The fifth Computer Science Advisory board meeting took place on Monday December 9, 2019, chaired by Chris Meissner, from Meissner Filtration.
Some of the companies in attendance were the following: OmniUpdate (who gave the company profile), Booze Allen Hamilton, Naval Air Warfare Center Point Mugu, Haas Automation, Semtech, Procore Technologies, Ventura County ITSD, SAGE Publishing, File Your Taxes, Saalex Solutions, as well as other friends and supporters of the department.
Professor Scott Feister, in the picture above, gave a great talk about his research in high performance computing, and he combined deep knowledge of his field, with a plan of incorporating CI students, and fitting his work into the CI context. Scott Feister, together with Bahareh Abbasi, Reza Abdolee, Eric Kaltman and Vida Vakilian, are the five new faculty hires – which we were very proud to introduce to the board.
Chris Meissner, the chair of the board, spoke about companies supporting our capstones, and creating a synergy between R&D for IT business, work experience for CI student and research engagement for faculty.
Lance Merker and Kimberley Prieto presented the profile of Omni Update, where they spoke about a recent merger with Destiny solutions in Toronto, and the fact they have hired 25 to 30 CI alumni over the last years. They also spoke about the business of higher education, digital engagement for students, and continuing education platform.
Michael Soltys mentioned the current student numbers, and the constant growth of the department – about 10% every year. There is growth even as the times of slow enrollment are upon us — as Lance from OmniUpdate said, there is an expectation of 15% decline in college student numbers nationwide over the next two decades – and an opportunity for universities to offer classes for non-traditional students, e.g., veterans, who will be coming to take continuing education classes.
Michael Soltys presented recent initiatives in Cybersecurity, such at the October 11, 2019, HAAS/CI Cybersecurity conference and Cloud Computing, as well as a collaboration with the Navy whereby we offer modules in Python and in the future AI/Machine Learning.