applying PLEASE LET ME KNOW, so I can give my contacts a heads-up to look for your resume. They are also planning on possibly hosting a dinner sometime in January for those interested in interning. Thanks and good luck! Glenda ______________________________ Glenda P. La Rue, P.E. Director, Women in Engineering The Ohio State University College of Engineering 122 Hitchcock Hall, 2070 Neil Avenue Columbus, OH 43210 PH: 614.688.4137 FX: 614.292.9379 Email: la-rue.10@osu.edu Website: http://wie.eng.ohio-state.edu ------------------------------ *From:* Foucher, Jaime (J.) [mailto:jfouche1@ford.com] *Sent:* Tuesday, December 04, 2007 10:28 AM *To:* Glenda La Rue *Cc:* Fulcher III, Lewis (L.) *Subject:* RE: Ford + OSU Glenda, Here's a copy of the job description for the internships. In addition, we usually target students in their Sophomore or Junior year or possibly Seniors who will be finishing up after the fall semester as opposed to spring. More information can also be obtained here: http://www.mycareerford.dealerconnection.com/CareerPrograms.asp Employer: Ford Motor Co Division: Information Technology Title: Information Technology Professional, Intern Summer '08 Description: To be considered for this internship, please go to http://www.mycareer.ford.com/ and fill out a profile Get hands-on experience and become a contributing member of our information technology team. Working full time during summer break will not only enrich your bank account, it will develop you as a person and your career. Our summer intern program lets you build a network of friends and contacts, have fun, learn valuable skills and see what Ford Motor Company is all about! Preferred candidates have exceptional leadership and communication skills and have completed the sophomore year pursuing a B.S. degree in Computer Science and Engineering or Computer and Information Science. This position is in Southeast Michigan, and to be considered, you must also go to http://www.mycareer.ford.com/ and fill out a profile Location: MI Position Type: Internship Desired Major(s): Computer Science & Engineering, Computer & Information Science - BS Work Authorization: US Citizen, Permanent US Resident & pending Permanent US Resident Regards, *Jaime Foucher* ADS Security & Controls Champion iTek West - W2C130 313-206-9983 jfouche1@ford.com -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.cse.ohio-state.edu/pipermail/acmw/attachments/20071205/a012bf7e/attachment.html From laugel.2 at osu.edu Thu Dec 6 00:45:51 2007 From: laugel.2 at osu.edu (Stacey Laugel) Date: Thu Dec 6 00:46:35 2007 Subject: [ACM-W] Student Data Analyst Position Message-ID: <27a7a0f60712052145tb8a8087if41a419b23dff3@mail.gmail.com> This is a good job opportunity right on campus for anyone who is interested. ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Martha Nieset Date: Dec 4, 2007 1:10 PM Subject: Link to On Campus Computing Jobs To: laugel.2@osu.edu Cc: wang.911@osu.edu, hfang@cse.ohio-state.edu Stacey, I was looking at the ACM-W at OSU website and wanted to make a suggestion. Would it be possible to add a link to the on-campus computing jobs found here? http://sfa.osu.edu/jobs/stuemp/computer.html It seems like some of the students in your organization would be qualified candidates for these positions. My department currently has an on-campus position posted for a Student Data Analyst (on page 3 at this link). If you have any questions or would like to recommend any qualified students please feel free to contact me. Martha Martha Nieset Resource Planning Analyst Colleges of the Arts and Sciences, Technology Services Office The Ohio State University 060 Denney Hall, 164 West 17th Avenue Columbus, OH 43210-1371 nieset.9@osu.edu (614) 247-7355 http://asctech.osu.edu/help/ ________________________________ Spam Not spam Forget previous vote From bbair at cse.ohio-state.edu Thu Dec 6 18:09:34 2007 From: bbair at cse.ohio-state.edu (Bettina Bair) Date: Thu Dec 6 18:10:18 2007 Subject: [ACM-W] Games for Girls Programming Competition - $1000 to winning team In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <5d1a6f030712061509h23c23cf6rce0253db734614a0@mail.gmail.com> So far I have heard from one student that is interested in being on a G4G team next spring. Anyone else? OSU has had teams in the last two competitions. You can see their very cool awards in my office. :-) Bettina ---------- Forwarded message ---------- *Win $1000 in Games for Girls Programming Competition* ChicTech, an outreach program of the University of Illinois' Department of Computer Science, extends an open invitation for college women to participate in the third annual Games for Girls Programming Competition (G4G). Registration must be submitted by January 31, 2008, at www.cs.uiuc.edu/g4g. Completed projects are due by April 9, 2008. We invite teams of up to five college women to design and implement a computer game for younger girls. The competition is designed to encourage the development of computer games that appeal to middle- and high-school aged girls, while fostering the development of communities of college women majoring in computer-related disciplines. Projects will be evaluated by approximately thirty high school girls attending the annual ChicTech retreat weekend on the U of I campus in April. Their evaluation will be based on their overall enjoyment of the games. G4G is part of an effort to attract and retain women in Computer Science. The creative process of game-building can help female students develop a stronger sense of belonging to the field of Computer Science and seeing the work of college women can help high school girls relate to the potential of CS as a major. The judging of the G4G games has proven to be one of the highlights of the ChicTech retreat weekend. This year's competition* *is sponsored by State Farm. G4G will award each member of the winning team $1000, with cash prizes also going to the second and third place teams. An additional $1000 will go to the winning team's department to help support programs to attract and retain more women in Computer Science. Games must be PC-based. Teams may use any development tools they wish, but we encourage them to use the GameMaker platform, which has worked well in previous G4G competitions. Please visit our website site for complete competition details. *The competition is open to all college women currently residing in the United States. *Each student team must submit an on-line registration by January 31, 2008. Visit the web site to complete an application: www.cs.uiuc.edu/g4g.** Sonya Harris, Outreach Coordinator University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign 1314 Thomas M. Siebel Center for Computer Science, MC 258 201 North Goodwin Avenue Urbana, IL. 61801 217.244.4493/Fax: 217.244.6073 http://www.cs.uiuc.edu/outreach/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.cse.ohio-state.edu/pipermail/acmw/attachments/20071206/67b37785/attachment-0001.html From bbair at cse.ohio-state.edu Sun Dec 9 14:20:03 2007 From: bbair at cse.ohio-state.edu (Bettina Bair) Date: Sun Dec 9 14:20:55 2007 Subject: [ACM-W] Happy Birthday Ada Lovelace In-Reply-To: <20071208150346.BE57440C75@pop1.cfu.net> References: <13141419437BDF4DAB94F7A351DA00FB03C5FA97@KC-MSX3.kc.umkc.edu> <20071208150346.BE57440C75@pop1.cfu.net> Message-ID: <5d1a6f030712091120y26fc7ebbo3a0b78917fd4f8d1@mail.gmail.com> fyi. :-) Bettina ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: John McCormick On December 10, 1815, Anna Isabella (Annabella) Byron, whose husband was Lord Byron, gave birth to a daughter, Augusta Ada. Ada's father was a romantic poet whose fame derived not only from his works but also from his wild and scandalous behavior. His marriage to Annabella was strained from the beginning, and Annabella left Byron just a little more than a month after Ada was born. By April of that year, Annabella and Byron signed separation papers, and Byron left England, never to return. Byron's writings show that he greatly regretted that he was unable to see his daughter. In one poem, for example, he wrote of Ada, I see thee not. I hear thee not. But none can be so rapt in thee. Byron died in Greece at the age of 36, and one of the last things he said was, Oh my poor dear child! My dear Ada! My God, could I but have seen her! Meanwhile, Annabella, who was eventually to become a baroness in her own right, and who was herself educated as both a mathematician and a poet, carried on with Ada's upbringing and education. Annabella gave Ada her first instruction in mathematics, but it soon became clear that Ada's gift for the subject was such that it required more extensive tutoring. Ada received further training in mathematics from Augustus DeMorgan, who is today famous for one of the basic theorems of Boolean algebra, which forms the basis for modern computers. By the age of eight, Ada also had demonstrated an interest in mechanical devices and was building detailed model boats. When she was 18, Ada visited the Mechanics Institute to hear Dr. Dionysius Lardner's lectures on the "difference engine," a mechanical calculating machine being built by Charles Babbage. She became so interested in the device that she arranged to be introduced to Babbage. It was said that, upon seeing Babbage's machine, Ada was the only person in the room to understand immediately how it worked and to appreciate its significance. Ada and Babbage became good friends and she worked with him for the rest of her life, helping to document his designs, translating writings about his work, and developing programs to be used on his machines. Unfortunately, Babbage never completed construction of any of his designs. Even so, today Ada is recognized as being the first computer programmer in history. That title, however, does not do full justice to her genius. Around the time that Babbage met Ada, he began the design for an even more ambitious machine called the "analytical engine," which we now recognize was the first programmable computer. Ada instantly grasped the implications of the device and foresaw its application in ways that even Babbage did not imagine. Ada believed that mathematics eventually would develop into a system of symbols that could be used to represent anything in the universe. From her notes, it is clear that Ada saw that the analytical engine could go beyond arithmetic computations and become a general manipulator of symbols, and thus it would be capable of almost anything. She even suggested that such a device could eventually be programmed with rules of harmony and composition so that it could produce "scientific" music. In effect, Ada foresaw the field of artificial intelligence over 150 years ago. In 1842, Babbage went to Turin, Italy, and gave a series of lectures on his analytical engine. One of the attendees was Luigi Menabrea, who was so impressed that he wrote an account of Babbage's lectures. At age 27, Ada decided to translate the account into English, with the intent to add a few of her own notes about the machine. In the end, her notes were twice as long as the original material, and the document, "The Sketch of the Analytical Engine," became the definitive work on the subject. It is obvious from Ada's letters that her "notes" were entirely her own and that Babbage was acting as a sometimes unappreciated editor. At one point, Ada wrote to him, "I am much annoyed at your having altered my Note. You know I am always willing to make any required alterations myself, but that I cannot endure another person to meddle with my sentences." Ada gained the title Countess of Lovelace when she married Lord William Lovelace. The couple had three children, but Ada was so consumed by her love of mathematics that she left their upbringing to her mother. For a woman of that day, such behavior was considered almost as scandalous as some of her father's exploits, but her husband was actually quite supportive of her work. In 1852, Ada died from cancer. Sadly, if she had lived just one year longer, she would have witnessed the unveiling of a working difference engine built from one of Babbage's designs by George and Edward Scheutz in Sweden. Like her father, Ada lived only until she was 36, and, even though they led much different lives, she undoubtedly admired Byron and took inspiration from his unconventional and rebellious nature. At the end, Ada asked to be buried beside him at the family's estate. In the 20th century, navy commander John Cooper honored Ada Lovelace by naming the US Department of Defense's new programming language after her. Ada is perhaps the only language to have applied software engineering principles to its design. After several years of requirements gathering, William Whitaker's team produced four generations of language specifications (strawman, woodenman, tinman, and ironman). The DOD then held a competition to design the language. Cii Honeywell Bull of France led by Dr. Jean Ichbiah won the final competition. For his accomplishments, Dr. Ichbiah was awarded the Legion d'Honneur by the President of France. Since its first ISO standard was approved in 1987, Ada has evolved with new standards in 1995 and 2005. Ada was the first object-oriented language to have an international standard. Ada is the language of choice in projects where failure is not an option. The safety critical software on board nearly every, high speed train, aircraft, and spacecraft is written in Ada. Praxis High Integrity Systems, the only company known to give unrestricted warranties on the software they develop, work exclusively in a subset of Ada called SPARKAda. SPARKAda provides the means for proving that software meets its specification. Replacing much of the laborious testing of software with rapid mathematical proofs allows Praxis to consistently underbid competitors using more mainstream but less precise languages. Praxis is currently developing the software for the United Kingdom's new en-route air traffic control system. At an estimated 1.2 million lines of code, it will be the largest software system ever formally verified. The same feedback that Ada provides developers of mission-critical software makes it easier for beginners to learn programming. The stability of the language allows compiler writers to concentrate more on the human side of programming than on adding new features. The GNU Ada Translator (GNAT) includes an expert system that analyses a student's programming style and a database of previous students' errors to tailor its syntax error messages. Introductory programming classes taught using Ada have consistently higher retention rates than the more popular languages. Perhaps Ada Lovelace would be pleased that her language namesake is particularly effective in retaining women in our profession. The film "To Dream Tomorrow" from Flare Productions, www.flarefilms.org, tells the story of Ada Lovelace and her contributions to computing. I highly recommend it for your students. John -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.cse.ohio-state.edu/pipermail/acmw/attachments/20071209/98859d93/attachment.html From bbair at cse.ohio-state.edu Wed Dec 12 10:06:14 2007 From: bbair at cse.ohio-state.edu (Bettina Bair) Date: Wed Dec 12 10:06:57 2007 Subject: [ACM-W] Dennis Frailey wins 2008 SIGCSE Award for Lifetime Service In-Reply-To: <6.0.1.1.2.20071212095008.01b2f948@mail.cse.ohio-state.edu> References: <6.0.1.1.2.20071212095008.01b2f948@mail.cse.ohio-state.edu> Message-ID: <5d1a6f030712120706g31b4080emc86a7d88bd9eb1a1@mail.gmail.com> Dr Frailey recently won the ACM SIGCSE Award for Lifetime Service http://www.cs.duke.edu/sigcse08/keynotes.html#frailey . Dr Frailey has been a great friend to the CSE Department for many years, often arranging scholarships for undergrads and sponsoring awards at the annual banquet. He was a recipient of the CSE Chair's Award for continued outstanding service. He has also been a great supporter of ACMW, usually making time to meet privately with members to provide mentoring, support and career advice. :-) Bettina -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.cse.ohio-state.edu/pipermail/acmw/attachments/20071212/a224c825/attachment.html From ann at redelfs.us Mon Dec 31 12:34:29 2007 From: ann at redelfs.us (Ann Redelfs) Date: Thu Jan 3 09:44:26 2008 Subject: [ACM-W] Empowering Leadership: Computing Scholars of Tomorrow Alliance Announces Mentoring Program for Minority Students Message-ID: Empowering Leadership: Computing Scholars of Tomorrow Alliance Announces Mentoring Program for Minority Students Prot?g?s and Mentors Encouraged to Join For Immediate Release The National Science Foundation-supported "Empowering Leadership: Computing Scholars of Tomorrow" Alliance (EL Alliance) has launched its online mentoring program designed to connect undergraduate and graduate minority students from research universities across the country with national leaders in the computing fields. Prot?g?s and mentors are encouraged to sign up at http://www.empoweringleadership.org. Prot?g?s and mentors are matched based on the prot?g?s' preferences as well as on the experience and qualities of a mentor. Mentors share knowledge and lend encouragement to their prot?g?s, help them meet others in the computing community, and guide them to opportunities for personal and professional growth, such as scholarships, internships, and conference opportunities. The Internet-based mentoring program provides prot?g?s and mentors with an accessible, supported environment to stay in touch and discuss issues of interest to the students, such as career options, coursework, opportunities for extracurricular experiences, and areas of concern. The EL Alliance, composed of dozens of leading universities, professional societies, laboratories, research centers, and corporations, also involves students in research opportunities, in-person meetings at national conferences and workshops, and support to keep the students excited, motivated, and connected to a broader community as they pursue computing careers. Students are important contributors to the EL Alliance-their feedback on programs and input on their own experience and goals help guide EL Alliance activities. Minority scholars in computing disciplines at tier-one institutions are scattered so sparsely across the country that they may be the only one, or one of very few, minority students in their classes. Relevant and consequential support networks, critical to all students, often do not exist for minority students due to a lack of peers with whom they can identify, or role models, or minority leaders. The EL Alliance's national network of formal and informal resources, support, and encouragement, developed with the active involvement of students and national leaders, is a vital community for minority scholars and for the country. About the EL Alliance http://www.empoweringleadership.org The EL Alliance is led by Rice University, and engages underrepresented minority students in computing disciplines at majority institutions in a nationwide network. The network, composed of dozens of leading universities, professional societies, laboratories, research centers, and corporations, involves students in research opportunities, professional development, mentoring programs, and support. The EL Alliance, benefits from the leadership and vision of several of the nation's top universities, with the active engagement of dozens of diverse partners and a plan for ongoing evaluation and feedback, particularly from the students involved. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.cse.ohio-state.edu/pipermail/acmw/attachments/20071231/d27fdb8b/attachment.html