Tuesday, June 21, 2011

Faculty from regional universities at IIUG 2011 conference.

I know this is quite a late post! But hey, it is "better late than never", right?

The wonderful organizers of IIUG 2011 conference allowed IBM to invite and host faculty members from the regional universities on May 16th, the first day of the conference. We had a good response from the major universities in this area. Six faculty members from five university campuses were at the conference: University of Missouri-Kansas City, University of Kansas (Lawrence campus), University of Kansas (Edwards campus), Kansas State University, and Northwest Missouri State University. The faculty members were given a one day pass to the conference which included an invitation to Monday's keynote, conference sessions, demos, a round table discussion with the IBM Informix team, lunch, and dinner. They also had an opportunity to meet with the keynote speaker Dr. David Ferrucci and discuss topics related to education and research in academia.

Dr. Ferrucci (second from left) with some of the faculty members
Following lunch, the faculty members participated in a round table discussion with the IBM Informix team. They were presented with an overview of Informix architecture, Informix usage in the database market, and its role in the IBM Smarter Planet initiative. They also learnt about what IBM has to offer to the academic community and how they can partner with IBM in producing a skilled workforce.

Prof. Praveen Rao from University of Missouri-Kansas City also presented a conference session in which he shared his experience collaborating with the IBM Informix team and the usage of Informix in his classes. He has been offering courses for the past two semesters that use Informix in the IBM Development and Test cloud as well as the Informix Virtual Appliance.

IIUG 2011 conference turned out to be an great event for the Informix on Campus initiative. All the faculty members that attended found it very valuable and are looking forward to collaborating with IBM this Fall. A big thanks to everyone at IBM and IIUG who made this event a great success!!

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