B-W: Computer Science News

Outstanding Computer Science and Mathematics Students Recognized

Each year, the Department recognizes outstanding Mathematics and Computer Science students. For the 2009-2010 academic year, the award recipients were recognized at the annual Honors Awards Ceremony, which took place on Saturday, May 1, during Ovation 2010.

Computer Honorary Initiates Members

The Baldwin-Wallace Chapter of Upsilon Pi Epsilon, national Computer Science honorary, conducted its annual initiation ceremony on Friday, April 30, 2010, in the Mathematics and Computer Science Building. After the ceremony, parents and friends joined the eight initiates and departmental faculty for a reception in MaCs 105.

Student Chapter End-of-year Picnic

The B-W ACM Student Chapter celebrated a full year of activities with its traditional end-of-year picnic at Dr. Tims' on Sunday, April 25. There was a great turnout for this afternoon and evening event, despite the rainy weather. As always, there was lots of good food and great camaraderie.

High School Programming Contest

The Seventh Annual Baldwin-Wallace College High School Programming Competition took place on Tuesday, April 20, 2010.

Registration included twenty-five teams representing fifteen high schools from the greater Cleveland area. First place honors went to Solon High School. Information about the contest, including past problem sets and results of past competitions, can be found at http://acm.bw.edu/contest/

ACM Sponsors Speaker

Dr. Jaymie Strecker, currently a Visiting Assistant Professor at the College of Wooster, addressed the ACM Student Chapter on April 12. Dr. Strecker's talk, Who Will Test the Testers? Empirical Evaluations of Testing Techniques, focused on software testing techniques and several ways of studying them empirically.

Cyber Defense Team Competes

The Baldwin-Wallace Cyber Defense team qualified for the regional level of the Third Annual Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition (CCDC) by taking first place at the state level competition held at Rhodes State College in Lima, Ohio, February 20 - 22. Team members Joe Beutler, Konstantin Dinev, Eric Hammon, Goran Jovanovic, Adam Pengal, Kyle Sipple, Joe Wrabel, Bryan Young, and alternates Andrew Dreimiller and Mitch Raney, traveled to Minneapolis, Minnesota the following weekend for the Mid-West Regional CDCC Contest. Most team members will be back next year, and are anxious to compete again.

B-W Programming Teams Compete

Baldwin-Wallace competed in two collegiate programming contests during spring term 2010. On February 27, 11 teams competed at the 21st Annual Denison Spring Programming Contest. The Baldwin-Wallace team composed of Drew Binkley, Adam Pengal, Mitch Raney, and Joe Wrabel solved four of the six problems and took third place. second team members participated.

B-W also competed in the Fourth Annual Ohio Wesleyan Programming Contest held on March 27. In all, there were ten teams competing. The B-W team of Erik Kaminsky, Adam Pengal, Mitch Raney, and Joe Wrabel placed second, solving three of the six problems. The top team, from the University of Akron, solved three problems as well, but completed them in 11 minutes less, earning them top honors.

Student Chapter Hosts Speed Interviewing Event

The ACM Student Chapter hosted a speed interviewing event on Tuesday, March 23. Students had the opportunity to present themselves in an abbreviated mock interview with industry representatives from the Computer Science Advisory Board. In preparation for the event, the chapter invited Career Services personnel to attend the regular chapter meeting the week before the event to help students polish their resumes.

Department Loses Faculty Member

The Department mourns the loss of Ken Weiss, Jr., B-W alum and longtime adjunct member of the department, who passed away on February 9, 2010. Professor Weiss taught computer classes for the Department for several decades, including Fall term, 2009. We will surely miss him and his ever-cheery presence.

ACM Chapter Elects Officers

At its last meeting of winter term, the ACM chapter elected officers for the 2010 calendar year:

President -- Bryan Young
Vice-President -- Ben Meadors
Treasurer -- Goran Jovanovic
Secretary -- Joe Beutler

Invited Speaker

On November 11, the Department welcomed Jennifer Marsman from Microsoft Corporation. This event, scheduled as part of the new Inroductory Seminar in Computer Science, was open to all students, and drew a large crowd. Ms. Marsman gave a highly entertaining account of her path to her current job, as well as some insights into Microsoft and some of its current products.

Programming Teams Compete

Each year, ACM, with support from IBM, sponsors the ACM International Programming Contest. This competition, which tests the programming skills of colleges and universities world-wide, begins at the regional level. Baldwin-Wallace College is in the East Central Region, which includes western Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, eastern Ontario, and Indiana. This year's regional competition took place on October 31 at four satellite locations. The B-W team of Drew Binkley, Konstantin Dinev and Mitch Raney took 71^st place out of the 113 teams competing. The top six places at this year's regional went to teams from University of Waterloo, Carnegie Mellon, and The University of Michigan.

Student Places at Muskingum

The First Annual Muskingum Programming Contest was held on September 26, 2009. It is intended to be a warm-up for the Regional ACM contest the following month. Only one of the B-W regional team members could attend that Saturday. Kudos to Konstantin Dinev for placing as a one-man team.

Student Chapter Start-of-Year Picnic

The B-W ACM Student Chapter started the year off with a picnic on Saturday, September 19. The weather could not have been nicer. The day was spent playing corn hole, jumping on the trampoline, eating lots of great food, and finishing off with marshmallows roasted over an open fire.

Department Welcomes New Faculty Member

Dr. Adam Anthony joined the Computer Science faculty beginning Fall, 2009. Having completed his undergraduate work in Computer Science at nearby College of Wooster, Dr. Anthony recently completed his Ph.D. in Artificial Intelligence at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. He and his wife, Barb, reside in Berea. They welcomed their first child, James, who was born during Fall term.

Department Expands to West Wing

The Family Life Center vacated the west wing of the Mathematics and Computer Science Building at the end of May, 2009, and moved to their new location on Bagley Road, just west of the railroad tracks. The space was renovated during summer, 2009. It is being used for faculty offices for computer faculty, a computer program office, an upper-level computer lab, a computer classroom, and a large classroom dedicated to serving COL 020 (Aleks) classes.

In addition, the film studio and faculty offices for Film Studies and Broadcasting/Mass Communications now reside in the renovated space. During Spring term, 2010, the remaining space in the west wing was used for several Biology labs and faculty offices while the Life and Earth Sciences building was being renovated. They moved to their permanent location in June, 2010, and were replaced by Conservatory faculty who await the renovation of the former Congregational Church and Merner-Pfeiffer.