Wednesday, 6:30pm to 8:00pm

Program Chair: Mark A. Friedman, The Richard J. Roman Institute
Scholarships Chair: Stephenie A. McLean, Texas Advanced Computing Center, University of Texas at Austin

The Student and Scholarship Recipient Orientation presents experience and suggestions to students towards maximizing the benefits of their participation in the Tapia 2005 conference and future professional activities. Students will learn of programs and opportunities to support their education and career offered by the Coalition to Diversify Computing (CDC) and our sponsors, ACM, IEEE-CS and CRA. Jeffrey Forbes, an assistant professor at Duke University and Tapia Conference alum, will share his past Tapia Conference and CDC program experiences and their influences on his career. The orientation will provide valuable information and professional networking opportunities.

Moving Towards Future Objectives
Jeffrey R. N. Forbes, Duke University

The success of students at Tapia is of primary importance. The need to build and fill a viable pipeline of prospective minority faculty is well documented. The lack of people of color in computer-related fields has been repeatedly observed at the undergraduate level, the graduate level and throughout society in what is commonly referred to as the Digital Divide. In some cases, there has even been regression in the number of students and faculty of color. It should thus come as no surprise that people of color are severely underrepresented in the faculty of computer science departments. The positive effects of a diverse faculty would be numerous, including better mentoring, potentially broader interests, and the higher quality work that inevitably results from a larger pool of candidates.

In order to become a professor, one must eventually finish graduate school. Isolation is one of the common problems cited by students of color in computing. Conferences such as Tapia provide an opportunity to share knowledge, network and obtain support. This talk will discuss how to have a successful tenure in graduate school. I will describe some common pitfalls and suggest alternative, more productive approaches that are more likely to result in progress towards one's goals.

Mark A. Friedman, The Richard J. Roman Institute, DrMarkAFriedman@gmail.com

Mark A. Friedman is the president of the Richard J. Roman Institute, a consultancy specializing in performance improvement and career advancement of computer scientists and software development teams using object-oriented and distributed technologies and software processes. Mark takes particular interest in mentoring young professionals - bridging the gap between foundations built in formal education and technologies and intrapersonal/interpersonal skills needed for success in industry. His dual experience in academia and industry makes him well suited for this role. Mark served eight years teaching and building computer science programs as an assistant professor at Trinity College and Central Connecticut State University. In industry, he worked at IBM Poughkeepsie and IBM's T.J. Watson Research Center; consulted at Hewlett-Packard, Digital Equipment Corporation and General Electric; served as the chief technology officer (CTO) at MokoNet; and founded the Richard J. Roman Institute. Mark earned a Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, specializing in computer architecture, and a master's from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, specializing in computer-aided design and electrical design automation.

Stephenie A. McLean, Texas Advanced Computing Center, University of Texas at Austin, mclean@tacc.utexas.edu

Stephenie McLean is the Education, Outreach and Training Director at the Texas Advanced Computing Center (TACC) located on the campus of the University of Texas at Austin. Prior to arriving at TACC, she was the training and outreach manager for the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA). During much of her career, Stephenie has worked to provide executive awareness, faculty development and educational opportunities to underrepresented faculty and students in the areas of science, technology, engineering and math. Stephenie is the director of the Minority Serving Institutions Network (MSIN), which aims to build a pathway of diversity in advanced computing and computational science. Stephenie was recognized for her work in increasing diversity in high performance computing as one of HPCWire's "people to watch in 2004".

Stephenie holds a M.S. in Journalism from Murray State University. She is a member of the Institute for African American E-Culture (iAAEC), ACM, Global Grid Forum (GGF), Coalition to Diversify Computing (CDC) and serves on the 2005 Supercomputing Conference Executive Planning Committee.

Jeffrey R. N. Forbes, Duke University, forbes@cs.duke.edu

Jeffrey R. N. Forbes is an assistant professor of the Practice of Computer Science at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. His research interests include computer science education, intelligent agents and robotics. He received a B.S. in Computer Science from Stanford University and a Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of California, Berkeley. Prof. Forbes holds memberships in the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), American Association for Artificial Intelligence (AAAI), and the Coalition to Diversify Computing.