Membership Contacts:

Hunter J Boudreaux – East Area Chair

Maciej J Zawodniok– North Area Chair

Christopher B Sanderson– South Area Chair

Faye Kann– West Area Chair

R5 EXCOM Roster can be viewed here: https://rosters.ieee.org/home.html

R5 EXCOM Meetings

2023 Audit Committee

Congratulations, the N&A Committee has approved the following slate to serve as the Region 5 Auditors during 2023. You will be contacted by 2023 Audit Chair, Bill Wylie, later in the year as he prepares you for 2023.

1. Treasurer: Paul Cassingham.
2. Audit Committee Chair, 4th Year: William Wylie (North) Billwylie@ieee.org
3. Audit Committee, 3rd Year: Silke Spiesshoefer (East) Silke_Spiesshoefer@ieee.org
4. Audit Committee, 2nd Year: Ernest X Njouondo (South) njouondo@ieee.org
5. Audit Committee, 1st Year: Patterson, Tristan Hunter (West) tristanpatterson10@hotmail.com

POC: Director Bob Becnel bob.becnel@ieee.org

 

Membership Development

As an IEEE member, or simply as an Engineer, we get the opportunity to make a difference in the lives of future engineers AND have some fun at the same time!

Science Fair Judge – Yes it is science fair season again! There are a number of science and engineering focused schools in the Region 5 area that host science fairs each year. Most will be hosting fairs over several days this year. Typically, they start in December with a local fair, move to a regional based fair in the Feb/March time, and then onto a state level competition. Those winners then go to Regeneron International Science and Engineering Fair – Society for Science, the Regeneron International Science and Engineer Fair. This is the world’s fair of science fairs. In 2023 ISEF will be held in Dallas May 13-19. If you look, there will probably be many local Science Fairs in your area. Many schools are still working out how to continue to support their students with virtual/in person science fairs. Pick a school, find out if they have a science fair, reach out to them, and go have some fun supporting the next generation of engineers!

Alisha Humphries is a member of the IEEE Region 5 Denver Section. As an IEEE volunteer, Alisha has assisted with
different meetings and conferences that the Denver Section has been involved with as a sponsor or providing volunteers.
Some of the conferences include the 2022 Conference on Electromagnetic Field Computation, the 2023 Green Technologies 
Conference, and the 2023 Annual Meeting with student competitions being held in Denver on April 19-23 
( https://ieeegreentech.org, https://r5conferences.org/student-activities/ )

Picture Above: Alisha Humphries

Alisha has been volunteering as the Treasurer of three different conferences for the Denver Section since 2018. She has a
background in Physics, graduating from the University of Denver in 2018 with a specialty in spintronics. After graduating,
Alisha began gravitating towards the world of finance and grew interested in supporting engineering initiatives through the
business lens. Her volunteer work as treasurer enabled her to re-launch her career in 2022 as Conference Business Manager at
the University of Colorado Boulder, where she has the opportunity to manage the finances for academic and educational conferences.
Alisha has thoroughly enjoyed learning more about IEEE conferences, conference financial operations, and networking with 
IEEE members throughout Region 5 and the world.

R5 Conferences, Webinars and Professional Activities

R5 Conferences and Webinars

• North Texas Future City Competition on January 28, 2023

       

        Future City is a project-based educational program for sixth, seventh- and eighth-grade students. The project provide
        school students an opportunity to explore engineering. It engages and challenges students to build their STEM skills, 
        tackle real-world problems and to develop their vision of a livable city of the future.
        Details at https://www.dfwfuturecity.org/index.html

       Judges and Mentors Needed!
       For More information, please contact:  Diane Bowen Collier d.b.collier@ieee.org

•  Denver Section supports Robotics Team

The Dakota Ridge High School’s Wired-Up Robotics Team #1799 is partially supported by the IEEE Denver Section. 

Team coach Christopher Gray teaches engineering and robotics at Dakota Ridge. Students on the team developed the 
organizational functions: budget, fundraising, build, programming, testing and strategy of the robot for the high
school FIRST robotics competition. Team member Tori Field was awarded Dean’s List Finalist in the Denver Regional
FRC and advanced to the World Championship held in April 2022 in Houston, TX.  Visibility of the IEEE logo is on 
the back of the student’s tee shirts and on both sides of the robot itself.

       
       The students from left to right are: Tori Field, Nick Weichert, Kesler Ratke, and Joe Lemier.

• El Paso Section assists with hackathonEl

  Paso Community College (EPCC) is strengthening computer systems in the El Paso/Cd. Juarez region to defend against cybercriminals hosted a three-day Hackathon, November 17-19, 2022, in the Arts Science and Technology (AST) building at EPCC’s Valle Verde Campus.
  The event is in partnership with the Universidad Autonoma de Ciudad Juarez (UACJ) and the Artificial Intelligence Center in Cd. Juarez, with the support of the Microsoft Corporation. This collaboration brings together students, educators, industry and leaders from both countries and will produce creative solutions to cybersecurity problems.
  Dr. Christian Servin is Chair of the El Paso Section and IEEE was also a sponsor. EPCC Computer Science Professor and event sponsor Dr. Servin explains, “Our commitment as a community is to identify solutions to everyday challenges that impact our society, our population, and the future generation of ethical hackers in our society. We accomplish this through experiential learning competitions, such as the Hackathon. We hope this event serves as a pillar for similar events that engage both sides of the border in developing the border’s good.”
  Hackathon participants will be from both countries. They will be collaborating together on their computers to develop solutions to computer security and safety challenges. On Thursday, participants will visit booths and view student poster presentations. They will also hear remarks from Microsoft Corporation representative J.J. Childress and get an introduction to cybersecurity concepts. Friday’s schedule features more speakers who will address hacking on the border and cybersecurity problems in our region, including, Mark Castillo, the Executive Director of Information Security at the college. Friday afternoon is the start of the Hackathon competition, with submissions due Saturday morning. The final day of the event will be the team’s presentations to the judges, with awards given to top-performers, including an outstanding Career and Technical Education (CTE) Award. 
  EPCC Computer Science Professor Nadia Karichev, who is co-organizing the event, has these words of encouragement. “Students should always look to participate in hackathons and similar collaborative and competitive environments since it brings out the best in a student. The hackathon is not always about winning but the answer to the questions – Were you able to make something you can be proud of, or what have you learned?”

  The Hackathon is the culmination of an eight-workshop series held throughout the fall semester. These workshops covered topics from introductory concepts to more advanced ideas such as DevSecOps, where “Dev” refers to the software developers and “Ops” to the computer operations at an organization. Workshop speakers included members of the U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command Analysis Center (DEVCOM) group from White Sands Missile Range (WSMR), who provided a hands-on workshop on Cloud Vulnerabilities.

  Both the workshops and hackathon provide professional development and experiential learning in cybersecurity-related topics for people with non-technical backgrounds. They also increase their cyber awareness. The goal is to address real-world security challenges in the border region.

  

  The above pictures show the students who won the first place in the first binational hackathon between El Paso Texas US and Cd. Juarez Mexico. The second picture shows the judges. IEEE was one of the sponsors along with Microsoft.

  

  Dr. Servin is on the left side of the picture along with the student team

• Robotics Team Wins 1st Place at 2022 IEEE student competition

  Members of the University of Texas at El Paso College of Engineering IEEE Robotics and Automation Society (IEEE-RAS), took first place in the IEEE Region 5 Student Robotics Competition this past weekend. The competition took place in Houston, TX in conjunction with the 2022 IEEE Green Technologies Conference, a forum created for engineers, researchers and specialists from academia, research centers, and industry to discuss the latest developments in applications related to protect the environment. The University of Texas at El Paso is in IEEE Region 5, which includes all major universities in the region encompassing 12 states.

  The competition challenged undergraduate students David Guereca (ME), Eunize Tobias (EE), Brayan Garcia Pong (EE), Sebastian Oropeza (ME), Alan Melendez (EE), Marco Colmenero (EE), Enrique Ceballos (EE), Adrian Duran (ME), and Jessica Medina (EE) to design, develop, program and operate a robotic vehicle to complete various task underwater. “We were able to create a multi-disciplinary team that was able to surpass all challenges and rise to the top, 1st place. These challenges included designing a robotic ROV that is able to move under water with agility and precision, waterproofing all electronics to survive a harsh environment and designing an electronic system that was able to fit in a small, enclosed area while maintaining all control, voltage and current requirements. Countless iterations and testing were completed to make sure all systems performed as expected and were repeatable throughout the competition.” Added Eunize Tobias.

  “The competition challenged the team to apply not only what they have learned in the classroom, but also learn problem-solving strategies.” Said Robert C. Roberts, Ph.D., assistant professor and IEEE-RAS team mentor. “Special thanks to Dr. Miguel Velez-Reyes, Electrical and Computer Engineering chair and College of Engineering Interim Dean Dr. Patricia Nava for enabling their extended building access so students could dedicate themselves to this project over holidays and weekends. Our success would not have been possible without the support from Dr. Virgilio Gonzalez, professor of practice and Dr. Laura V. Alvarez College of Science assistant professor for sharing her aquatic robotics expertise and advice on testing robots in the UTEP pools.” 

  

  Dr. Christian Servin, Chair of the El Paso Section is on the right side of the picture by the robot and the pool where they successfully navigated the competition. Dr. Servin and Bob Becnel, Region 5 Director on the left side of the picture when the students received their award at the annual R5 banquet. 

  

  Dr. Servin and Bob Becnel, Region 5 Director on the left side of the picture when the students received their award at the annual R5 banquet.

2023 Region 5 Annual Meeting and Student Competitions The 2023 IEEE Region 5 Annual Business Meeting will be held at the Hyatt Regency Aurora-Denver Conference Center, 13200 E. 14th Place, Aurora, CO 80011. On Friday April 21, 2023, a reception starts at 6 PM. The website is https://r5conferences.org/

R5 Business Meeting: The R5 Annual Business Meeting will start on Saturday, April 22, 2023, at 8 AM [when a quorum is needed] and will continue Sunday April 23, 2023. IEEE Region 5 holds an annual meeting to approve its Executive Committee members, set goals, and determine an annual budget for programs and services. Each of the 27 Sections are expected to send a minimum of one voting representative to participate [Primary Section Delegate PSD].

Student Competitions: For more information about the competitions, visit the Student Activities webpage https://r5conferences.org/student-activities/ Student Teams interested in competing will also need to complete the Intent to Compete forms from the competition of their choice. Forms should be submitted as soon as possible to properly accommodate everyone. We are looking forward to a great conference in 2023, and we hope to see you all there. Note that the Region 5 annual business meeting is held adjacent to the IEEE 2023 GreenTech conference; for information on attending this technical conference, please visit the GreenTech webpage at https://ieeegreentech.org.

R5 Conference Organizing Committee: Abd Arkadan, General Chair Ian MacMillan, Operations Chair Jim Sipes, Student Competitions Chair

• The 2023 IEEE Region 5 Annual Student Competitions will be held at the Hyatt Regency Aurora-Denver Conference Center in Aurora, Colorado on April 22, 2023. These competitions are open to all undergraduate IEEE student members who are attending a school in Region 5. Space is limited for some competitions and is given on a first come first serve basis. Interested teams should submit their ‘Intent to Submit’ forms as soon as possible. Student Competition Discord server: https://discord.gg/meG8Qku6RD For more information, please visit: https://r5conferences.org/student-activitiesPlease direct any questions you may have to the region 5 student representative, jaiden or the student activities chair, Amardeep. Jaiden Strong rsr@ieeer5.org, Amardeep Kaur student_activities@ieeer5.org

• For Listing of Region 5 Conferences, please visit: https://conferences.ieee.org/conferences_events/conferences/search?q=*&subsequent_q=&date=all&from=&to=&region=Region05-Southwestern%20USA&country=all&pos=0&sortorder=desc&sponsor=&sponsor_type=all&state=all&field_of_interest=all&sortfield=relevance&searchmode=basic&virtualflag=Y&virtualConfReadOnly=N&eventformat=

R5 Sections and Formation Date

 

	Section	Date
1	Arkansas River Valley	June 20, 1994
2	Arkansas	April 23, 1947
3	Baton Rouge	February 5, 1955
4	Beaumont	June 27, 1945
5	Central Texas	May 23, 1930
6	Corpus Christi	October 25, 1951
7	Dallas	March 18, 1928
8	Denver	May 18, 1915
9	El Paso	March 7, 1940
10	Fort Worth	January 5, 1956
11	Galveston Bay	January 1, 1980
12	High Plains	February 13, 2010
13	Houston	August 7, 1928
14	Kansas City	April 4, 1916
15	Lafayette	November 11, 1970
16	Lone Star	November 23, 2019
17	New Orleans	December 8, 1933
18	Oklahoma City	February 16, 1922
19	Ozark	April 20, 1966
20	Panhandle	June 12, 1947
21	Pikes Peak	May 22, 1978
22	Saint Louis	January 14, 1903
23	Shreveport	January 14, 1903
24	South Plains	May 4, 1955
25	Southwest Missouri	February 14, 2009
26	Tulsa	October 1, 1937
27	Wichita	September 16, 1937

 

IEEE USA News

IEEE-USA MOVE Vehicle

Region 5 may be in a position to receive an IEEE-USA MOVE Vehicle that would be located in the Region to help with disasters, STEM events and training for the central part of the USA. To help launch this exciting opportunity, we need a volunteer coordinatorto act as a project manager on behalf of the Executive Committee through 2023 to start. If you have time on your hands, are passionate about the mission of MOVE and would like to be involved with the Region for the first time, please drop an email to bob.becnel@ieee.org. It is important this slot gets filled this month.

You will not be required to service, drive, or be called out for a disaster in this role. It will be decided later where the vehicle will be maintained but you will be part of that decision making. More information on MOVE is here: https://move.ieeeusa.org/. This is a perfect opportunity for a Life Member.

 

IEEE MGA News

MGA Scoop

https://mga.ieee.org/news/32-ieee-news/476-mga-scoop-december-2022-issue?mkt_tok=NzU2LUdQSC04OTkAAAGIgm2E3Pw9vccIGRMODFno50CI8gmz227f1jiMT3-ysxLF9P-FOp796IgApBiZPulu41Yod3iGNY-_v-_makx-5o0ldaH_lOVV40teM79ezSU#nss-featured

2022 Financial Reporting
The deadlines for your Geo Unit to submit the financials for the fiscal year of 2022 are:
   •  Third Friday of February (17 February 2023) – To qualify for the additional 10% rebate bonus
   •  Last Day of February (28 February 2023) – To qualify for a rebate
Starting on January 3, 2023, those Geo Units with Local Bank Accounts will receive the Bank Upload Templates along with
instructions on how to complete them.
For those Geo Units with CB Accounts, we will start sending the CB Bank Upload templates as soon as the statements for the
month of December 2022 have been released by our Treasury Department, around mid-January 2023.

If your Geo Unit has already submitted the transaction templates for the period of January 1 to June 30 2022, we will send you
the templates for the remainder of the fiscal year (July 1 to December 31 2022).
 
If your Geo Unit did not submit the transaction templates for the period of January 1 to June 30 2022, you will receive a template
 for the entire fiscal year (January 1 to December 31 2022). Please use these new templates instead of the old templates we sent to
 you back in August/September.

2022 Tax Reporting
Please disregard this section if you have already submitted the Tax Reporting via NextGen or did not make any payments that can be 
classified as income.
 
Payments issued during the calendar year of 2022 such as awards, grants, honorariums, prizes, commission payments, hourly compensation
payments need to be reported via NextGen. Please note that Expense reimbursements should not be included.
 
    –  For Geo Units within Regions 1 through 6, please complete the 1099 Reporting form only 
    –  For Geo Units within Regions 7 through 10, please complete the Grants and Awards Reporting form only.
 
These forms can be submitted through the IEEE NextGen Volunteer Dashboard ieee.org/nextgen by logging into the system with your IEEE User ID and Password. For instructions on how to submit these forms please refer to the attached user guides.  
 
“The due date for the Geo Units to submit the 1099 and Grants & Awards Reporting forms to IEEE is January 10, 2023.

We thank you in advance for working with us as we continue to improve upon the financial reporting process for all Geo Units.
If you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to contact us at finance-solutions@ieee.org.

Acceptable and unacceptable gifts and recognition for IEEE staff and volunteers.

IEEE’s policy regarding gifts will be modified effective 1 January 2023

Understanding what is an acceptable and unacceptable gift is a critical component to the IEEE’s commitment to ethical
business practices. To improve the clarification on what gifts may be accepted and distributed, on 20 November 2022 
the IEEE Board of Directors approved revisions to the IEEE Policies on gifts.

The following changes have been made:

   – Language has been revised from “Business Gifts” to “Gifts”
   – Gifts are subject to a $100 threshold instead of a “nominal value”
   – Recognition gifts to volunteers are now integrated with a value of $100 per gift not to exceed a total of $500 per year
   – The annual cap above does not apply to IEEE-branded items
   – Incorporates contact information for questions

For any questions, please contact the Legal and Compliance team at compliance@ieee.org. 

EFFECTIVE DATE: 01 January 2023 
IEEE Policy, Section 9.9.F

“Gifts. Employees and volunteers of IEEE are not permitted to receive gifts, favors, services, payments, privileges or special
treatment of any kind or nature whatsoever from any individual, enterprise or organization that conducts or seeks to conduct 
business with the IEEE unless:

   · They are consistent with good business practices; and
   · They are of a nature that could not be construed as a business inducement; and
   · The retail value of the gift does not exceed USD 100.

There may be occasions when it is appropriate for IEEE to provide an IEEE volunteer with a gift to recognize their contribution
to an IEEE event or activity. Such gifts from IEEE should not exceed USD 100 (or the local equivalent) and the total value of all
gifts to an IEEE volunteer in any calendar year should not exceed USD 500 (or the local equivalent).

IEEE branded items (e.g., certificates of appreciation, keepsakes items, plaques) under USD 100 shall not be considered gifts for
purposes of this policy.

For further guidance on the IEEE Gift Policy, contact compliance@ieee.org

Open Lockheed Martin Engineering Positions
Lockheed Martin is seeking over a thousand engineers to fill open roles. Below are some of the roles that we are hiring for. 
 
Applications Engineer
Aeronautical Engineer
Crew Station Design Engineer
Composite Material and Process Engineer
Electrical Power Engineer
Full Stack Engineer
Hydraulic Systems Engineer
Industrial Engineer
Manufacturing Engineer
Mechanical Engineer
Project Engineer
Propulsion Performance Engineer
Software Engineer
Software Quality Engineer
Subsystem Design Engineer
Systems Engineer
System Integration Lab Engineer
System Integration and Test Engineer

Please contact: Leah Collins for additional details. 
Candidates should send their resumes to leah.m.collins@lmco.com

Frequent Links

The Full ExCom Roster can be viewed here: https://rosters.ieee.org/home.html

MGA https://www.ieee.org/communities/geographic-activities.htm

IEEE USA https://ieeeusa.org/

IEEE Region 5 https://r5.ieee.org/

IEEE OU Analytics https://mga.ieee.org/resources-operations/volunteer-tools/samieee

vTools: https://events.vtools.ieee.org/

 

The Newsletter is sent to all current members in Region 5

Newsletter Editor: Ademola Peter Adejokun

newsletter@ieeer5.org