Category: Education

Another fine showing at Digi-Key

DKC3 2005 logo
Each year Digi-Key (a major catalogue/on-line vendor of electronic components several hours north of here) hosts a very nice programming and problem solving competition for several regional schools. They obviously see it as a valuable computing and PR exercise as they really lay out the red carpet for us each year, including paying for the hotel stay, tons of food, and nifty prizes. A week ago Friday (21 Oct 2005) was our fourth time to participate, and the for the third year running we had a team place in the top three (out of 17 teams). In fact, of the six teams that have competed in the last three years, no team has done worse than fifth and four of the six have place second or third. (The first year we competed was odd because the students had to use a language and programming environment they were completely unfamiliar with.) The action shot below shows the team that placed third: Declarative Non-statement, featuring (l to r) Matt, Scott, Tyler and Jake.

Declarative Non-statement: DKC3 05 3rd place
This year the winning team (from U of M Duluth) blew everyone away with 367 points. The range from second to fourth, though, was only 27.5 points (279.5, 264.5, and 252), and then another big drop to fifth with 195 points. Only 12.5 points separated our two teams, so it was definitely a tight finish.

From a teaching standpoint it’s a nice contest because they mix a lot of different skills and activities (short and long programming problems, word/math problems, engineering puzzles, etc.) so it’s clearly about problem solving instead of “just hacking”. And from a departmental standpoint it’s a cool event because we get money if the teams do well. Every member of the third place team, for example, gets a $100 gift certificate at Best Buy, and the discipline gets a check for $600 – w00t! Last year, when our teams placed 2nd and 3rd, we received $2400 on the backs of our students’ success :-).

Congratulations to both our teams on another fine year! Now we’re in the chaos of prepping for the ACM regional competition. No money in this one, but much tougher competition so more prestige. The top team or two in the region (probably out of over 150 teams) will get to go to the International Finals (in San Antonio this year) in the Spring, which is a pretty sweet deal. UMM had a team make the finals in 1998, and have had numerous teams in the top 20 over the years, so on any given day…

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Why UMM students need to vote on the levy

Abandoned classroom, based on Old School 30 by Lainmoon on Flickr
Below is a letter to the editor for the University Register, UMM’s student newspaper…

Tuesday, the 8th of November, the residents of the Morris Area School District will turn out to vote on a proposed school levy. While most UMM students realize that they can vote in this election, I realize that many are unsure as to whether they should vote in this election. My purpose in this letter is to try to convince you, the UMM student, that as members of this community you absolutely should vote in this election, and that its outcome will have a direct and powerful impact on your experience as UMM students, and the experience of students to come.

Of the many reasons why students should care deeply about the outcome of this election, I think the starkest is also one of the simplest: the quality of the Morris Area schools has a profound and direct effect on the quality of UMM’s faculty and staff. As Peter Wyckoff said in his recent piece for The Counterweight

Let’s say you are not moved by the plight of my kids and their peers. You, fiscally conservative UMM student, still should vote for the levy. Why? Because the fates of UMM and the Morris Area Schools are intimately entwined. If local school quality erodes, UMM faculty and staff will leave. I, for one, love UMM. The one thing, however, most likely to cause me to abandon ship is if the local schools become inadequate for my children. Talented UMM professors feel this way too.

Peter’s comment focus on the concerns of faculty and staff currently at UMM, but they apply just as strongly to our ability to recruit and retain top quality staff and faculty in the future. Last year I was on three search committees: the Computing Services Director, the Digital Services Librarian, and a tenure track faculty position in Computer Science. In each of these cases, one of the first questions almost every candidate asked was about the quality of the local schools. This was by no means atypical of my past experiences on other searches, and is, I suspect, representative of the attitudes and concerns of candidates in the vast majority of UMM searches.

To date I’ve been able to respond by honestly and openly discussing our family’s positive experiences at Morris Area Elementary. If this levy fails to pass, leading to the deep cuts that are inevitable given the current financial situation, it’s going to become much harder to answer those questions, and consequently harder to recruit quality people. So the risk of Peter and others like him leaving is a double hazard: Not only do we lose great people, but we run the risk of being unable to replace them with equally great people.

Communities are complex creatures, with subtle and deep connections. As UMM students you are, obviously, important and powerful members of the UMM community. What is not always as obvious, however, is that you are also important and powerful members of the Morris community. Your choices affect the larger community, and the choices of the community affect you.

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