Academics > Majors and Areas of Study > Mathematics and Computer Science > Past Commendations > 2001



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2001
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January 2001 Thiel Participates in Nationwide Putnam Exam On Saturday, December 2, 2000 several Thiel students tried their luck on the 61st annual William Lowell Putnam Competition sponsored by the Mathematical Association of America. The exam consists of six hours spent on twelve very challenging problems. Results are not usually known until the following spring. This year's participants were Tiffany Goble (not pictured), Quinn Fiscus (right), Nicholas Lias (center), Michael Harpst (left), and Dave Pribozie (not pictured). Top

February 2001 Congratulations Graduates This month we congratulate all of the Thiel students who graduated in December 2000, but in particular Yoshitaka Tachibana who earned his degree in Management Information Systems. Yoshitaka came to this country from Japan specifically to study MIS at Thiel College. Like all MIS majors, he was required to do an internship, and in this case he did it right here on campus in our computer center. His primary responsibilities were to install new systems and troubleshoot computers which were not functioning up to par, both of which he did with exceptional skill and dedication. But he went beyond the call of duty to create a data base to track printer cartridge usage, paper usage, etc. This has proven exceptionally helpful in tracking our inventory of computer supplies. Yoshitaka is hoping to find employment in this country for a few years before returning to his native Japan. We wish him well in his efforts. Top

March 2001 Great Job Dr. Caulkins In March, Dr. Jonathan Caulkins, director of the Pittsburgh office of the prestigious organization RAND, visited Thiel and presented the talk An Ounce of Prevention, a Pound of Uncertainty: The Cost-Effectiveness of School-Based Drug Prevention Programs. It was a fine talk given to a small, but enthusiastic audience. Thank you, Dr. Caulkins! Dr. Caulkins is currently on leave from the Heinz School of Public Policy of Carnegie-Mellon University. His current research interests center on modeling issues pertaining to illicit drugs, crime and violence, but he is also involved in various projects including modeling sulfur dioxide emissions, trading allowance markets, developing methods for adjusting GPA's to reflect course difficulty, and rating the on-time performance of airlines. Recently, Dr. Caulkins was inducted into Thiel's Board of Associates, a group of people interested in Thiel's welfare and willing to provide assistance in some of the College's activities. Top

April 2001 Way to Go Actuarial Studies Majors! For their exemplary performance in the Actuarial Studies program we commend Senior Sara Lee, Sophomore Erin Kelly, and Freshmen Nicole Demski and Quinn Fiscus for the month of April. Quinn(left), Nicole(center), and Erin(right) are pictured above. All four of these stellar students have maintained a remarkable 4.0 grade point average in their Actuarial Studies major course work. In addition, each has an overall grade point average well above 3.5 with two of the four maintaining a perfect 4.0! Sara, Erin, Nicole, and Quinn should be very proud of their success, as are we in the Math & Computer Science Department and indeed all of Thiel. There is great expectation that they will do themselves and Thiel proud in their future academic and professional endeavors. Top

May 2001 Congratulations Scholarship Winners! We in the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science have the privilege each year of choosing two students to receive scholarships. The George and Magdalene Skegas Scholarship for Mathematics was established by Karolyn Skegas Krial '43 in memory of her parents. The winner of this $1000+ award for 2001-2002 is junior Daniel Svirbly (in the center in the above photo). Dan is a mathematics major seeking secondary certification. The Nathan Warren Harter and Besse Roseberry Harter Scholarship was established as a memorial to Mr. and Mrs. Nathan Harter to encourage Thiel students in the study of mathematics or Latin. The amount of this scholarship varies from year to year depending on the prevailing interest rates, but this year an award of a little over $400 was made to junior Jonathan McElhaney (on the left in the above photo). Jonathan is also working for a mathematics major and secondary certification. Each year the Science Division awards the Irene Wintersteen Memorial Science Scholarship to a rising junior or senior woman science major. This year the $3000+ award was split three ways. One of the recipients is Tiffany Goble (on the right in the above photo) a double major in mathematics and chemistry. The other two recipient are biology major Lisa Goodell and environmental science major Ruth Warrington. We commend these students for their hard work and congratulate them for their success as scholars of mathematics and other sciences. Top

June 2001 Congratulations Graduates! This month we commend our majors who graduated on May 13, 2001. They include Benjamin Blasco(top row left), Math; Amber Cochran(top row center), Actuarial Studies; Eli Dortort(top row right), Actuarial Studies; Camulla Kepple(middle row left), Comp Sci and MIS; Sarah Lee(not pictured), Actuarial Studies; Kara McDowell(middle row center), Math; David Pribozie(middle row right), Math; Kathleen Thompson(bottom row left), MIS (AA); Christina Toth(bottome row center), Math; and Philip Wise(bottom row right), MIS. Besides the earning the majors listed above, these students had many other accomplishments. Amber complimented her major with a minor in Math and the AA degree in Accounting. Eli augmented his major with additional majors in Business Administration and International Business. Camulla also completed a major in Business Administration which she earned with departmental honors from that department. Sarah completed her major with departmental honors and also earned a minor in Business Administration. Kara graduated Magna Cum Laude with departmental honors, and also completed the AA degree in Accounting. Christina complimented her degree by completing the requirements for Secondary Education, which she accomplished with departmental honors from that department. These students have all worked hard to earn their degrees and we congratulate them for their successes. We are sure that they will continue to enjoy success in whatever careers they may choose to pursue. NOTE: Photos courtesy of Chappell Graduation Images Aardvark Studios. Click on an individual picture to enlarge it. Top

July 2001 Great Job This month we commend Camulla Kepple for her success in finding an excellent job. Camulla graduated on May 13, 2001 with majors in Computer Science, Management Information Systems, and Business Administration. Her Business Administration major was earned with departmental honors from that department. All that hard work paid off big! Way back in December 2000 she received a job off from Lincoln Electric with a starting income which makes many of us jealous. Camulla started work for her new employer a week before graduation. Her primary responsibility is to convert her company's sales process, from order to payment, from a paper system to an electronic system. Camulla, her employer, and we in the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science are confident that her education at Thiel College has prepared her well for this task. We are sure she will do well with this assignment and expect many more great things from her in the future. Congratulations Camulla! Top

August 2001 Welcome Home! This month we would like to welcome four old friends back to Thiel College. First is Jim Amon who has taught at Thiel for several years but had to take a year off because of illness. We are delighted that he is now feeling better and can rejoin us as an adjunct professor of mathematics. The other three, Jennifer Junk '91, Barry Balaski, and Jennifer Cebula '96 are all Thiel graduates who will now be joining us as adjunct professors. Jen Junk went on to earn an MBA at Penn State after graduating from Thiel and has taught at Mercer County Career Center, Penn State, and at the Trumble County Campus of Kent State. Barry Balaski and Jen Cebula both graduated from Thiel with Pennsylvania Secondary Certification. Barry has taught at Reynolds High School and is now teaching at Greenville High School. Jen Cebula teaches at Lakeview High School. She is already known to the Thiel community as the assistant cross country coach. We are happy indeed to have these three alumni join our teaching ranks in mathematics. Top

September 2001 Scholarship Leader Each year the Financial Aid Office grants many scholarships to entering freshmen. These take two forms, grants based on financial need and scholarships based on academic performance. The academic scholarships can range from a few thousand dollars to full tuition. This month we salute Joseph Page, the scholarship leader among the freshmen majoring within the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science. He received a scholarship which covers about 60% of his tuition. Joe comes from Laughlintown, Pennsylvania and graduated from Ligonier Valley High School with a very impressive GPA. He was involved in a variety of activities including National Honor Society and Youth and Government. He has come to Thiel as a Computer Science major, and his high school performance tells us we can expect great things from him. Joe is the son of Joseph and Gloria Page. Top

October 2001 Thanks, Mike! It is our pleasure this month to recognize an outstanding alumnus, Mike Miller. Mike graduated from Thiel in 1992. After doing excellent work for companies like Innovative Icons, Inc. and Xcelle Net, Inc., Mike joined Microsoft in 1996. Since then he has worked as a senior consultant on a variety of interesting projects throughout the United States and Europe. The projects involved domestic clients like Key Bank in Cleveland to those outside the United States like the Swiss Stock Exchange. Currently he specializes in projects associated with financial organizations. In 1999 Thiel recognized his outstanding achievements by giving him the Young Alumnus Award. This year Mike returned for Homecoming and participated in the Alumni Career Fair where he spoke to current students about opportunities to work at Microsoft. As in the past, this year he also graciously took time out of his busy schedule to give guest lectures in some our computer science courses. We always enjoy his visits and appreciate the insights and information he provides as an experienced professional in the field of information technology. Top

November 2001 Three Cheers for Three Jobs Well Done Paul Persic (left) spent this past summer in an internship at FirstEnergy's Beaver Valley Power Station, a nuclear generation facility. He had a great experience learning many details of computer network administration and network migration. His primary task while at FirstEnergy was to assist with the migration from Windows NT networking at the Beaver Valley plant, to the company standard Novell networking environment. His supervisor summed up Paul's contribution to FirstEnergy quite simply: "I want him back." David Visnicky (center) made good use of his summer by engaging in a cooperative education experience at Penton Media Inc. in Cleveland, Ohio. His job involved providing the various segments of the company with needed information either through file transfers or the production of reports. He had to learn how to use and monitor the various components of the computer system there including cartridge readers/writers, printers and network servers. One day he even helped prevent the place from going up in flames! Dave also had the opportunity to use and refine his people skills. He was able to become a valued team member who on occasion had to assume full responsibility for a job when others were absent. It is clear from his employer's evaluation that Dave lived up to and exceeded the company's expectations. Steven Dedrick (right) had an internship with Larson's Texts, a textbook publishing company. One of his primary responsibilities was to check algebra computer tutorial programs to make sure the problems were worded correctly and that the programs functioned properly. Steve also checked some geometry answer books for accuracy and wrote exercise sets and review sheets for several books. Steve's employer spoke highly of him and found him a valuable asset to the mathematics text department. We are very proud of all three of these students and commend them for their superior work during their internships. They did an excellent job of representing themselves, the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science, and Thiel College. Top

December 2001 ACM Programming Contest Throughout this Fall six of our Computer Science students prepared for competition at the computer keyboard. Matching their wits and C++ programming skills against 120 other teams from across Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, eastern Ontario and Indiana were Thiel Gold team members: (top picture left to right) Dan Heckert, Ivan Grimm and Thian Eng Tan; and Thiel Blue team members (lower picture left to right) Scott Free, Scott Gerow, and Joe Chastain. This year our students had a particularly challenging set of eight problems to grapple with. Among all 122 teams no team solved all of the problems, and only a handful of teams solved more than two problems. At the end of competition both teams "knew they had problem C done correctly" but couldn't pass the criteria set by the judges. Once away from the intensity of competition, we were able to look at the problem specification again. It turns out that both teams had forgotten a "/" character - but otherwise had the problem licked. While it was frustrating to miss the problem due to this tiny oversight, both teams reported that they came out with renewed self-confidence. We are proud of our students who were willing to put in the time and effort in order to represent Thiel College at this event. Top