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Three students stuck behind in Utah after the AIS Competitions in Provo.  Paul Blackford, Kyle Bridges, and Austin Abair took a journey to Arches National Park to traverse a number of trails to discover the bewonderment that is Arches.  Oddly enough, the first arches they visited were not in the park but resembled two golden arches for which breakfast was served.

After a three hour car ride to the park, the three explorers giddily climbed out of the car with peanut butter sandwich and banana in hand and a lot of water as they headed to the unkown.  Well, on second thought, they knew very well as they planned their day out to visit Delicate Arches and the Devil’s Garden in search of the magnificent arches; they had maps, a nearly clear trail ahead, and time. 

Traveling first to the Devil’s Garden, the crew fastidiously trudged forward to come across the Pine Tree Arch.  Taking a plethora of pictures, this was just stop numero uno for the group, not knowing the amazing sights that lay ahead.  Moving on, they went to see the Tunnel Arch and Landscape Arch followed.  Climbing on treacherous paths up sandstone rock faces and intimidating rock fins, the band of gentlemen didn’t look back, unless they turned around to make sure everyone was there, and reaching a dead end, they had to turn around to get back to the main trail.  The landscape and scenery were breathtaking, also, the high altitude restricted the amount of oxygen these Michiganders were used to.  The Three not so Musketeers explored and climbed like little kids but in a grown-ups body.  They saw a great deal of wildlife including geckoes, rabbits, birds of different species, and the pervasive colonies of ants (but no uncles).  The next arch on the list was Partition Arch which to the three was the favorite.  The view through this arch was immaculate as you could view for miles without seeing any sign of civilization until you put your sunglasses back on to not be blinded from the sun, but even then, you were blinded for a moment.  Nevertheless, there were no roads creating a view and imagery similar to what the first settlers saw whence they came across the same terrain.  Not far from Partition, there was Navajo Arch.  The view from above th arch again lay out a beautiful snapshot into history, though our time machine did not work and so we had to stay in the current year. After another half hour, the young soon-to-be-natives were faced the daunting challenge of the day.  To see the Double-O Arch, there was a rock fin you had to conquer.  The width of the rock path was less than two feet wide.  The only way forward was to not look down in fear that vertigo would take over,  relying on your fellows to get you over to the other side.  When we came to a split off of the trail, there was the Black Arch to one side and Double-O to the other.  We forced our weakening legs to the Black Arch.  The view to which the Arch was placed created a mind game on the travelers as it looked from the glare to be a sign that Michigan was not too far.  Taking our sunglasses off, Paul and Austin remarked that the reflection of the sun off a rock within the arch looked like a giant block ‘M’. The team of miscreants turned and went ahead to the Double-O of legend.  The rock fins opened up to one set of smaller arches, it was with intuition that they kept moving forth as these could not have been the true arches foretold in the map description.  They went about ten feet further to be shocked an amazed when the true Double-O arches presented themselves to those worthy of setting their eyes upon the pristine collection of nature’s wonder.  The true explorer came out of the members as they went off trail and became lost for a moment walking across an unfamiliar terrain.  They returned back to the trail, and ventured back.  Arriving at the end of the trail and back in the parking lot, canteens empty to point of pouring out sand, as well pouring out sand from their shoes, the members had one more goal… Delicate Arches. A three mile hike would bring them to the infamous arch that represents all that is Utah.  Up and down hills, over rocks, passing cairns, which they enjoyed topping with rocks to show they were indeed there, the Michigan tribe was but a mile away, yards, feet, voila.  The magnificent Delicate Arch.  The view was amazing, especially during the setting sun.  One was brave enough to confront the arch and live to tell the tale.  The three had a great time going back down the path back to the parking lot whilst reflecting on the bemusement they were ingrained with in going to Arches National Park. With many laughs, memories, and bad movie references later, the three got home safely.

Several members of the ITM Club recently traveled to Provo, Utah for the 3rd annual Student Chapter Leadership conference and Inaugural Competitions. The conference was hosted at Brigham Young University’s Marriott School of Management from April 26-28, 2012. The conference gave student a chance to network with students from other AIS student Chapters, faculty members, members of the AIS organization, and professionals from major US companies such as Walmart, Pariveda Solutions, and Microsoft. The conference was highlighted by Keynote speakers Karenann Terrell- CIO of Walmart and Kevin Ball- Service Integrations Supervisor of ExxonMobil. In addition to the two keynote speakers, our Faculty Advisor, Lise Urbaczewski, who is also the Vice-President of AIS student chapters gave a state of the association address. The ITM Club also hosted a session on networking and club activities, in which several different AIS chapters were given the chance to share ideas and feedback on club activities and events. In addition to the networking, sessions, competitions, and speeches, conference attendees were also given the chance to do some fun social activities, which included “IT Jeopardy!”, a trip to a ropes course, and hiking to the “Y” located on the mountain above BYU’s campus.

The Club represented UM-Dearborn well at the conference, wearing matching UM-Dearborn ITM Club apparel every day ranging from club T-shirts to professional button up shirts. The matching shirts got very positive feedback from the conference attendees; A member of a Jamaican Chapter even inquired about buying one of our shirts!!

The ITM Club was the only AIS Student Chapter in the world to make it to the finals in all four competition tracks! Although we were not the biggest chapter at the conference, the club did very well in the competition finals, bringing home more awards than any other chapter. Since the club only sent 6 members to the conference, members had to work together to spread their resources and skills across all four tracks.

The social media finals required participants to improve upon their social media strategies from the qualifying-round of virtual competition, as well as to implement a social media strategy for AIS Student Chapters. The ITM Club took first place in this track, and will have their proposed social media strategy implemented by our very own Kyle Bridges, who is in charge of social media and web development for AIS Student Chapters.

The video competition finals required participants to create a brand new video in less than 24 hours, which would teach viewers about a random topic (drawn out of a hat). In addition to this, each finalist would also be judged based upon their qualifying-round submissions and votes by conference attendees. The ITM Club picked “Human-Computer Interaction” for their final round video topic. Team members decided the best way to describe HCI was to have a computer describe it for everyone. Therefore, they chose Siri, Apple’s famous HCI personality, to explain the topic and its many uses in the video. The ITM Club took 2nd place in this category, and got very positive feedback from many conference attendees.

The Mobile Application Development track was judged based upon the Windows Phone 7 application submissions from the qualifying round of competitions. The ITM Club’s submission was an application which gives users advice on things to do around campus at UM-Dearborn, as well as a Geo-Caching feature, which allows users to go in search of different items around the campus. The ITM Club took 3rd place in this track. The mobile Application is available for Download in the Windows Maretplace here.

Although The Club did not place in the top three for the IT Risk management track, club members worked very hard on this track in both the qualifying round and the finals. They gave an outstanding presentation on implementing a new security strategy and IT security system at a fictional company in their given case. Just making it to the final-round shows how much hard work and effort was put into this track! All-in-all, it was a great learning experience for those involved.

The three-day conference flew by. ITM Club members were very disappointed it went by so quickly, as many of them bonded together, made new friends, and learned some great new things. Everyone took something away from this great experience!

After the conference ended, Kyle Bridges, Austin Abair, and Paul Blackford stayed behind for an extra day to travel to Arches National Park, where they spent the day hiking the trails, climbing the rocks, and and seeing some awe-inspiring rock formations.

The club is already planning to attend next year’s AIS Student competitions and conference, which will be held next April. The location of the conference is still To be determined.

We would like to introduce you to our incoming club officers for the 2012-2013 school year!

Secretary: Jess Harper – jlharper@umd.umich.edu
Financial Chair: Deshawn McCullough – dmmccull@umd.umich.edu
Chair of Digital Communications: Kelly Turner – klturner@umd.umich.edu
Chair of Human Resources: Andrea Menke – amenke@umd.umich.edu
Chair of Alumni Relations: DeShawn Collins – dccolin@umd.umich.edu
Professional Development Chair: Lauren Toccalino – ltoccali@umd.umich.edu
Faculty Advisor: Lise Urbaczewski – liseu@umd.umich.edu

Alumni Board: Lauren Toccalino, Felix Ferrer, Greg Walker, Phil Dean  

Fundraising Board: Kyle Bridges, Kelly Turner, Andrea Menke, DeShawn Collins  

Alumni Board Members:

• Lauren Toccalino (President ’11-’12)
• Phil Dean (President ’10-’11, Advisor to the Board ’11-’12)
• Felix Ferrer (Treasurer ’11-’12)
• Greg Walker (Chair of Professional Development ’11-’12)

 Next Club meeting(s):

Officer Meeting: Wednesday, May 16 at 5:00pm in Room 148 FCS

Regular Meeting:To Be Announced

On Friday, March 9, 2012, the ITM club held it’s 3rd annual Winter Bowling fundraiser at Woodland Lanes in Livonia.

The event, which was organized by Kyle Bridges, the club’s Digital Communications Chair & AIS Coordinator,  included 3 games of Glow in the dark Bowling, food, prizes, and a lot of fun. In all, 35 people attended the event, including several club members and UM-D students. Overall, between the 50/50 raffle and the money from admission, we raised a total of $402  for the Club! This will help us pay our way to the AIS Student Chapter Conference in Provo, Utah at the end of April.
Thank you to everyone who attended this event.

We look forward to our future Bowling events, including our 4th annual Fall Bowling fundraiser, which is scheduled for October 2012!

February 11, 2012-- The ITM Club moves on to the finals in all four competition tracks in the inaugural Association for Information Systems student competitions. Only the top five schools from each competition track made it to the finals. The club will now represent the University of Michigan-Dearborn in the finals on April 27, 2012 at the 3rd annual AIS Student Leadership conference in Provo, Utah. The ITM Club will be directly competing against other AIS Student Chapters from around the world.
Great job ITM Club!!

Justin Esgar, C.E.O. of Autriv Software Development and Virtua Computers, Inc. took time out of his schedule to Skype in to our Winter semester kick-off meeting on January 18, 2012. Justin started his career by creating an ipad app called “SignMyPad”- a PDF signature app which currently sells on the itunes app store. During the meeting, Justin presented the ITM Club with some great information, including career advice and information about his company. He told us his story, how he developed his company, and how SignMyPad came to be. We look forward to meeting with more IT professionals, both in person and via Skype at future meetings.

On Wednesday, November 2, 2011, the ITM club went on a tour of Google HQ in Ann Arbor.

The tour took us through Google’s offices, including the kitchen, stocked with tons of fresh local foods, a massage therapist on staff giving Googlers free massages whenever they want, and their new environmentally friendly rooftop dining area! 

Thank you to the 11 people who attended this event.  We look forward to touring Google’s facilities again soon.

During Homecoming week, the ITM club participated in the 2nd annual cardboard boat race along with 7 other student organizations. The college of Business was represented well, as both the ITM Club and our friends from AMA participated in the event. Although we were not the fastest boat, we won our heat and even made it through the entire race without sinking!! Although our friends from AMA were not so lucky (good thing for life vests!), we made sure to cheer them on in their race as well. The ITM Club did win “The most spirited team award” for our Pirate themed team uniforms, boat design, and team spirit. “Arr Matey!”

Last year the ITM Club won the same award for our Lifeguard team uniforms. We were very convincing lifeguards!

HiredMyWay, a sponsor of the ITM Club, can show you just how easy it is for YOU to find a job!!

They are a rapidly expanding company based out of Metro Detroit, which uses the token system to post and send resumes to employers. Users can also recommend people for a job, which in return gets you a cash bonus of up to $4,000!