History
The first IEEE student branch in Jamaica was established at
The University of Technology, Jamaica (UTech), (formerly The
College of Arts, Science & Technology). A petition to form a
student branch was signed by twenty-two student engineers in January
1989, and forwarded to the IEEE by Dr Kris K. Murthy, an IEEE Student
Branch Counsellor at the institution. Dr Murthy was subsequently advised
by the IEEE Membership Development & Student Services, by letter
dated 13 March 1989, that the petition was approved by the
IEEE Regional Activities Board. The College of Arts, Science &
Technology was also welcomed to the IEEE Student Branch Programme.
Clayton Brown was appointed Interim Branch Chairman. Other
signatories to the petition
were: Hugh Alexander, David Archer, Carl Blackwood, Austin Brown,
Paul Green, Andrew Hunter, Phillip Jackson, Everton James, Martin
McLeavy, Stephen Legister, Claude Morgan, Rupert Miller, Michael
McDowell, Dwight Muschette, Billy Meikle, Derrick Nelson, Oral
Palmer, Victor Ramsay, Denfern Simpson, Andrea Small and Beresford
Shernan.
Dr Halden Morris (chair), Ms Carline Senior (student activities),
and Mr Vincent Hewitt (lecturer), spearheaded activities leading
to the re-activation of the UTech student branch in August 2000.
Mr Hewitt served as student branch counsellor from 2000 to
2011.
Student Branch activities
Students from this branch over the years have participated
with enthusiasm in local (JamCon), and regional (SoutheastCon)
conferences. SoutheastCon is the IEEE Region 3's technical,
professional, and student conference. In March 2001 twelve students
from the Faculty of Engineering & Computing attended
SoutheastCon at Clemson University, South Carolina, USA.
The students participated in the major competitions at the
conference and won first place in the T-Shirt, and honours
certificates in the hardware, Web page, and paper competitions.
SoutheastCon 2003
The University of Technology, Jamaica and the UTech IEEE student
branch hosted the
Southeastcon 2003 student conference held in Jamaica, at the
Renaissance Jamaica Grande Resort in Ocho Rios, April 4-6, 2003.
This was the first time the prestigious conference was hosted outside
the United States of America. One hundred and ninety six
students, in addition to twenty student branch counsellors from
thirty two universities, registered for the conference. The student
programme of the conference which included hardware, software, website,
paper and T-shirt competitions, was a resounding success.
A group of fourteen students from the IEEE Student Branch of the
University of Technology, Jamaica (UTech), student advisers, and
two executives of the Jamaica Section attended the Southeast
Conference 2012 in Orlando, Florida, March 15 - 18, 2012. The
UTech students excelled in three competitions, placing 1st
in the T-Shirt, 3rd in the Open Robotics, and 3rd in the Technical
Paper competitions. IEEE Student Branch Chair Kimroy
Bailey, received the exemplary Student Branch Award on
behalf of UTech for exemplary operations over the year. Of the
52 universities which participated in the conference, UTech
attained 2nd place, receiving a total of four awards.
UTech Faculty of Engineering & Computing
The Faculty of Engineering and Computing of
The University of Technology,
Jamaica, (UTech) is the second largest faculty within the
University. It comprises the School of Engineering, the School
of Computing and Information Technology, and the Computing and
Engineering Entrepreneurial Centre. The Faculty admits students
from diverse academic backgrounds to pursue a wide variety
of programmes at various levels and offers, inter alia, courses
in the following area: Electrical Engineering -(Power,
Telecommunications, Instrumentation and Control, Electronics and
Communications), Computer Engineering, Computer Science,
and Information Technology
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