IEEE Eastern North Carolina Section Report www.ieee.org/encs 

Region 3 Meet at Atlanta,November 21-23, 2003:

Prepared by Abhinav Aggarwal, Section Chair & David Ruden, Vice-Chair

Overview: TheEastern North Carolinasection has over active 3000
members, several of them participating in regular activities. Our
objective is to make this section like a role-model, shifting the
focus to Members as the center of activity. Steering Committee and
Virtual Community are steps in that direction. We had a change of
leadership in July, 2003 when John B Gibson relocated
toCalifornia. Dr. Abhinav Aggarwal, then Vice-Chair, took over as
Chair and David Ruden moved to the Vice-Chair Role in addition to
holding the TreasurerÕs position. The momentum of activity created by
John has been consistently maintained and driven forward with several
new initiatives. Details of ExCom are at ieee.org/enc whoÕs who page.


New Initiatives and Proposals:

* ICEVT: the proposal on "IEEE Centerfor Excellence in Vision of
Technology" is being presented to the Region Leadership for approval
of $20,000 (or available funds) as a special section project. ICEVT is
toresearch in identifying the direction for technologies of the future
towards creating a better world andexpected to help the Section
Membership professionally in several ways. Preliminary proposal was
presented at NC Council Meet in Sept 2003.

* The Section Website reconstruction, creating a virtual community and
reviving the newsletter, all thanks to Charles Lord.

* We are in the planning towards an NC-based Conference on the theme
"Technology for Life," in October 2004 at RTP area to put the focus
onNorth Carolinain Biotech field, encompassing several areas in
Bioinformatics and Biomedical Engineering. Thomas Jepsen has the lead
on organizing, helped by Subroto Bhattacharya and David Ruden. By
making a presentation on the conference proposal at R3 meeting, we
wish to explore the funding opportunities and support that the NC
Council and R3 can provide.

* Lower CapeFear (Wilmington) Sub-Section has been re-activated.

* New Chapters: Neural Networks, Remote Sensing, ACME (inter-society)
and Signal Processing chapters have been formed. EMBS Chapter has been
reactivated. Embedded Systems Interest Group and Entrepreneurship
Development Network have been launched.

* We helped upgrade several Members to Senior Member and are in the
process of launching another drive to upgrade qualified Senior Members
to Fellows.

April-November Activity Report:(details can be viewed
atwww.ieee.org/encCalendar)

Over 50 meetings, presentations and chapter activities were held, some
of these spanning Section (8), ExCom (7), ComSec (4), Computer (1),
EMBS (2), NNS (3), ACME (1), Embedded Systems (2), EMS/PDI (3),Power
(1), EMC (1), Software Developer's Job Hunt Collaboration (3),
Bio/Pharma JHC (6), Remote Sensing (3), Sub-section (3), WIE, besides
participation at Computer Technology Showcase, AITP, CIO Forum,
Student Activities and Scouts Engineering Merit Badge.

Thanks and best wishes ...

Dr. Abhinav Aggarwal
Chair, IEEE Eastern North Carolina Section