A Faculty Member’s
Perspective
School of Natural Sciences & Mathematics
School of Natural Sciences & Mathematics
The UAB CIS Undergraduate Experience
1. Preparing Students for Technology Leadership
School of Natural Sciences & Mathematics
Software is Everywhere
• Think of some of the things that entertain
and enrich your daily life
• All of the above are driven by software
• Software developers equipped with a
computer science degree have opportunities
to work on exciting and cutting-edge projects
Software is Everywhere
• 98% of all microprocessors control devices other
than desktop computers
– Automobiles, airplanes, televisions, copiers, razors…
> 1M
SLOC
15-20Kb
1-1.5Mb
>10Mb embedded software
• These devices also need software and often
require strong technical skills to develop
Intellectual Opportunities
“… the software industry is going to make
more breakthroughs in these next 10 years
than it's made in the last 30 … software is
really going to transform not just what we
think about as the computer industry, but
the way that everything is done …”
Re-architecting
the Internet
Harnessing
parallelism
Wreckless
driving
Quantum computing
Prosthetics /
augmentation /
access
Transforming all fields
of science and engineering
Transforming the
nation’s defense
The Demand for Computer Scientists
Computer Science
occupations
are
projected to grow
twice as fast as the
average for all
occupations.
Between 2006-2016 a projected 822,000 new jobs will be
available in Computer Science occupation areas in the
United States alone.
Source: http://www.bls.gov/opub/ooq/2007/fall/art02.pdf
The UAB CIS Undergraduate Experience
1. Preparing Students for Technology Leadership
Companies hiring recent UAB CIS Grads
School of Natural Sciences & Mathematics
The UAB CIS Undergraduate Experience
2. Mentoring in Research and Scholarly Activities
Mentored Preparation for Real-World Challenges
School of Natural Sciences & Mathematics
Reasons to Consider UAB CIS
• Undergraduate Research Opportunities
– CIS undergraduates are awarded summer internships to
participate in special research programs sponsored by the
National Science Foundation. The students participating in
these opportunities continue their research throughout the
academic year and prepare research talks and papers that
are published at regional conferences. Over the past two
years, CIS students placed in the top 3 at the ACM Midsoutheast conference in Gatlinburg, Tennessee.
Three First-Place Winners: UAB CIS
students have received first place in all
categories (Undergrad, Masters, PhD)
amid students from 7 states.
Freshman Research
Undergraduate Amos Smith presented his
research as a true Freshman (first in
conference’s 30 year history), and was
awarded first place as a Sophomore.
Reasons to Consider UAB CIS
• Programming Contest Team
– Each year, the CIS department sends our top 9 students to compete
in the annual ACM programming contest (held the last few years in
Melbourne, Florida). To prepare students for this competition, a new
course has been introduced in the curriculum that teaches students
problem solving techniques not typically covered in core courses.
The 2008 UAB CIS Competitive Programming teams placed 1st and 2nd at their
contest site for the ACM International Computer Programming Competition, beating
all other schools in Alabama and Mississippi and producing UAB's best-ever finish in
the Southeast region overall (5th and 13th place overall in Southeast).
Microsoft Imagine Cup Finalist
• May 2009, Cambridge, MA
• One of 15 teams, out of 200, invited to the
Microsoft Imagine Cup Finals
• Winner of the “People’s Choice” Award
UAB Computer Forensics
• break new ground in the research areas
of Spam, Phishing, and Malware
• provide the most qualified graduates to fill
a large pool of available cybercrime
analysis positions
• reduce the victim pool by explaining
cybercrime to the public
One Day of Phishing
The Law Enforcement Spam Problem
UAB is working to turn
raw spam data into
actionable intelligence.
Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining
• The KDDM lab supports education and
research of new algorithms, systems, and
applications for large-scale data mining and
visualization.
Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining
Geometric Modeling and
Medical Imaging
• Scientific
Research
• Real-world
Applications
The UAB CIS Undergraduate Experience
3. Social and Professional Networking Opportunities

Student Chapter of
Association for Computing Machinery
– Ice Cream Socials; Volleyball Picnics
– Educational and Career Seminars
– Community Volunteerism
School of Natural Sciences & Mathematics
The UAB CIS Undergraduate Experience
1. Preparing Students for Technology Leadership
2. Mentoring in Research and Scholarly Activities
3. Social and Professional Networking Opportunities
School of Natural Sciences & Mathematics
High School Outreach at UAB CIS
Mentoring for Science Fair Competitions
• Weekly mentoring at UAB throughout
academic year; students treated like a
PhD student with office space
www.cis.uab.edu/gray/Pubs/jerrod-sutton.pdf
Programming Contest and Alice Festival
• May 2010
• Over 150 students
and
parents
from
across Alabama
• Prizes: Laptop, Xbox,
software, books, gift
certificates
• Alice Film Festival!
www.cis.uab.edu/progams/hspc
www.cis.uab.edu/progams/alice-festival
Summer Camps
• 6 weeks High School;
1 weeks Middle School
• Tuition Scholarships Available
• Taught by UAB Faculty
• Topics include Java, robotics, graphics,
game programming, scientific computing
• In 2009, over 65 students attended
www.cis.uab.edu/progams/camps
www.cis.uab.edu/heritage