INDUSTRY ADVISORY BOARD MEETING

April 11, 2006

Hosted and Chaired by Dolores Ventura, Infrastructure Engineering Corporation

  1. Welcome

The April 11, 2006 MESA Alliance Industry Advisory Board Meeting was called to order at 1:10 pm by Dolores Ventura.

  1. Introductions
Members Present
NameCompanyPhoneEmail

Cairns, MarielC Valdo Corporation(858)

Chambers, PamelaNorthrop Grumman(858)

Chavez, ThelmaSDSU MSP Program(619)

Garcia, TheresaSDSU MESA Engr Program(619)

Gooden, CarolNasland Engineering(858)

Haynes, KathyKennedy/Jenks Consultants(858)

Hooker, DeeCALTRANS(619)

Marquis, MeridithKyocera America, Inc.(858)

Picha, LanceTMI(858)

Stebbins, DavidCALTRANS(619)

Troian, RosemaryNOAA Fisheries(858)

Ventura, DoloresIEC(858)

Members Excused
NameCompanyPhoneEmail

Bakhiet, RagaSouthwestern College MESA(858)

Forbes-Celise, NatashaSDSU MESA Engr Program(619)

Hice, SaraNavy HR Center(619)

Makibbin, AlisonNasland Engineering(858)

Philpott, AlanSPAWAR/PEO C4I & Space(858)

Sandoval, JesseSHPE San Diego Professionals

Ward, AdamQualcomm, Inc.(858)

Guest Present
NameCompanyPhoneEmail

Charles, MariaHamilton Sundstrand(858)

  1. Review of Minutes (February 14, 2006)

A motion to approve the minutes of the February 14, 2006 meeting was made by David Stebbins- CALTRANS and seconded by Meredith Marquis-Kyocera. The minutes were then approved.

  1. Program Updates (all information, unless otherwise noted, given by Theresa M. Garcia)
  2. SDSU MEP – The annual graduation, awards, and scholarship event is a reception not a banquet. The invitations and sponsor levels were already sent in the regular mail. So far we have received a good amount for scholarships. The scholarship winners are identified through an application process that is based on participation, GPA and need. The scholarship amounts have increased to coincide with tuition increases; we plan to award $1500 (tuition for one semester) scholarships

The MESAState wide Chief Operation Officer and Program Director visited the SDSU MEP center and shared some good news. MESA will award $16k to 10 MEP centers throughout the state. This funding comes from the California Public Utilities Diversity Council. In addition $4k will be awarded for data management. Other than the designated $4k for data, the remainder can be spent at the discretion of the director with approval by MESA. Theresa asked for spending ideas; Dolores suggested to allocate some for the mentor program and Pam suggested some be used by staff for professional development and attendance at MPACE and NACE conferences. The most recent MESA statewide newsletter was shared which highlighted the industry support of SDSU MEP in San Diego.

David Williams of CALTRANS and alumni of MEP plans to implement a seminar series for the 06-07 academic year. This series will consist of several topics directed at MEP and student organization students. Topics to date: Pursuing Internships, Building/Maintaining Credit, Ethics, Professional Exams, and PursuingGraduateSchool. Other topics and speakers are welcome. Other suggestions were resume workshops, which are usually offered by the student organizations, and Interviewing Techniques.

  1. City College MESA – Due to several changes in the MESA staff, the City College President has asked that they go on Hiatus until Fall semester.

Pam had questions regarding the April 26th event taking place at CityCollege, however it is not a MESA event.

CityCollege is currently on Spring Break.

  1. Southwestern College MESA – Science opportunity day was 3/21/06. Several tables were manned by SWC student organizations and departments as well as off-campus companies and educational institutions.

SWC had new student orientation on 3/28/06. Not sure if that was new MESA students or new SWC students in general.

The SWC MESA program was able to organize new Chem 100 and Chem 170 study sessions for students.

SWC is also on Spring Break.

Student Organizations – No student representative attended the meeting. For a report from those student organizations who submitted information, please see “Student Chapter Reports and Requests” attached.

  1. Joint MESAAlliance Events
  2. Leadership Summit, 3/3-3/5, summary; 25 students from 3 campuses attended this event. Workshops included: the Gallup Organization’s StrengthsQuest, Communication & TeamBuilding. This year our IAB Chair also provided a seminar in Ethics and Business Etiquette. The team design project was a spaghetti bridge competition in which the student were mixed from all campuses. Of course fun activities like bonfire and zipline were available.
  3. MESA Olympics and Robotics Challenge, 4/29/06; location change to SDSU campus – Volunteers are still needed to be proctors and judges. This is the event where all campuses in the Alliance compete in math, chemistry, physics and engineering topics as well as in robotics.
  4. E-Week Forum @ Elementary Institute of Science – this was a new event spearheaded by Lee Wills from QUALCOMM. The intent of this event was to bring attention to National E-Week in San Diego. A panel of deans and superintendents, along with exhibits from various engineering programs like MESA, Project Lead the Way and EIS kept the interest of invited VIP guests. QUALCOMM donated $250k to San Diego Foundation for scholarships for local high school graduates choosing to major in Computer Science, Computer Engineering and Electrical Engineering at a San DiegoUniversity. QUALCOMM’s hope with this gift is that other companies would contribute to the local talent.
  5. SDA&ERC Evening with Industry – was held on 2/22/06 at the City of San Diego Metropolitan Operations Center. About 15 – 20 students were in attendance. A panel of HR and Engineers spoke to the students providing important information. A chocolate fountain was enjoyed by all attendees.
  1. Task Teams
  2. TrainingAcademies; NAVAIR, 4/21/06 – Robert Espinoza from NAVAIR is organizing our next and final TrainingAcademy. Our goal was 2 each semester. We were able to get 3 off the ground, including the upcoming one on the 21st. Great job!
  3. MESAdvantage
  4. Graduating Senior Resumes – Were sent via email prior to this meeting. This was our first time doing this, but there was a lot of interest to do so. We had about a dozen resumes that were sent. We hope to continue doing this and hope that next time the resumes will be higher in number.
  5. Internships -We expected to launch the internships this summer, however, we’ll have to postpone until next summer.
  6. Face to Face - event will occur during the SDSU Joint Professional Development conference in October. We hope to launch the connection group over the summer.
  7. STEP: NSF proposal – is being revised for the September deadline. The National Science Foundation’s (NSF) goal is to increase underrepresented graduates in STEM fields. We will be asking for letters of support from the IAB over the summer; we will send out templates to help in this endeavor.
  1. Other Topics
  2. Distribution of Thank You Gifts – Lanyards with the MESA Alliance name imprinted were distributed as a small token of our appreciation of your support.
  3. Cub Scout tour – Contact Theresa if your company can host a tour for her sons’ cub scout pack 399.
  4. MEP Alumni Group – Interest is increasing in forming an MEP Alumni Chapter of the SDSU Alumni Association.
  5. SDSU Undergraduate Research Symposium – is looking for judges to review engineering posters and oral presentations on 4/21/06.
  1. Building agenda for next meeting
  1. Adjournment – the meeting was adjourned at 2:25 pm. Thank you Lance Picha for the delicious lunch you provided!

Visit us at:

SD MESAAlliance -

SDSU MESA Engineering Program –

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