In this last newsletter of the 2022 academic year, we invite you to a spectrum of activities within Engineering and the Sciences at UCSB that are designed to strengthen UCSB's collaborations with industry. But first, we want to announce the retirement of our Assistant Director of Corporate Programs, Chris Russo. Among many things, he is well known for his leadership with corporations getting involved in the CoE capstones. In this newsletter, we extend an invitation for you to attend the Engineering Capstone Expo in June, we highlight one of our most active STEM student organizations: the Data Science Club at UCSB, and we invite you to participate in our Fall quarter recruitment. Please contact Ashley Antoon at antoon@engineering.ucsb.edu to schedule an info session, meet and greet tabling or to send out any last minute job postings.

We also invite you to read the Spring 2022 edition of Convergence. Please click the link to read the digital version online!

In the 2023 U.S. News list of “Best Graduate Schools,” UC Santa Barbara’s materials program is ranked No. 2 among public institutions and No. 5 overall. The chemical engineering program, also part of the College of Engineering, was ranked No. 9 overall and No. 6 among public universities. The College of Engineering itself was ranked No. 14 among public universities.

The UC Santa Barbara graduate program in physics overall ranked No. 11, with four specializations landing in the top 10: quantum (No. 6), elementary particles/field/string theory (No. 7), condensed matter (No. 8), and cosmology/relativity/gravity (No. 8).

Please join us in congratulating Chris on his retirement. He is a huge part of our organization and we will miss him dearly! We wish him well on his many adventures we know he already has planned!

It has been a real pleasure working for UCSB in the role of Associate Director of Corporate Business Development for the past 14 years. The corporate, faculty and student relationships I have built along with securing funding for research and graduate students have been instrumental in making this a satisfying way to end my career. Prior to UCSB, I spent 20 years as an engineer and in technical sales, working for companies in the Electronic Design Automation, Embedded Computing and Silicon-IP space. 14 years ago, I decided to switch gears to academia and never looked back!

I will still be busy into retirement being a board member of Montecito Trail Foundation and Reef and Run, a weekly, community focused, swim race on Thursday nights at East Beach in SB for 10 weeks every summer. I also enjoy adventure travel, mountain biking, snowboarding, scuba diving and spending time with family. My wife and I also have grandchild #6 on the way, so never a dull moment there!

Thanks again to everyone I have worked with over the years, I really enjoyed it!

Friday, June 3rd

2:00-5:00pm

Campbell Hall, UCSB

The Capstone Design Project program offers senior undergraduates throughout the College of Engineering the opportunity to work in teams to solve real-world problems over the course of their senior year at UCSB. Many of these projects are developed in collaboration with industry partners or UCSB research labs. At our Capstone Expo in June, the student teams all present and demo their final products and showcase their creativity and hard work. A panel of judges composed of Faculty and Industry Leaders evaluate the projects and select top teams for awards. This event is free for all and open to the public. Please join in-person at the UCSB Campbell Hall to meet all the students and see demos of all of their projects.

2:00 - 3:30pm: Poster and prototype demos

4:00 - 5:00pm: Live band and engineering showcase

Use parking lots 16 & 18

Please contact Tyler Susko, susko@ucsb.edu, with any questions.

Thursday, June 2nd

8:30am-4:40pm

ESB 1001, UCSB

An all-day event held by the ECE Department to showcase Computer Engineering (CE) & Electrical Engineering (EE) “Capstone” senior year design projects.

8:30 - 8:45am: Light breakfast & coffee

8:45 - 11:30am: Presentations

11:30 - 11:45am: CE Awards

11:45 - 1:00pm: CE & EE Posters, Prototypes & Pizza

1:00 - 3:00pm: Presentations (Part 1)

3:00 - 3:10pm: Coffee & cookies

3:10 - 4:30pm: Presentations (Part 2)

4:30 - 4:40pm: EE Awards

Use parking lot 10

Please contact Yogananda Isukapalli, yoga@ucsb.edu, with any questions.

We just published the Spring 2022 issue of Convergence. Convergence is the magazine of the engineering and the sciences at UC Santa Barbara. Please click the image below to read the digital version. Click here to download a PDF version of Convergence. Click here to see the Convergence archives.

To be added to or deleted from the Convergence mailing list, please contact James Badham at jbadham@engineering.ucsb.edu.

Founded in 2015, Data Science UCSB is the most active engineering and statistics club on campus with over 300+ undergraduate students. We are all about fostering a data science community by catering to students of all skill levels through our different pipelines, data talks, and social events. Each year, selected project groups participate in our annual showcase where they present their work to a panel of industry judges and our campus community. Our most recent showcase featured Emoji-powered text suggestions, bone marrow classification, AI-powered reddit recommendations, and several other impressive projects. We are currently seeking sponsorship as we prepare to host a fall data science career fair in conjunction with the statistics department and the College of Engineering. You can find out more about us in our club overview and on our website.

If you have any questions, please contact us at datascience.ucsb@gmail.com.

Summer is almost here and I know it seems early, but it's time to schedule your Fall 2022 recruiting plans! Fall is the best time for companies to host info sessions and tech talks because it is when all of the top students are choosing their internships or full-time jobs for the following June. Classes begin on Thursday September 22, so I would recommend hosting an info session during the week of Oct 10 (week 3) or Oct 17 (week 4). To secure your company's spot in our campus recruiting schedule, please contact Ashley Antoon at antoon@engineering.ucsb.edu to schedule an info session, meet and greet tabling or to send out any last minute job postings.

Click the image below to see the recruiting schedule for Spring 2022.