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A PUBLICATION OF THE PIEDMONT SECTION OF THE IEEE

November, 1997

http://www.carol.net/ieee/

Articles:
Chairman : Nominations of 1998 Officers : National Society of Professional Engineers : 1998 State Engineering Conference: : CECA Electrical Career Expo '97: A Hit with Students : Next Meeting : Editor : Officers

A MESSAGE FROM THE CHAIRMAN

Glenn Bishof

Traditionally, the Piedmont Section sponsors a student paper contest held in January of each year. It is usually left to the faculty of Clemson University to encourage students to participate. I have found in the past that the students perceive this contest as a monumental task equivalent to a thesis research project. The participation in the contest has been sparse due to this misconception. I ask the members of the section to encourage students to participate by letting them know that this contest is about presentation skills, not about major technical innovations. The ‘paper’ may consist of material taken from a class project modified to fit the format of the contest. Karl Gurley, the winner of the Piedmont Section competition, went on to win again at the state level by developing a paper, previously written as a course assignment, into a very nice presentation.
As many of you realize, the presentation skills required for today’s team work environments often take as long to develop as practical technical knowledge. By participating in the student presentations to IEEE sections, students have a unique opportunity to practice speaking in front of a non-hostile, technically competent audience which will offer constructive criticism and encouragement. This certainly beats the potentially devastating environment of a critical design review as a first chance to make a presentation to a group other than peers.
Assisting a student with a presentation can be a rewarding experience and is not against the rules. If you know a college student who is a member of the student chapter of the IEEE, encourage him or her to take a shot at the contest and offer your assistance to review the materials and, perhaps, be a trial audience. The students can learn from your experience and you may be surprised at how much you can learn from the students

Nominations of 1998 Officers

Adib Chebli

The following nominations have been submitted to the Piedmont Section Executive Committee for the 1998 offices:
Nancy Gunderson is currently serving as the 1997 Vice Chair. Mark Stokes is currently serving as the 1997 Treasurer. He is also the Newsletter Editor. Steven Bobo is the Student Section Mentor. Wayne Cockrell has been active in organizing the local school presentations during National Engineers Week. Voting for the 1998 offices will take place during the January regular meeting. Please make an effort to attend and vote.
Generally, once the new Chair takes office, he or she will appoint or re-appoint the various committee chairs (Awards, Membership, Pace, etc...).

National Society of Professional Engineers

Wayne Cockrell

Again this year we will be working with the National Society of Professional Engineers to visit local schools and talk to students about careers in engineering. In the past we have spoken to math and science classes, had booths at career fairs, and judged science contests. While this is done as part of the activities for Engineer's Week, in practice the events are spread out from late January to early May. Volunteer support for this effort has been strong in the past (some people even reported that they had fun!). For this to be another successful year, now is the time to contact schools and schedule events. This involves sending letters to the schools and following up with phone calls. We'll be looking for volunteers to contact the schools at the January meeting.

1998 State Engineering Conference:

Adib Chebli

Mark your calendars now for the 1998 State Engineering Conference, sponsored by the South Carolina Council for Engineering Societies and Land Surveyors. The Conference will take place on March 13, 1998 in the Swearinger Center at USC in Columbia. Six engineering societies, including the IEEE will be participating. The IEEE will sponsor two full-day concurrent technical sessions (subject to be announced). PDHs will be offered for attending the technical sessions. Lunch will feature a national speaker.
More details will be provided to you as soon as they are available.

CECA Electrical Career Expo '97: A Hit with Students

Adib Chebli

For the second year in a row, the South Carolina Council of the IEEE sponsored a booth at the CECA Electrical Career Expo in Columbia, SC. CECA is the Carolina Electrical Contractor Association, a non-profit vocational organization. Each year they organize a career exposition to which they draw well over 2000 high school students from across the state. Several companies and educational organization participate.
The South Carolina Council of IEEE booth was organized by Jerry Freck of the Columbia Section (also serves Secretary on the Council), and the SquareD Explorer's Club. The booth featured a basketball goal with an electronic annunciator system that was built by the Explorers. As in the year before, the IEEE booth was a hit with the high school students. The volunteers were also able to discuss career options in electrical engineering with the students.

Next Meeting

November 20, 1997
James M. Conrad on Robotics
Nancy Gunderson

The January talk will be given by James M. Conrad, co-author of the book Stiquito: Advanced Experiments with a Simple and Inexpensive Robot. This book is being published by the IEEE Computer Society Press. Dr. Conrad will discuss the robot and its uses, and demonstrate assembly and control of Stiquito. As a special incentive, a drawing will be held among all those in attendance. One book will be given to a lucky attendee. In addition, another book will be given to a lucky student attendee.
The Stiquito robot is a small, inexpensive, six-legged robot that is intended for use as a research and educational tool. The book describes how to assemble and build Stiquito, provides information on the design and control of legged robots, and illustrates its research uses. The experiments in the text lead the reader on a tour of the current state of micro-robotics research. The most interesting feature of the book is that it includes all materials needed to build the Stiquito robot. Only tools (hobby knife, pliers) and a battery are needed to complete the robot. Dr. Conrad is currently a Senior Staff Engineer with Ericsson, Inc in Raleigh, NC. He was formerly an Assistant Professor at the University of Arkansas, Department of Computer Systems Engineering.
James has provided us with a web page describing the project.

Meeting details:
Date: Thursday, November 18, 1997
Location: Colonial Inn, 755 Wade Hampton Blvd., Greenville.
Social: 6:30 pm
Meal: 7:00 pm (cost is $10 per member/non-member, $5 per student)
Meeting: 7:30 pm (no cost if you attend the meeting only)
PLEASE contact on e of the officers listed at the end of this newsletter to indicate you will be attending the meeting and/or the meal.

Next Month: Christmas Party at Dave Hulett's home (for Nancy Gunderson).

From the Editor

Mark Stokes
Well, the inevitable finally happened, after about three hard drive crashes in the last few months, I finally lost some data. Some of this data was the newsletter email list. I still have a list of the names of those of you who were willing to receive the newsletter by email only, but I no longer have your email addresses. Please send me notification of your desire to receive the newsletter in this format to m.stokes@ieee.org. The pIEEEdmont Potential is available via three methods:

Officer List:

CHAIRMAN Glenn Bischof (864) 638-3601ext 4357 bischof@oconee.em.slb.com
VICE-CHAIRMAN Nancy Gunderson (864) 882-2414 ext. 357 n.gunderson@ieee.org
SECRETARY Bob Richardson (864) 587-4435 bobr@wspa.com
TREASURER Mark Stokes (864) 647-2065 m.stokes@ieee.org
MEMBERSHIP DEVELOPMENT Allen Thomas (864) 862-5718 a.thomas@ieee.org
PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES Nick Pasquerilla (864) 882-2414 ext.271
n.pasquerilla@ieee.org
STUDENT ACTIVITIES Dr. John Komo (864) 656-5916 john.komo@ces.clemson.edu
EDUCATIONAL ACTIVITIES Lee Stogner (864) 281-8276 l.stogner@ieee.org
NEWSLETTER EDITOR Mark Stokes (864) 647-2065 m.stokes@ieee.org
AWARDS Dr. Randy Collins (864)656-5920 randy.collins@ces.clemson.edu

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The Piedmont section of the IEEE is still offering sections of its newsletter for advertising space. If you are interested in supporting this effort, please contact one of the officers listed above.

-Mark