Go meat!

Oh yeah, so pictures from last Wednesday's Welcome/Welcome Back Cookout have been posted! >Click here to check them out<

matthany wuz here

The picnic was a huge success, if I do say so. We tried to go a little more bare-bones/organic this year, by really just hosting a good old fashioned cookout; no presentations, no formalities, no catering, just a chance to all get together and have fun. And, the weather cooperated! The entire front hallway of Carlson was set up with side dishes, cookies, snacks, and buns to precondimentize, and then outside we had drinks on ice and two grills firing up some hot dogs and hamburgers. We had the volleyball net set up, which (once people had a chance to stuff their bellies) got some heavy use. I also brought ladderball, and speakers connected to my iPod to play streaming XM radio. Throughout the evening we held raffles, giving away t-shirts, sunglasses, water bottles, and plenty other CIS goodies. Oh, and the GRAND PRIZE of two seats at the CIS Alumni Ball tables! Woo hoo! (Which, on a side note - I think this is the first time we have been so far ahead of the game for filling our tables. For some reason, it was really easy this year. SO excited.)

So it seemed the cookout went really well! There were still plenty of folks left over at the end (which made for easy clean up - thank you so so much to those of you who helped). And I haven't heard a single negative complaint. The only thing that I could think of as being a downside was that we did not have tables and chairs outside, so some people chose to stay inside to eat instead. On the other hand, not having tables and chairs made for a much more free flowing group of people, and it was easy to mingle about. So, if we do it this way again next year, I would suggest taking some of the tall tables from the lobby and putting them outside - but without the chairs. That way people would have a surface to place their drink while eating, or their plate while drinking, or whatever - but it wouldn't have the formalities of sitting together at a table. It would have more of a happy hour about it. Also if we do it this way again, we'll have to hope we have as good of weather! In Rochester, you never know...

Oh yeah, and I should point out, we ended up with two overflowing boxes of cans and non-perishable items to donate :-)

"All dentist's offices have lava lamps"

Yay! I just got a visit from two of our interns from this past summer! Sarah and Elaine were on campus to work on their research poster so they stopped by. It was so great to catch up with them and hear how their school years are going. It feels like they have been gone for so long, even though it's only been a month. Oh, and I got to show them their gifted lava lamp in action, yeah! Elaine took a picture of it to send to Halle - I love that this year's interns have continued to keep in touch with each other. And I especially love it when they keep in touch with us. (Though it's a weird realization that I'm now playing the part of the older figure happy to hear updates from the young'ns.) Have I ever mentioned how awesome my job is? I should make a new label on here called "awesomeness".

I've got my fingers crossed.

I just posted my first entry to the Staff Council blog! Check it out!

This was my idea. :-)

 Staff Recognition Awards: And the Award Goes to...

Don't miss your chance to see Bro Pow flippin burgers!

Definitely not "bored" meetings

So in another week of many meetings, I am happy to say that I haven't disliked or been bored in a single one of them!

Wednesday, Institute Council: Whoa. So this was my first IC meeting, and it was so interesting. Though, being a newbie, I sat in a place which I thought was in the back of the room. In my defense, there weren't a lot of seats left (even though I was 10 minutes early), and another newb sat next to me (undoubtedly making the same assumption). Well eventually Dr. Mary Beth Cooper came and sat 2 seats away from me... Jaw drop... And then Dr. Haefner sat on the other side of her... Jaw falls to floor... and then President Destler sat next to him... Okay, my jaw was in China at this point. (Side note: Hey China alumni! Come out and meet Dr. Pelz at an alumni reception next week!) Anyways, I apparently accidentally sat in the big-wig area. Gulp. But anyways, it was cool. I was surrounded by staff, faculty, students, and deans - and, oh yeah, upper administration - and got to hear all about campus news and issues before the rest of campus does. Seriously, how cool is all that? It was a great meeting, with great people, and very efficiently run. I am looking forward to the next monthly meeting.

Thursday, Breakfast at Liberty Hill: What an opportunity! Thanks to my leadership in RIT Young Professionals, I got put on the invite list to attend a breakfast discussion at Dr. Destler's house, led by Mayor Tom Richards. Once again: Seriously, how cool is that?! Mayor Richards spoke all about the topic “Innovative Strategies and Creative Thinking That Will Make Rochester, NY Thrive". He was fantastic to listen to, and I really appreciated a lot of what he had to say. He also had great answers to questions posed by audience members, my particular favorite addressing the jobs issue for young graduates in response to how to handle the Rochester area's brain drain. It was an interesting talk and an exciting opportunity to interact. This time, not only was I rubbing elbows with RIT people that I look up to, but with community and industry leaders as well. It was a wonderful experience that I hope to be able to partake in again soon.

Thursday, Staff Council: Not to say that I was shy or uncomfortable before, but I feel so much more at home now at RSC meetings thanks to my experiences on the executive committee, RSC outreach committee, and at Institute Council. My favorite part of this meeting was when we went around and said who we were, what our jobs are and how long we've been at RIT, and one thing that people might not know about us. It was a great way to introduce ourselves and get to know interesting things about each other, like who has twins, belly dances professionally, runs marathons, is a parent to 9 children, and more. One of the reasons I joined Staff Council in the first place was to get to meet people all across campus, so this was perfect for me. After we got down to business and carried out the rest of the meeting, Molly (the chair of RSC) and I updated the Staff Recognition Awards display along the SAU hallway between the cafe and the RITreat. But since the winners haven't actually been announced yet, in place of pictures we put blank silhouettes with question marks over the faces, tee hee. I'll be writing a Staff Council blog about our little teaser next week.

Today, COS Staff Retreat: This morning, the College of Science held their annual Staff Retreat. This is a great way for us to make our voices heard, and it is wonderful of our Dean to provide us this opportunity. We outlined all sorts of hot topics, discussed important items such as professional development, promotions, sabbaticals, awards, and networking, and established a plan to organize a COS staff advisory committee. But my favorite part of the whole experience was getting to see and interact with fellow COS staff members. Although Imaging Science is part of the COS, because we are in a different building we don't often get to be around our fellow COS'ers. I met some new faces, made some new friends, and overall enjoyed the company of my colleagues. I hope that we do make sure to do more social events together in the future, because we really have a great bunch of folks here.

Phew, what a busy two weeks this has been. I thought I really meant this when I said it last Friday, but this time around: TGIF x 1,000! Luckily, my schedule next week is actually pretty open - for now... :-)

And now, for something completely different

So starting last year, we established a new little activity to get new students (and interns) acquainted with people, places, and things around CIS and the Color Science building. Those of you who have experienced the annual Imaging Science Hunt are familiar with the concept: groups are given a bunch of things they have to find, capture visually, and assemble into a video in a sort of competition. This activity varies a little bit, in that the groups of students are given packets of pictures of the people/places/things they need to find. Each of the packets are different for the most part, with a couple items consistent for all the groups. Once found, the groups have to capture video explaining who/where/what the thing is and what it's used for. 

Anyways, I just got back from watching the freshmen videos, and all I can say is: WOW. I was blown out of the water. All of the videos showed great insight, and a few of them had incredible production value. The group that won had it all: clean, concise editing; captions; Beatles tunes; background music; random sequences just for fun; story telling; AND they got all 25 items AND they put them in order. Incredible! 

Word of warning for the upperclassmen, I would look out for these guys come spring...

Extra! Extra!

The latest issue of the CIS Imaging Connection newsletter is now (finally?) available. The CIS Imaging Connection newsletter is your source for current events from the Chester F. Carlson Center for Imaging Science at RIT. While the main audience for this newsletter is Imaging/Color/Photo Science alumni, most topics are of general public interest. Check it out!

Highlights include:

• CIS Summer Intern Program
• Dr. Stefi Baum on Sabbatical
• CIS Student Stories
• CIS Alumnus Creates Unique Website
• New Outreach Resources 
• Upcoming Receptions & Events

School's a brick and I'm drowning slowly

Okay, that title is too dramatic, but WOW what a crazy week this has been. For being a short week (thanks to Labor Day), it sure has felt looooong. I feel like I am barely treading water to keep myself afloat! The start of the school year means a number of things:

• *POOF!* Welcome back, thousands of students! The campus goes from a ghost town to a bustling metropolis in a single day. Orientation does little to prepare for this, especially because freshmen can't park anywhere near where I do, and have all their own activities to participate in that don't involve our building. But I welcome the activity, and am excited to have students back :-) ...even though I have lousier parking (more exercise!).
• TONS of RIT emails.
• The restart of the Seminar Series. Not only does the series starting back up mean quite a bit of maintenance on my part, but other schools are now back in session also - which means a number of future presenters are getting their abstract/bios/et cetera to me simultaneously right now.
• The start of classes - which does impact me since I am continuing to take a graduate class each quarter. (I feel like I just finally recovered from my class over summer!)
• Regular Staff Council meetings. Since my tenure on Staff Council started in June, meetings have been irregular during the summer months. Now it's time for me to adjust to a regular meeting schedule... And since I'm on the Executive Committee, that means I am now busy from 2-4 every Thursday from now until forever. Plus there's the Ad-Hoc Outreach Committee that I am liaison for - we only meet once per month, but our one meeting so far has generated a fair amount of action items. Oh, AND there's Institute Council meetings once/month.
• Regular IS&T (Imaging Science & Technology Club) meetings every Friday.
• Espresso Cart socials 4 days a week
• And last but not least, my personal favorite: Noon-time skating every day!!!! Woo hoo!!!!!

On top of all of this going on this week, some other things happened to coincide:

• We have a new Assoc. Director of Alumni Relations for COS - which is GREAT news! It has been difficult to organize alumni events in the absence of a dedicated person over in Alumni Relations. So this is wonderful, but just happened to coincide with everything else busy going on in this short week - so I have planning upcoming receptions now on my plate with everything else.
• New CIS Promotional Items - which in turn need their own promoting, kind of. I'm advertising our new SWAG to entice people to participate with our Foursquare and Ambassador Program initiatives.

So all of those have been the major themes of my week, with even some more little things here and there - getting promo materials together for the Office of Graduate & Part Time Enrollment to use on their recruiting trips; promoting the espresso cart and seminar series; putting out fires regarding the seminar series live feed (or rather, an unannounced lack thereof...); getting in the hang of our foursquare presence; making connections with new people across campus; so on, so on. Oh my! And I really, REALLY need to get the next CIS Imaging Connection newsletter finished. I have been trying to get it done now for 2 weeks but between meetings, more pressing/urgent matters, and the not-quite-decided-on elements of the newsletter (namely, upcoming events and receptions), it remains incomplete. This is stressing me out quite a bit.

It has been a difficult week because I feel like I have been so busy, and yet I feel like I have gotten so little accomplished. For everything I can check off of my to-do list, 3 more things get put on! I don't mean to vent or sound negative; I am just trying to objectively and accurately illustrate how my week has been. I don't let it get me down - I prefer being busy because I love my job! Well, TGIF!

CIS is now on Foursquare!

So I've decided to try and expand our social media outreach tactics, which means CIS is now running specials on Foursquare! If people check in to CIS during the Coffee Cart, Seminar Series, or IS&T, they'll be able to view specials and find out how to fulfill campaigns to receive prizes. I'm pretty new to Foursquare, so this should be interesting. I'm not usually a big fan of it, but I think that checking in on a college campus during normal business hours should be nice and safe, and the app as a whole has some pretty neat features that could become a lot of fun. Who knows, maybe the "Mayor" of CIS will be allowed certain perks, like cutting to the front of the IS&T pizza line... We'll see! I'm also very open to suggestions on where to take this. 

Click the logo below to be taken to CIS's venue page!

Introducing...All new Outreach resources!

I have been glued to my chair for the past while, putting together several new and several other updated pages for the CIS website:

• NEW! CIS Ambassador Program - Details the new CIS Ambassador Program I'm organizing, which supports and rewards dedicated individuals willing to help spread the good word about Imaging Science.
• NEW! Imaging Science Outreach That You Can Do - Features videos, informational slideshows, and activities that can be presented to students of all ages.
• Facelift! Outreach Programs - Added slideshow banner, reorganized, and added the new pages above.
• Facelift! In-Class Demos - Added slideshow banner, reorganized, added programs/events we participate in, and added schools we've visited.
• Facelift! Information For: Alumni - Added information on the Ambassadors Program (which we are hoping will involve many alumni), reorganized, and added pictures.

PHEW! Believe me, this is no small feat. It has been a lot of effort and a lot of experimenting to get all of these things running and looking good. I am proud of everything I've put together this week. And the Office of K-12 Programs likes the new Outreach pages too - we're going to be linked on their website! Yeah!

Next it's on to finishing the summer issue of the CIS Imaging Connection - which will now be a little late once it gets out, but that's a good thing because now it can include all of the new goodies I made.