- University News Archive - 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock /news-archive/tag/denver-ellis/ 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock Fri, 06 Dec 2019 19:59:46 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.4 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock students provide computer training to Arkansas Secretary of State employees /news-archive/2019/12/06/students-provide-computer-training-to-state-employees/ Fri, 06 Dec 2019 19:59:46 +0000 /news/?p=75830 ... 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock students provide computer training to Arkansas Secretary of State employees]]> Three computer science students at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock have used their tech-savvy skills to provide computer training to employees at the Arkansas Secretary of State鈥檚 office this fall. The venture began this fall when Kerry Moody, director of communications and education for the Secretary of State鈥檚 office, contacted Dr. Albert Baker, interim chair of the Department of Computer Science and advisor to the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) student chapter at 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock.听 鈥淥ur Chief of Staff, Deputy Dwight Southerland, was interested in providing our staff the opportunity to participate in specialized computer training,鈥 Moody said. 鈥淗e tasked me with finding the right program, and after doing a bit of research, I realized that we needed to reach out to 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock. I received a call back from Professor Al Baker and knew immediately that we would be able to make something work with his team of students.鈥听 Three ACM members created a computer training program and provided five three-hour workshops over the course of five weeks to 20 employees at the Secretary of State鈥檚 office. The students include Denver Ellis, a sophomore from Parin, Arkansas; John Clements, a senior from Little Rock; and Gaige Ehrenworth, a sophomore from Royal, Arkansas.听 鈥淛ohn, Denver, and Gaige exhibited the level of professionalism expected of IT professionals at any level,鈥 Baker said. 鈥淭hat these members of the student chapter of the ACM provided this excellent service to an office of Arkansas state government exemplifies the kind of cooperation with the Arkansas IT community encouraged by the Department of Computer Science at 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock.鈥听 Ehrenworth served as the main instructor during classes, while Ellis and Clements assisted students one-on-one during their class projects. Ehrenworth enjoyed the leadership experience he gained during the training.听 鈥淭his was the first time that I got to be the head of a project for the ACM, and it was the first time that I provided a service like this to people in the community,鈥 Ehrenworth said. 鈥淭here was a lot of hard work involved, but it was a very rewarding experience overall.鈥听

糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock graduate students, standing from top left, John Clements, light blue, Denver Ellis, plaid, and Gaige Ehrenworth, black shirt, teach a Microsoft Office training class to employees of the Secretary of State’s Office. The students are members of the 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock Association of Computing Machinery club. Photo by Ben Krain.

Moody said that those who attended the workshop were excited to learn new things. Even those who weren鈥檛 expecting to learn much were surprised by the knowledge they picked up.听 鈥Our staff here at the Secretary of State鈥檚 office enjoyed the training and were pleasantly surprised with learning so much. Gaige, Denver, and John were great at helping everyone throughout the process. They definitely knew the programs and were able to share with our employees lots of functional information. Gaige, Denver, and John truly knew how to walk through each program and provide practical tips that everyone could use in the office.鈥听 Clements said ACM members are excited about opportunities that allow the club to become more in the community. The club shut down five years ago, but restarted one year ago with active members who are excited to get involved.听 鈥淭his workshop fulfilled one of our club鈥檚 purposes, which is to provide professional development activities to the community,鈥 Clements said. 鈥淲e do many other community events. I鈥檝e taught a workshop on game development for high school teachers. Our members are also involved in game jams and hackathon competitions.鈥 The workshops served as a pilot program for the ACM. With its initial success, the ACM hopes to offer more workshops in the future.听 鈥淓veryone took something away from the workshops that they will use in their work,鈥 Ellis said. 鈥淭he ability to teach one-on-one is something that I am very passionate about. I love to tutor, and this provided a new outlet that was beneficial to a lot of people.鈥听 The Secretary of State鈥檚 office plans to be the first to sign up for new workshops.听 鈥淲e enjoyed our training, and the staff that were unable to participate this time would like to in the spring,鈥 Moody said. 鈥We were able to interact with three kind, outgoing, and intelligent young men, and they were able to visit with a diverse group of civil servants.听 I think it was a positive eye-opening experiment for all of us. Our office looks forward to working with them again in the future.鈥]]> 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock student hackers win prize for creation of affordable virtual reality safety simulator /news-archive/2019/05/02/crimsonhacks-safety-simulator/ Thu, 02 May 2019 13:15:58 +0000 /news/?p=74153 ... 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock student hackers win prize for creation of affordable virtual reality safety simulator]]> A team of 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock students is trying to promote a safer work environment with the introduction of 鈥淟eap into Safety,鈥 an affordable virtual reality safety simulator designed to make the operators more adept at operating powered equipment safely.听 The team includes Trenton Burroughs, information science major, and Denver Ellis, computer science major, as well as web design students Ryan Hood and Sunny Singh. For their efforts, the students won first place in the Best Hardware Hack category at the March 23-24 at the University of Alabama. Each team member won an Elegoo Super Starter Kit, which includes Arduinos, sensors, motors, and other fun programmable hardware. During CrimsonHacks, more than 250 students participated in a 24-hour hackathon to create technology to solve real world problems. 糖心Vlog传媒 Little Rock鈥檚 team created 鈥淟eap into Safety鈥 by using the Leap Motion Sensor to track hand movements and integrate them into the Unity game engine, which allows users to interact with objects in a virtual environment in real time. The team demonstrated how their technology could be used in safety simulations for welding and those who work with heavy equipment. The program is affordable, accessible, and easy to setup and use. In the future, the team would like to integrate 鈥淟eap Into Safety鈥 with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to ensure more workers can easily use the program for safety simulations. The end result will be more highly trained and safer employees who experience less injuries due to occupational machines. ]]>