Center for IT & eBusiness

A team of four MIS majors won first place at the first ever Information Systems Project and Case Competition hosted by Ball State University in Muncie Indiana.

A team of four students majoring in Information Systems at the College of Business Administration took FIRST PLACE in the PROJECT CATEGORY, FIRST PLACE in the PRESENTATION CATEGORY, and THIRD PLACE OVERALL. Congratulations to the four senior MIS Majors who independently conceived of their project, developed it on their own during the spring semester, and successfully presented and defended it against 11 other teams. They are (see picture below):

Iulian Arsene, team captain and Chief Engineer (right)

Derek Lippert, taking on the role of Chief Product Designer (middle)

Gary Ward and Ben Gump, talking on the role of Business Analysts (left and second from left)

Dr. Bill McHenry, Professor of MIS and coach (second from right)

THE IDEA!

In a nutshell, the team took on the idea of developing a USB device with a small screen that can transfer files wirelessly to a similar (or other Bluetooth-enabled) device without having to go through the intermediary of a computer. The team treated this as a new product development, selected a hardware and software platform, investigated and understood the capabilities of a small chip that would be at the heart of the system, wrote code to implement several classes needed to make the transfers work, documented their developed in a UML diagram, developed a 3-D model and animation to go with the presentation, created a lively and informative poster board that blew all the other teams away, analyzed the market position of their product using a SWOT and Five-forces analysis, priced what it would take for an initial proof of concept batch to allow them to move on to seek further funding, and explained all of this in a 20 minute presentation/Q&A session, including a small demo of bits being transferred from the development environment/chip (“the device” as we fondly called it) to an iPhone. A couple of the other teams wrote mobile phone apps or did some programming, but no one took on anything close to the scope of this project. One of the judges told us privately that he has judged many student presentations at Ball State over the years and this was the best single student presentation he has ever seen! Congratulations again to our most successful team!

Topic: IT/IS Talent Management Report Card: Where are we, and where do we need to go

Does your workforce/talent management strategy for IS/IT resources support your business strategy? Have you considered where you will be in 3, 5, or even 10 years from now? Is there a talent crisis in NE Ohio? What creative solutions are you applying now and will apply in the near future to ameliorate these problems?

Date and Venue:
June 1, 2012
2:30PM – 4:30PM
Murphy Room,

College of Business Administration
The University of Akron, OH.

On Tuesday, February 21, 2012, a group of 15 Information Systems students from The University of Akron visited the Westfield Group campus in Westfield Center, Ohio. The morning began with an overview of the company and internship/career options, presented by Tony Cascaldo, Wayne Hartzler, and Rebecca DiRienzo. CTO Steve Tien shared his personal experiences with the group and answered a range of questions from the students. The Westfield Campus has preserved the original architecture of the buildings and was shown to the students on the tour of the rotunda. The breakout sessions were conducted for an hour and a half; students were paired with Westfield employees based on their interest areas and learned about the employees’ day-to-day operations at Westfield. The group met for a delicious catered lunch in Smucker Hall and concluded the day with a tour of the Center for Innovation and Technology. CITe would like to thank Westfield Group for organizing a wonderful opportunity for the students.

Guest Moderator: Sandy Rapp, Timken

RAPM: Rapid Analysis Portfolio Management

With the enormous number of new technology opportunities that are becoming available, old governance mechanisms are hard-pressed to keep up. Come to this session of ITEE to explore, with your colleagues, how to respond to opportunities as diverse as social media and cloud computing within the framework of the existing IT infrastructure.

Date and Venue:
March 30, 2012
2:30PM – 4:30PM
College of Business Administration
The University of Akron, OH.

The Center for IT & eBusiness (CITe) is hosting an informal networking event at The University of Akron for juniors and seniors from local high schools in Polsky room 567 on Monday, November 7th from 6:30 to 8:30 pm. The event will give high school students a chance to interact with IS students, IS faculty, and area IT executives to learn more about career opportunities, programs available at the university, and scholarship information. Food and door prizes will be provided.

ITEE meeting – November 4, 2011; 2:30 pm to 4:30 pm; Murphy Room, CBA, The University of Akron

When a business unit head doesn’t get something in the IT budget, he circumvents policies and gets it somehow. Another user is not satisfied with the provided conferencing system, so sets up a meeting at home using Skype. With the exploding number of choices available to end users throughout the organization, are IT policies and their enforcement becoming a myth? Come to discuss the travails of rogue users and what your peers are doing about them.

Interested? – send email to  cite_info@uakron.edu

About 30 high school sophomores and juniors students from 15 different local high schools in Summit, Stark and Cuyahoga counties interested in pursuing a career in information technology will be on The University of Akron campus June 20-24, 9 a.m. – 4 p.m., for the Second Annual Information Technology (IT) Career Camp.

Sponsored by the College of Business Administration’s Center for IT & eBusiness (CITe), the week-long event will feature 8 reality based hands-on activities sponsored by area companies such as Westfield Insurance, NASA Glen, J.M. Smucker Co, Revol Wireless, and Hyland software. Among the careers to be explored are IT Infrastructure, IT Forensics, Robotics, Data Mining/Business Analytics, Business Process Management, Software Development and more.

The camp also features presentations by local business executives, students and alumni panel, team and individual competitions with scholarships to The University of Akron awarded to the top participants and an end of the week Awards Ceremony/Banquet for the participants and their families.

Virtualization has given IT departments an unprecedented cost reducing tool through server consolidation, streamlined business continuity, and access to the cloud. But questions remain: can virtualized servers really scale? Has virtualization delivered the promised ROI? Can and should IT take the next step to virtualization on the desktop? How might virtualization facilitate business agility and repositioning IT as a service?

Come share your perspectives at the next ITEE meeting!

Location: CBA 258 (Murphy Room), CBA, The University of Akron

Date: June 3, 2011

Time: 2:30 p.m. to 4:30 p.m.

This IT Career Camp is designed for rising high school juniors and seniors from NE Ohio to work together in groups and gain a better understanding of the Information Technology field and careers.

The camp will be a five day event held on The University of Akron campus from June 20-24th. Students interested in registering should fill out the available form.

For more information on the event, visit the ITCC home page, or email ua.itcc@gmail.com

Margaret Sell has joined The University of Akron as Assistant Director of Development for the College of Business Administration.

Margaret attended Ohio University and ultimately received her bachelor’s degree in Business and Organizational Communication from The University of Akron in 2005.  Following graduation, Margaret joined the United Way of Summit County as a Resource Development Director, working with companies in Bath, Copley, Fairlawn and Richfield on their annual fundraising campaigns.  In addition to her work as a campaign manager, Margaret also managed the United Way’s Young Leaders Society, an affinity group for donors 40 and younger.  She is a member of the 2011 class of Torchbearers, as well as a member of the Greater Akron Chamber’s Knowledgeable Network of Women (KNOW) and Young Professional’s Network.  Margaret currently lives in Barberton with her husband and two children.

Margaret can be reached by phone at 330-972-7259 or by e-mail at mg29@uakron.edu. Her office is located on the fourth floor of the CBA building, CBA 422.

Please join me in welcoming Margaret to the CBA!

Vijay