Working collaboratively in 2008-09
 by Dean Dennis R. Depew
New Synergies – This is the theme for President Cordova’s and Purdue University’s newly adopted strategic plan. It also describes the way an institution works at its best. The sum is greater than its parts alone. Whether it’s research, curriculum development, or a new administrative process, sharing and collaboration make for a much better outcome.
As I mentioned at the Welcome Forum last Monday, we are getting ready to embark on a whole new strategic plan for the college, and your participation will be integral to our college’s future direction. Dr. Melissa Dark, assistant dean and professor of CIT, will lead the process along with a steering committee. They will schedule a series of forums for open discussion and feedback as we develop our 2008-14 College of Technology strategic plans. I encourage you to get involved and be proactive in sharing your thoughts and ideas during this process.
We have had many successes this past academic year, and I anticipate many more again this year. Sponsored research activity, faculty accolades, and scholarship funding for our students continue to rise to record levels. If you were unable to attend last week’s Welcome Forum, I would also encourage you to view this PowerPoint file (Click to download.)
Finally, when you get a chance please visit the college’s new Intranet: https://share.tech.purdue.edu. You can access the site with your career account username (onepurdue\username) and password. With calendars and document review and share amongst its functions, this medium promises to serve as yet another venue for us to collaborate on various departmental and collegewide projects together. I have been told that the Marketing Communications office is in the process of working with the areas to set up read/write permissions on the site so you may only be able to initially access and view certain areas. It is also possible to request site permissions in the drop-down area where your log-in name shows up (right hand top corner). I hope you will take advantage of this communication tool.
I wish you the very best this upcoming academic year. Please know that I greatly appreciate all that you do to make our college successful.
Hail Purdue!
Dennis R. Depew, dean
Faculty and Staff News
Faculty and staff new for the 2008-09 academic year include:
Aviation Technology
• Jay Hedden, visiting assistant professor
• Arthur Janneck, continuing lecturer — flight instruction
• Belinda Jasiak, continuing lecturer — simulator training
• Chien-tsung Lu, associate professor
Building Construction Management
• Kevin Behling, visiting assistant professor
• Bryan Hubbard, assistant professor
• Randy Rapp, associate professor
• Mark Shaurette, assistant professor
Computer and Information Technology
• Raymond Hansen, clinical assistant professor
• Brandeis Hill Marshall, assistant professor
• Eric Matson, assistant professor
• Jeff Sprankle, clinical assistant professor
Industrial Technology
• Todd Kelley, assistant professor
• Eric Kukula, visiting assistant professor
• Shimon Modi, postdoctoral research assistant
Mechanical Engineering Technology
• Bryan Evans, limited-term lecturer
• Erik Garay, limited-term lecturer
• Jeffrey Holewinski, limited-term lecturer
Advancement office
Kristen Ziese, director of development
Statewide Locations
Anderson
• Barbara J. Alder, director
Columbus
• Lucian Silvian, visiting assistant professor, mechanical engineering technology
Indianapolis
• John Mott, continuing lecturer, aviation technology
Lafayette
• Edward Dirk Hilt, student services coordinator
• Deborah Saks, visiting assistant professor, organizational leadership and supervision
Kokomo
• Christy L. Bozic, director
New Albany
• Ananth Sriraman, clinical assistant professor, computer graphics technology and mechanical engineering technology
Richmond
• Sarah George, continuing lecturer, computer graphics technology
South Bend
• Michael D. Sanders, director
Sponsored Research Update
For an updated look at sponsored research activities within the College of Technology, visit the applied research section of the CoT Web site.
CoT News Submissions
Report your CoT news through the online reporting form. Feel free to use this form to notify the communications team of your college-related news, events, and achievements. This information will be distributed to the team for potential use in news releases, the dean's e-newsletter, Innovation magazine and updating information on the college's Web site. The next e-newsletter is scheduled for distribution on Monday, September 8.
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Faculty Accolades
Four College of Technology professors are among 49 universitywide to be inducted into Purdue's "Book of Great Teachers."
Computer graphics technology faculty members Craig L. Miller and James L. Mohler and aviation technology faculty members Dale Oderman and Donald A. Petrin will be honored.
The Book of Great Teachers honors outstanding teaching faculty who have demonstrated sustained excellence in the classroom.
The Aug. 28 induction, which occurs once every five years, will take place from 3:30-5:30 p.m. in the North Ballroom of the Purdue Memorial Union. Purdue President France A. Córdova and Provost Randy Woodson will recognize the honorees.
To be included in the Book of Great Teachers, professors and former professors must have served on the Purdue faculty at least 10 years. Honorees include past recipients of universitywide teaching excellence awards and those nominated by students, alumni, and colleagues.
"These professors are passionate about teaching and are making a difference in the lives of students both inside and outside the classroom," Woodson said. "This honor reflects our commitment to excellence in teaching and the faculty that embody this every day."
The book, a bronze and walnut wall display in the west foyer of the union, was first unveiled in 1999 with 225 current and former faculty honorees. The last ceremony was held in 2003, when 42 faculty members were added to the book.
Student News
Brina Splingaire, a senior in mechanical engineering technology, was recently featured in a Journal and Courier article about her participation in the National Hot Rod Association. Journal and Courier article
Students, faculty and staff traveled to Los Angeles this month to promote Purdue at the annual ACM-SIGGRAPH conference. The SIGGRAPH conference and exhibition is a five-day interdisciplinary educational experience, including a three-day commercial exhibition that attracts hundreds of exhibitors from around the world. SIGGRAPH is recognized as the most prestigious forum for the publication of computer graphics research.
Representatives from the Department of Computer Graphics Technology and the Envision Center for Data Perceptualization designed and manned the Purdue booth, which was designed to promote some of the computer graphics work being conducted at the West Lafayette campus. Faculty and staff representatives included Laura Arns, Kellen Maicher, James Mohler, Nate Hartman, and Jim Sprinkles. Student representatives included Chris Mankey, Brian McCreight, Angelica Montes De Oca, David Nelson, Chris Sprunger, and Stephen Woodall.
Sarah Van Hoy, a sophomore at the Columbus location, recently won the 2008 Indiana Quarter Horse Queen competition.
Alumni News
Robert Theodorow, CGT ’01 and founder of Stormfront Productions, recently celebrated the fifth anniversary of his company Web site. The Web site has attracted more than 100,000 unique visitors and has more than 25,000 Web sites linking to it. Stormfront Productions is a full-service Web firm that was founded in 2002. It is located at 302 Ferry St., Suite 207, Lafayette.
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In the News
Director named at College of Technology at Anderson/Muncie
Barbara J. Alder has been selected as the new director of the Purdue College of Technology at Anderson/Muncie.
In her position, she will oversee operations for the College of Technology locations in Anderson, located at the Anderson University Flagship Center off Interstate 69, exit 22, and in Muncie, on the campus of Ball State.
Alder worked in admissions and financial aid at Hanover College before beginning a 26-year career in the telecommunications industry. She worked for GTE for several years in Indiana and Texas and was appointed to the regulatory compliance office when Verizon Communications was formed in 2000. She was named director of regulatory compliance in the Arlington, Va., office in 2004. She retired from Verizon in 2006.
This year, she worked part-time with Habitat for Humanity of Madison County, and in September she will begin serving on the Hanover College Alumni Association board of directors. She is a volunteer tutor with Church Street Commons in Alexandria and a SCORE small business counselor with Anderson Chapter #519.
Alder also has volunteered with United Way, Junior Achievement, Broad Ripple Arts Fair and the Indiana Repertory Theatre, and she served as president of Keystone Crossing Kiwanis Club in Indianapolis.
Alder received a bachelor's degree from Hanover College and a master's degree from Indiana University, both in business administration.
Indianapolis location offers new specialization in logistics and supply-chain management
Beginning this semester, Purdue University's College of Technology at Indianapolis will give students the option of learning more about manufacturing logistics, especially as it relates to the aviation industry.
A new specialization in logistics and supply-chain management will be available to students admitted into the aviation management bachelor's degree program beginning this fall and will include several courses in industrial technology.
"Indianapolis is a hub of logistics, and aviation is essentially a logistics business — moving people and freight," said Jon Aull, the director of the College of Technology at Indianapolis. "Supply-chain management is a natural fit for our students studying aviation management and will give them added skills that will qualify them for a broader range of jobs."
University News Service
Indianapolis Star
Purdue program provides chance at success
Some of the newest Purdue University students this semester can measure their break from school in years and decades instead of summer months.
The Purdue College of Technology in Lafayette held its back-to-school program at Subaru of Indiana's Lafayette plant on Aug. 14. The program hopes to attract nontraditional students for classes in industrial technology and organizational leadership and supervision.
"We schedule our classes for times that work for adults," said Michele Summers, assistant director of the program.
Journal and Courier
New lab gives dedicated space to high-performance computing
Purdue has opened a research and learning laboratory for students in the College of Technology's growing specialization in high-performance computing.
The high-performance computing laboratory in Knoy Hall, which opened this month, contains space for a wide variety of computer hardware, an adjoining space for student collaboration and projects, and a classroom area across the hall.
"High-performance computing is becoming more common in industry, and there is a huge demand for graduates who understand these systems," said Thomas Hacker, an assistant professor in the Department of Computer and Information Technology. "This new lab gives our expanding specialization – one of the few in the nation – room to grow."
University News Service
Purdue Leadership course begins Sept. 2 in Crawfordsville
The College of Technology at Lafayette is accepting enrollment for a leadership course in critical thinking offered in Crawfordsville beginning Sept. 2.
The course, Organizational Leadership and Supervision 345, will be held at the Weliever Building, 1823-29 E. Elmore St., Crawfordsville.
Students may choose to attend one of two class times designed to accommodate shift workers: 4:30-8:20 p.m. Tuesdays from Sept. 2 to Oct. 21, or 8 a.m.-noon Saturdays from Sept. 6 to Oct. 25.
The course will teach students how to use critical thinking and inductive and deductive reasoning to distinguish between matters of fact and opinion.
University News Service
Purdue raising southern Indiana profile
They see 40 acres bulldozed and a big building go up. They notice its sign. They assume Purdue University has come to Southern Indiana.
Eager to be Boilermakers, they call Andy Schaffer. Then Schaffer must point out, yet again: This exciting new presence is not everything that everyone could want.
This is not Purdue University Southeast, as Schaffer puts it. This is not Purdue's local debut.
It is the new Purdue University College of Technology, located on Charlestown Road in New Albany. But the Purdue program actually began long before, in the little-known reaches of its local collegiate archrival, Indiana University Southeast.
Louisville Courier Journal
Purdue earns an average 'green score,' review says
Purdue University student groups want the school to do more to be a good environmental steward, and a new rating of universities shows Purdue could do better.
The Princeton Review, a Web site dedicated to helping high school students with standardized tests and choosing colleges, gave Purdue a 75 for its "green score." The score was based on a scale of between 60 and 99, putting Purdue at an average score of more than 300 schools.
Michael Rebbec, treasurer of Purdue GreenBuild and a senior in building construction management, said he'd like to see Purdue look for alternative energy sources instead of burning coal in its power plant.
Journal and Courier
From a 'big chunk of wood' to a guitar of one's own
When Ben Krebs, a high school student from Avon, signed up for the STEPS High School Guitar Making Workshop at Purdue, he didn't expect to have much responsibility while building his guitar.
"I expected it to be more boring," said Krebs. "I didn't expect it to be so much on our own."
Instead, Krebs and 21 other high school students had a hand in almost every step of the process during the program conducted by several Purdue professors and staff. It started July 29 and ran through Aug. 1.
Mark French, assistant professor of mechanical engineering technology and one of the professors who oversaw the workshop, said the participants did much more than paint and sand the bodies of their instruments.
"It's really cool to be able to build something you can actually play and say that you did most of the work," he said.
Journal and Courier
Program aims to get youngsters enthused, interested in technology
A radio-controlled helicopter hovered between 50 and 100 feet in the air in front of the Purdue Technology Center on Aug. 5.
A camera attached to the flying device snapped photos of more than 20 children who were standing in front of the building and were participating in a technology-based entrepreneurship project.
On Aug. 4, they attended a session with Susan Manahan, assistant director of diversity for the Purdue College of Technology, and were able to program small robots to dance, move and pick up items.
Journal and Courier
Columbus Space Camp sparks students' interest
Students ages 13 through college age interested in the science and technology involved in space-related careers participated in Space Camp 2008, sponsored by Purdue College of Technology at Columbus from Aug. 5 to 8 at Space Port Indiana, located at the Columbus Municipal Airport.
Activities included presentations from engineers and scientists about the near-space environment, working in teams to research the near-space environment, designing near-space payloads, conducting a launch to near space, tracking launches and gathering data from the payload students designed, and meeting and talking with engineers from NASA.
Columbus Republic
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