• Student and Alumni Success
• Staff and Faculty Success
• Department Events
• Faculty Scholarship
• Grant Awards and Submissions
• Business Developments
• OSHA Education Center

CMS student Becky Cania ('10) was recognized as an Outstanding Adult Student by RIT for the 2008-2009 academic year.

CMS alum Rachelle Danno (‘09) was honored as a nominee for the Salute to Excellence Award held in Chicago at the National Restaurant Association Trade Show. Danno was also the executive chef for the 24th annual Puttin’ On The RITz dinner held at Oak Hill Country Club on March 28th, 2009.

Nathan Fisk (’08) has had his first book, Understanding Online Piracy: The Truth about Illegal File Sharing, published by Praeger Publishing.

Sean Forbes (’08) returned to RIT on September 17 for a presentation sponsored by the NTID Student Congress and the Barnes & Noble @ RIT Bookstore. Sean is the co-founder of Deaf Performing Artists’ Network (D-PAN) as well as its first performing artist.

American University in Kosovo Student Diellza Gashi was chosen as the 2008-2009 Outstanding Female Senior at RIT. She came to the US to attend graduation ceremonies at RIT, then returned for ceremonies in Kosovo. She is currently studying on campus at RIT in the MBA program as one of 4 students who have transferred to RIT from AUK.

Michael Johnson (’09) was featured in an article by RIT about the first cohort of students graduating from CMS’ degree program with Xerox. Michael traveled from Phoenix to attend graduation ceremonies: http://www.rit.edu/news/?v=46889

Fiona Kelmendi was chosen as the delegate from AUK to attend graduation ceremonies at RIT for the 2008-2009 academic year.

John Kuhnle, a bachelors student, was awarded the 2009 Exemplary Online Learning Student Award.

Alex Moser (’09) was the winner of the 2008 Imagine RIT poster contest. His design was used in marketing the event, held in May, which drew over 13,000 attendees to the RIT Campus.

Yuko Ota (‘08) has launched her own website and comic strip. She can be found online at: http://johnnywander.com/

New Leaf Spa has opened its doors at 36 N. Main Street in Pittsford. The spa is owned and operated by Nadia Pratt (’03).

Photos from the graduation ceremonies from Rochester Institute of Technology and the American University in Kosovo can be found online: http://picasaweb.google.com/cmsatrit

The first cohort of Xerox students presented their capstone projects in June of 2009. Xerox estimates that from these projects, they will save $8 million.

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Michelle Firnstein was nominated for Online Learning’s Exemplary Online Learning Faculty Award.

Michelle Firnstein and Jan Nystrom were awarded the S.T.A.R. of the quarter for Summer 2009. This award is bestowed upon the employee(s) who best exemplify Service, Teamwork, Action, and Results.

Dewey Lawrence and the RIT CARES team were nominated for a 2009 Staff Recognition Award.

Rachel McGinnis completed the Institute Advising Professional Certificate at RIT.

Samuel McQuade III was quoted in an article about online child safety. The article can be found online: http://www.reason.com/news/show/133863.html

Tom Moran was nominated for the Outstanding Distance Faculty Award at RIT.

Carol Romanowski was awarded the Provost’s Learning and Innovations Grant Program (PLIG) for 2009-2010. She was awarded for her work with Betsy Dell, Robery Garrick and Michael Slifka for Mind Mapping Techniques and Its Influence on Student Learning and Faculty Course Delivery.

Lea Stavoli was hired as a Program Specialist for Outreach Education and Training.

Lea Stavoli participated in the RIT Sponsored Programs Accounting training workshops and successfully completed the competency assessment. Her commitment to developing and enhancing her grant and contract administration skills were formally recognized at the Sponsored Program Accounting and Regulatory Certification (SPARC) Celebration on September 17th.

Kitren VanStrander passed the Certified Professional in Learning and Performance (CPLP) exam. The CPLP is a credential of the American Society for Training and Development (ASTD).

Donna Winter and Lyndsey McGrath were awarded the S.T.A.R. of the quarter for Spring 2009. This award is bestowed upon the employee(s) who best exemplify Service, Teamwork, Action, and Results.

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An article titled “Product Representation and Expression Using Constrained XML” was submitted to ASME Transactions, Journal of Computing and Information Science in Engineering by Carol Romanowski. The article was submitted with Jayaraman and Nagi in August 2009.

Brian Tomaszewski’s “Situation Awareness and Virtual Globes: Application for Disaster Management” has been accepted for publication in Computers and Geosciences.

“Geocollaboration,” by Brian Tomaszewski, has been accepted for publication in The Encyclopedia of Geography from Sage Publishers.

Brian Tomaszewski was a co-author on “Conceptualizing a User-support Task Structure for Geocollaborative Disaster Management Environments” in Advances in Management Information Systems Monograph Series, Volume on Information Systems for Emergency Management. It was co-authored with Koua, E.L., A. MacEachren, I. Turton, S. Pezanowski, and T. Frazier.

Brian Tomaszewski was the author of “Managing Multiple Point-based Data Instances on a Single Coordinate in Mapping Mashups” published in Proceedings of the 24th International Cartography Conference (ICC), Santiago, Chile.

“Time of the Duck,” a short story by Tom Moran, was included in the 2009 edition of Penumbra, the literary journal of California State University, Stanislaus. Guy Johnson attended the 2009 NYS GeoSpatial Summit on May 20, 2009 in Schenectady, NY. The event was co-sponsored by the NYS GIS Association and the NYS Office of Cyber Security & Critical Infrastructure Coordination and was targeted to discuss forces that are shaping the present and future of Geospatial Technology in New York and beyond.

Carol Romanowski and Mary Boyd presented “Data mining for project management success” at the Industrial Engineering Research Conference (IERC) in Miami, FL. The conference was held in May 2009.

Carol Romanowski presented “Data Mining in Design of Experiments” at the Industrial Engineering Research Conference (IERD) in Miami, FL during May 2009.

Brian Tomaszewski presented Supporting disaster cycle decision making and situation awareness with GIS – two case studies at the NYS APA Conference in Albany, NY.

A joint presentation was given by Brian Tomaszewski and Dr. Algis Kucinskas (from Ecole Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture de Paris La Villette) titled Towards an Interactive Educational Environment for Disaster Management Support. The presentation was for the United Nations Platform for Space-based Information for Disaster Management and Emergency Response (UN-SPIDER) Workshop on “Disaster Management and Space Technology-From Concepts to Application” in Bonn, Germany.

Brian Tomaszewski gave a presentation titled “Vexillology – the Study of Flags, or Flags Are Cool!” The presentation was for Cub Scout Pack 105 at their annual Blue and Gold Banquet in Mendon, NY.

“The Work of Writing: Lessons from Literary Engineers” was presented by Tom Moran at the 2009 International Professional Communication Conference, sponsored by the IEEE Professional Communication Society and included in the conference proceedings.

Tom Moran presented “Lists-Ten Keys to Ensure They Work for Your Readers and Users” at the Spectrum 2009 conference, the 50th regional educational conference sponsored by the Society of Technical Communication, Rochester chapter, and included in the conference proceedings.

CMS and the Bachelor of Science degree being developed in the field of Geospatial Technology will be represented at a statewide GIS conference in October. Teresa Wolcott, a graduate student in CMS, will be attending the poster session, held in Lake Placid, NY.

The faculty of CMS, James Myers, Mary Boyd, Guy Johnson, Samuel McQuade III, Tom Moran, Carol Romanowski, and Brian Tomaszewski, authored a paper titled “Bridging the Institute – The Value of a Multi-disciplinary Degree Program.” The paper was presented at the Polytechnic Summit held at the University of Wisconsin-Stout in Menomonie, Wisconsin in July of 2009. Carol Romanowski, Samuel McQuade and Sr. Academic Advisor Abby Berner attended the summit.

Samuel McQuade III has been appointed to the National Online Safety and Technology Working Group. The US Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) through the “Protecting Children in the 21st Century Act” started the working group.

James Myers has been selected to serve as a member of the peer review panel for the US Agency for International Development (USAID) US-Mexico Training, Internships, Exchanges, and Scholarships (TIES) Partnership Program with Higher Education Development (HED). The review panel will be focusing on applications for higher education institutional capacity building partnerships to address development issues focusing on Biodiversity Conservation and Energy in Mexico.

Brian Tomaszewski is the co-program chair for the 7th Annual International Association for the Study of Information Systems for Crisis Response and Management (ISCRAM) International Conference, Seattle, Washington, 2010.

Brian Tomaszewski participated in the United Nations Geographic Information Working Group (UNGIWG) meeting at Google headquarters in Mountain View, CA to discuss various geographic information technology issues.

The RIT membership in the University Consortium for Geographic Information Science (UCGIS) was initiated, facilitated, and secured by Brian Tomaszewski. Brian is also serving as the RIT UCGIS delegate. The website can be found at www.rit.edu/go/ucgis

Brian Tomaszewski attended the UCGIS summer assembly meeting in Santa Fe, NM.

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Accepted Grants/Awards

NYSERDA has awarded RIT a two-year grant to RIT faculty members including Dan Johnson, Dave Krispinsky, Carl Lundgren, Larry Vallasmil, and Clark Hochgraf. The RIT lead on the grant is James Myers. The grant, named the Rochester Clean Energy Education Partnership, is a collaboration between RIT and Monroe Community College to create new college level courses, professional development initiatives and training programs in alternative energy technology and clean energy development.

Brian Tomaszewski was awarded the 2009 Young Scholar travel grant to attend the 24th annual meeting of the International Cartographic Conference (ICC) in Santiago, Chile. The United States National Committee of the ICA provides the grant.

A 2009 Faculty Evaluation and Development (FEAD) Grant and a Scholarship Incentive Grant (SIG) were awarded to Brian Tomaszewski through the College of Applied Science and Technology (CAST) at RIT.

Submitted Grants/Awards

Mary Boyd and Carol Romanowski applied for a grant titled “Investigation of Current Practices in Project Communications Management for Multinational Corporate Projects” to the Project Management Institute.

Brian Tomaszewski was the Principle Investigator and Carol Romanowski was co-Principle Investigators on a grant titled “GeoSeer: An Analytic Environment to Forage, Find, Frame, and Federate Heterogeneous, Web-based Geographic Data.” They submitted their grant to the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency University Research Initiative.

Brian Tomaszewski has a grant under review by the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERA) for Bicycle Mapping Application for Peddlers and Pedestrians (BikeMAPP). Brian is the Principle Investigator to develop context-aware consumer trip-planning software to promote bicycle use as an alternative transportation to automobiles.

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RIT and the American Society for Quality (ASQ) signed a partnership agreement that will enhance best practices in education, manufacturing, healthcare and service industries. Members from ASQ traveled to RIT in April to officially sign the agreement and tour the campus. They met with Jeremy Haefner, RIT Provost; H. Fred Walker, CAST Dean; James Miller, Senior Vice President, RIT Enrollment Management and Career Services, and James Myers, Director, Center for Multidisciplinary Studies.

USAID-Kosovo featured the MS in Professional Studies that is being delivered at the American University in Kosovo through RIT. The program currently has two cohorts working towards the advanced degree.

A new Industrial Advisory Board met in Spring Quarter to review the new Geospatial Technology curriculum. They will be meeting twice a year as the program evolves and is made up of professionals from across the GIS field in education and industry.

CMS’ degree program with Xerox welcomed its fourth cohort of students in August for a two-day orientation program on the RIT campus.

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Donna Winter and Kitren VanStrander showcased the offerings of the RIT OSHA Education Center at the DiVal Safety Summit in Buffalo, NY on June 3, 2009 to an audience of approximately 500 people.

Kitren VanStrander worked the RIT booth at the Finger Lakes Works Training Provider Showcase in Newark, NY. Approximately 200 people attended the event.

For more information about the RIT OSHA Education Center and a full list of upcoming courses, please visit www.rit.edu/OSHA

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