Information Technology and Web Science at RPI

WHAT IS THE  RACKSPACE.COM  PROGRAM? Rackspace loves startups, and they have partnered with the Foundry-RPI to provide $2000 in Rackspace Cloud credit per month for a period of one year for companies participating in the Foundry program. That is a great runway to be able to get your startup off the ground. WHAT IS THE FOUDRY-RPI? Foundry-RPI is a working group where students, alumni and community members meet weekly, get peer feedback, and execute on ideas in an environment in which it is both expected that you are trying to do awesome things and it is okay to fail. The Foundry does not invest in or take fees from students or participating companies. HOW DO I SIGN UP FOR THE FOUDRY-RPI? Send your contact info to  SCTE@rpi.edu . You can find out more information on the Foundry-RPI at  http://scte.rpi.edu/foundry. html Rackspace Startup Program offered to Foundry-RPI members RACKSPACE.COM Managed Cloud Hosting Committed to Open Standards Plan, Deploy and Run

HCI  Symposium Hosted by Prof. Roger Grice & Theory & Research in HCI Class On Wednesday, December 5 th  2012 From 2pm to 5pm At Sage 4711 “Come for HCI…Stay for the  soda & cookies ”

The Entrepreneurship club is excited to host the first  University Hacker Olympics . This is a once in a lifetime opportunity to win an  all-expense paid trip to San Francisco in January to hack against the top engineers from 30 hot tech startups such as:  AirBNB, Kayak, Dropbox, CouchSurfing, Yelp, and more.  (See attached flyer). In California you will not only be hacking but also meeting and networking with these top tech startups, and who knows maybe get a job offer. How do you win you may ask? To be eligible to be selected to compete in California you must participate in a 4 hour code challenge (using hacker rank) which will pit you against not only RPI students but students at some of the top schools in the country. From those participants 4 will be picked to fly out to California. (the top 10 students form RPI will be asked to fill out a questioner and a panel of judges will pick the top 4). Please join our Facebook event page: http://www.facebook.com/ events/1061679595

STARTUP WEEKEND SYRACUSE!!!! http://bit.ly/nacMRj   Nov 30,   2012  Register The Syracuse Technology Garden Ever wondered what it takes to be an entrepreneur? The professional and personal challenges, the high and lows, the failures and the success? Startup Weekend is a global grassroots movement of active and empowered entrepreneurs who are learning the basics of founding startups and launching successful ventures. It is the largest community of passionate entrepreneurs with over 400 past events in 100 countries around the world in 2011. The non-profit organization is headquartered in Seattle, Washington but Startup Weekend organizers and facilitators can be found in over 200 cities around the world. From Mongolia to South Africa to London to Brazil, people around the globe are coming together for weekend long workshops to pitch ideas, form teams, and start companies.

The ITWS program is pleased to announce the 2012 Founder's award winners: Michelle Sharer, Alexander Lahuerta, and Lindsay Poirier.  Alex Bulazel, a dual ITWS major, won the Founder's award with Computer Science.   The Founders Award of Excellence was established in 1994 to honor students who embody qualities of creativity, discovery, leadership, and the values of pride and responsibility at Rensselaer. Unfortunately we were unable to get a photo of the student winners, however, we did manage to find the old and new director of ITWS.  Thanks Jim and Peter!

This year's alumni panel was held on Tuesday October 16, 2012 and was great success!  Thank you to all the alumni, faculty, staff and students who attended.  For the first time this year we teleconferenced with alumni on the west coast. Colin Anderson  Colin began his career as an educator and recently completed his Master’s Degree in Information Technology with a concentration in MIS from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.  He now works as a Lead Consultant at Blue Slate Solutions in Albany, NY.  Colin’s consultant experience has been focused in both the healthcare and financial  industry.  He is a key team member in leading requirements and analysis in increasing a healthcare payer’s Medical Review effectiveness.  This involves working directly with key members  across, and at all levels, of the organization in the standardization and re-engineering of their Medical Review process with the goal of leveraging the specific root cause for payment denial in a structured form

When:  Wednesday, October 10, 2012  11:00 AM  -  12:00 PM Where:  Winslow 1140 See:  http://bit.ly/OQzuXQ Description:  Join us on Wednesday, October 10th at 11:00 am ET in Winslow 1140 as we introduce the Web Science Research Center to the rest of the Web Science Trust. More information and registration to the live webinar can be found at http://bit.ly/OQzuXQ Contact:  Tetherless World Constellation, x4384 Topical Areas:  Discussions Tags:  Discussions, Conferences_Meetings

On Tuesday, October 16, at 4 pm in Lally 104 we will hold an "Open Discussion" with our new  Director, Peter Fox. Pizza and soda will be served. Please mark your calendars and plan on joining us. Thanks. Linda

RPI and the ITWS program was mentioned on the Today show.  Fast forward to 1:25 to see the clip.   http:// video.today.msnbc.msn. com/ today/49256526#49256526   Transcript of the portion related to RPI: RPI, our nations oldest technological university and it's a great pick for students who are budding engineers, scientists, architects, and IT and web specialists.  Major corporations come to recruit on this campus.  Like Boeing, Amazon, and Apple and it's also ranked number 20 for return on financial investment. Those graduates have some of the highest entry level salaries at just over $60,000.

Peter Fox Named Director of Information Technology and Web Science Program at Rensselaer Professor Peter Fox has been named the new director of the Information Technology and Web Science (ITWS) program at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Fox is currently the Tetherless World Research Constellation Chair and a professor of Earth and Environmental Sciences and Computer Science at Rensselaer. “Through his own research, Peter Fox has shown himself to be a master of crossing the disciplinary boundaries, a value that is at the heart of our successful Information Technology and Web Science program,” said  School of Science  Dean  Laurie Leshin . “His contributions to the program since joining Rensselaer in 2008 have already proven invaluable, and I am delighted to announce this appointment.” Fox joined Rensselaer in 2008 after 17 years at the High Altitude Observatory of the National Center for Atmospheric Research, where he served as chief computational scientist. “I consi

Dear Colleagues in ITWS, With the approval of the President and Provost, I am very pleased to announce the appointment of Professor Peter Fox as Director of the ITWS Program, effective immediately. This appointment comes after consultation with those of you who attended our discussions, excellent feedback on Peter as a candidate, and my own discussions with Peter — in short, it came after much consultation and consideration.  I want to thank Peter for taking on this role — I look forward to working with him to continue to advance ITWS at Rensselaer.   I'd also like to take this opportunity to express my sincere appreciation for the distinguished service of former Director Jim Hendler, and to David Spooner who has served as Acting Director these past few months.  They have carried forward the goals of ITWS admirably! I hope you all are having a productive semester, and I look forward to our continuing progress in positioning ITWS for an exciting future! All the be

All - Thank you again to all of those who attended last week's  TWed Talk . We had a great turn out.  As we mentioned, there are several ways to get involved with TWC's Web Science Research Center (WSRC). Specifically, we'd like to extend an invite to the following two events today,  Wednesday, September 19th: Weekly RPI TWC WSRC meeting  Join us at our weekly internal meeting where we will discuss upcoming events, projects, etc.  When: 10:00 - 11:00 am EST Where: Winslow (meet 2nd floor common area) We need your help as we gear up for our own WSTNet Webinar presentation on October 10th. WSTNet Lab Webinar Featuring the Oxford Internet Institute (OII) Join us as we gather to watch OII's webinar presentation and discuss how we can better collaborate with this lab in the future. When: 11:00 am - 12:00 pm EST  Where: Winslow (2nd floor common area)  RSVP to Kristine For those unable to attend, we will be taking live notes here  < http://websci.t

Making the leap from entrepreneurial student to business startup is no easy task. Are you looking for a place to start? Looking for a place where you can get feedback and support from like-minded peers and experienced business professionals? The Foundry-RPI program is designed to provide just that place. Launched at Rensselaer with the support of the Severino Center for Technological Entrepreneurship as an experiment in the spring semester of 2012, the program found success through the summer, and will continue in the fall of 2012. Over the spring and summer terms 17 startup companies and 24 students have participated in the program. This fall, the Foundry-RPI is coming out of beta and launching as a fully-supported program of the Severino Center. An information session for the fall 2012 program will be held September 19 at 4:30 to 5:30 p.m. in the Fischbach Room,Folsom Library. Please help get the word out and RSVP for the meeting.  http://www.facebook.com/ events/144612039015

Subject: [tetherless] TWed Talk this Week: Dominic DiFranzo presents "Web Science 101" (Weds, 7p, Winslow Building) "There's always something happening on Wednesday Nights in the Tetherless World!" < http://tw.rpi.edu/web/twed/ > "Web Science 101" Web Science is a new, emerging field that studies the World Wide Web and its impact on both society and technology[1].  Web Science seeks to understand the multi-faceted nature of the Web and its development as key communicational and representational system that enables information systems to be decentralized. In this talk TWC graduate student Dominic DiFranzo will lead us through a discussion of the many areas and disciplines that make up Web Science, the goals, questions and themes of Web Science, and  what research has currently been taken in this area. We will also discuss the Web Science Trust, the collection of labs and Universities in the Web Science Trust (which includes RPI's

Dear ITWS Community, Please join us for a Town Hall-style discussion with Professor Peter Fox, a candidate for the position of ITWS Program Director.  Peter will make a short presentation and we will have a discussion afterwards.  We will ask for your written feedback on the candidate at that time. It is important that as many members of the ITWS Community as possible participate in this process, so I hope to see students, staff and faculty there!   Here are the details: When: Wednesday, August 29th Room:  Lally 104  Time:  10 – 11 All are welcome! See you soon, -Laurie

Touchdown! by  MARY MARTIALAY  on  AUGUST 6, 2012 At 1:32 a.m. Eastern time, the NASA rover  Curiosity  safely touched down on the surface of Mars after a journey of more than 300 million miles and a harrowing descent from orbit, complete with parachutes, rockets, and the perilous ”sky crane manuever.” As a member of the science team for Curiosity,  Rensselaer Dean of Science Laurie Leshin traveled to California for the landing, and is currently at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory helping to analyze data from the rover. An opinion piece Leshin wrote about the importance of the mission, and the hope that it will engage young people in the pursuit of math and science,  appeared in Sunday’s edition of the Albany  Times Union . Before she left, I had a chance to speak with Dean Leshin about the mission and her work as a member of the science team: What’s the Curiosity mission all about? Curiosity is all about trying to understand the habitability of an interesting site on

Ranking Based on Surveys of Engineers, Professionals, and Entrepreneurs Working at Technology Companies Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute  has been named one of the top engineering schools in the world. Industry-focused website Business Insider ranked Rensselaer fourth on its list of “World's Best Engineering Schools.” The rankings were based on surveys of engineers, professionals, and entrepreneurs working at technology companies. “Rensselaer’s engineering programs are held in very high esteem among the academic and scientific communities. We have long been recognized for the quality of our academic programs, the unique experiences we afford our students, and the ability of our graduates to make significant contributions early in their careers. This latest ranking provides clear evidence of the value placed on our world-class engineering programs by the companies that hire our graduate

How to Land a Technology Job on Wall Street: Inside an Elite Wall Street IT Education Capital markets firms are recruiting graduates from the top schools in computer science and other majors to train the next generation of IT talent. Tags:   Sapient Global Markets ,  Campus Recruiting ,  Steve Rubinow ,  FX Alliance ,  Blackstone Group ,  Bill Murphy , Building IT Skills , By  Ivy Schmerken @ischmerken MAY 31, 2012 Share on email Despite the view that the U.S. economy is sluggish and it's hard for new college graduates to get a job, financial services firms are hiring. In fact, top Wall Street companies are reaching out to the elite colleges in a huge way to bring in the best and brightest graduates whom they can groom to fit their cultures. How to Climb the Wall Street Corporate IT Ladder How to Manage Millennials: Harnessing Their Adaptability, Flexibility and Connectivity Campus recruiting at the top universities in computer science, engineerin

Thank you to all the students, faculty and advisory board members for making this years workshop a great success!   Special Thanks for Lynn Andrea Stein, from Olin College, for coming to RPI to run our annual workshop.  Students and instructors had a great discussion regarding the curriculum and the laboratory space.    Abstract : The IT and Web Science (ITWS) Program has inaugurated a new interdisciplinary undergraduate laboratory and project space designed to cultivate undergraduate research. The space is open not just to ITWS students, but all undergraduates, as well as graduate students and faculty members interested in engaging in highly interdisciplinary work that involves some IT or web science component. Our intent for this  space is to foster guided research through a suite of faculty-defined projects that intersect with faculty research interests. The purpose of this workshop, which may be conducted in the form of a minor charette, will be to generate the initial set of

Every year the ITWS program takes its students to New York City to network with alumni and visit their companies. This year, we went to Capital IQ, Knewton, the 9-11 Memorial, and the trip ended with a reception at Red's (right under the RPI designed Brooklyn Bridge.)