- University News Archive - ��Vlog��ý Little Rock

Obadimu wins $1,000 scholarship in “Make Your Mark” contest

Ajani Oyindamola — Tue, 30 May 2017 13:14:16 +0000

A University of Arkansas at Little Rock student won $1,000 in the “Make Your Mark” scholarship competition. Adewale Obadimu, a second-year student in the University of Arkansas at Little Rock computer science doctoral program, received second place after writing an essay answering: “How will an international education help me make a difference in the world?” “I wrote mostly about my past in Nigeria, and how I want to give back to the community,” he said. “I realize that this opportunity that has been given to me by studying in the U.S. can also be given to others that I would like to one day help.” The contest, which was open to international and study abroad students, was sponsored by , a provider of student insurance. Obadimu earned a bachelor’s degree in computer science from Obafemi Awolowo University in Nigeria in 2013. He worked as a lead software developer at Health Informatics Research Laboratory and a technologist for the Center for Energy Research and Development before coming to ��Vlog��ý Little Rock. Since arriving in January 2016, Obadimu said, he has been fortunate to meet new friends, especially through the ��Vlog��ý Little Rock chapter of the International Friendship Outreach. “I’ve always been fascinated with coming to the U.S.,” Obadimu said. “T��re are a lot of brilliant minds and opportunities in the U.S. I’ve really been lucky to meet a lot of nice people here. Being an international student is a worthwhile experience.” At ��Vlog��ý Little Rock, Obadimu teaches software engineering classes as a teaching assistant and conducts research on social computing with Dr. Nitin Agarwal, ��Vlog��ý Little Rock Jerry L. Maulden-Entergy endowed chair and information science professor. “We are extremely proud of Adewale,” said Agarwal, director of the COSMOS, where Obadimu is a research assistant. “He brings an immeasurable energy to our Center for Social Media and Online Behavioral Studies (COSMOS).” While Obadimu has yet to select a focus for his doctoral research, he has had fun working on many “interesting projects.” One of the projects includes developing an Android app that serves as a social media network to put ��Vlog��ý Little Rock students in touch with alumni. “What if a student needed to find an internship, and they wanted to ask alumni? It would be very nice to have a way to connect with each other online,” he said.

Gass appointed to Arkansas Board of Corrections

Ajani Oyindamola — Tue, 07 Mar 2017 17:20:06 +0000

A University of Arkansas at Little Rock criminal justice doctoral student has been appointed to a seven-year term on the . Whitney Gass, who is also an assistant professor of criminal justice at Southern Arkansas University, learned of her appointment Feb. 13. SAU President Dr. Trey Berry nominated her for the position.

Whitney Gass. Photo by Southern Arkansas University.

“On the first day of class of the semester, Dr. Berry asked if I had any interest in him recommending me for the Board of Corrections,” Gass said. “It was an academic seat, and they wanted some representation from the southern part of the state. I was honored.” The Board of Corrections’ mission is to provide public safety by carrying out the mandate of the courts, provide a safe, humane environment for staff and inmates, strengthen the work ethic through teaching of good habits, and provide opportunities for staff and inmates to improve spiritually, mentally, and physically. Several weeks after her name was submitted, officials contacted her and started vetting her for the position. She even met with Gov. Asa Hutchinson, her first time meeting a governor. As a board member, Gass hopes to make positive changes in public policy for corrections in the state, including revising education and rehabilitation programs to better prepare inmates to transition into society after incarceration. Gass has been pursuing her doctorate at ��Vlog��ý Little Rock part time since 2013 and has an anticipated graduation date in 2018.

��Vlog��ýLR alum receives prestigious National Science Foundation fellowship

Ajani Oyindamola — Mon, 25 Apr 2016 17:50:13 +0000

Thanks to a prestigious National Science Foundation fellowship, University of Arkansas at Little Rock alumnus Jermaine Marshall will no longer have to work as a teaching assistant to support himself as a first-year doctoral student in Notre Dame’s computer science program. Instead, he will be able to devote more time to his research involving the analysis of data from social networking websites. Marshall, 23, of Helena, Arkansas, has been named a 2016 recipient of the . He graduated from ��Vlog��ýLR in 2015 with a bachelor’s degree in computer science. For 2016, the National Science Foundation awarded 2,000 fellowships from nearly 17,000 applicants. The fellowship provides three years of financial support through a $34,000 annual stipend and $12,000 cost-of-education allowance to the student’s graduate institution. “It just lit up my whole day,” Marshall said. “T��y only have an 11 percent acceptance rate. I didn’t think I would get it, but it happened.” The NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program recognizes and supports outstanding graduate students in NSF-supported science, technology, engineering, and mathematics disciplines who are pursuing research-based master’s and doctoral degrees at accredited U.S. institutions. Marshall’s current research involves social sensing, which uses the massive amount of information people share through social networking websites as research data to discover trends and influences. However, the information people share on social media is not always accurate. Marshall is developing a program that will detect when this information is accurate. “People may lie or report false information on social media,” Marshall said. “My goal is to develop a framework to tell when people are reporting truthful information on social media and determine how that information can be useful to society through research.” In 2015, Marshall was named a National GEM (Graduate Engineering Degrees for Minorities) Ph.D. Science Fellow. The GEM Fellowship greatly increased Marshall’s chances of acceptance into distinguished Ph.D. programs. He also received a paid summer internship with Adobe, a global leader in digital marketing and media. Among his many distinctions at ��Vlog��ýLR, Marshall was a McNair Scholar, a Donaghey Scholar, an African American Male Initiative Program member, an Engineering and Information Technology Ambassador, a former EIT Summer Undergraduate Program of Entrepreneurship and Research Scholar, a member of the Dean’s List, and an active member of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity Inc., Kappa Psi Chapter. “T�� Donaghey Scholars and McNair Scholars programs helped me pursue research and taught me how to get involved with it,” he said. “T��y helped me get to the point where I could do research, apply to graduate school, and get accepted into a prestigious program. They really helped me prepare for my future.” Marshall thanked the African American Male Initiative and Alpha Phi Alpha for giving him the support he needed to complete his degree. “T��y helped give me the motivation and support to pursue my dreams,” he said. This summer, Marshall will be a software engineering intern at Intel. After his anticipated graduation from Notre Dame in 2019, Marshall plans to continue his research into social networking websites at a research lab and eventually open his own social networking company.

Study launched to help adolescent asthma sufferers

��Vlog��ý Little Rock — Fri, 16 Oct 2015 15:03:38 +0000

A University of Arkansas at Little Rock professor will play a key role in a project designed to help adolescents suffering from asthma. Dr. Mengjun Xie, ��Vlog��ýLR assistant professor of computer science, is serving as a co-investigator on a research study that recently received a pilot award from the . The project, “Exploring the Effects of Sleep Patterns and Physical Activity on Asthma in Adolescents with Wrist-Work Smart Devices,” is led by Dr. Tamara Perry of ��Vlog��ýMS. Drs. Jiang Bian and Yi Guo of the University of Florida also are collaborating. The project, which will primarily take place at the Arkansas Children’s Hospital Research Institute, will use data collected from activity trackers worn by participating asthma-diagnosed teens to uncover the triggers of asthma symptoms. The 20 participants, ages 14–17, will be able to go about their normal routines and activities during the eight-week study, unlike the participants of many asthma and sleep studies. The portability and usability of the activity trackers allow participants’ physical states and reactions to be monitored without causing inconvenience. Researchers think this method of study will make it easier for individuals to participate and potentially improve the accuracy of results. Xie will supervise a ��Vlog��ýLR graduate assistant, who will be heavily involved in the data collection and coding for the study. Through the project, researchers plan to observe and draw significant conclusions on the roles of exercise and sleep patterns in causing asthma flare-ups. Those involved in the study hope the work will lead to the improvement of treatment methods for adolescent asthma and help researchers develop more accurate methods of predicting asthma attacks. This project was supported by the Translational Research Institute, grant UL1TR000039, through the . The content of this article is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the NIH.

��Vlog��ýLR hosts national cyber security research program

Taylor Aldana — Tue, 04 Aug 2015 20:14:40 +0000

When it comes to undergraduate research, Jeffery Wooldridge is on the cutting edge of improving database security. Wooldridge, a University of Arkansas at Little Rock junior majoring in computer science, was one of 10 students chosen for a national cyber security research program hosted by the university. Privileged to be accepted into the CyberSAFE@��Vlog��ýLR Research Experiences for Undergraduates program, Wooldridge, a Maumelle, Ark., native, said the opportunity gave him plenty of hands-on experience with independent research. The ��Vlog��ýLR-hosted, eight-week intensive student research program is funded by a $289,662 grant from the National Science Foundation. In its second year, the research program will conclude in the summer of 2016. The CyberSAFE@��Vlog��ýLR REU program aims to advance understanding of cyber attacks and to investigate more secure, user-friendly approaches to protecting people while they use their smartphones, post on social networks and access data in computing clouds, said , project mentor and assistant professor of computer science at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock.

Dr. Mengjun Xie

It’s a selective program: Out of 200 applicants, 10 were chosen, including two from the state of Arkansas. Each student was given a $5,400 stipend. Additionally, participants were loaned a Chromebook and provided housing in ��Vlog��ýLR dormitories during the program. Wooldridge’s research involved computer database security and dealt with encrypting and decrypting data in tables by hiding information. Wooldridge’s partner on the project, Laura Nivens from Kansas Wesleyan University, wrote search queries and papers for their databases while Wooldridge dealt with the technical aspects of the project. “Working with Laura has been good,” Wooldridge said. “Having a research partner has helped me out in many ways and has lessened the amount of work I have to do.” Dr. Chia-Chu Chiang, computer science professor and REU mentor, gave Wooldridge plenty of advice when it came to the student’s project. One of the many ��Vlog��ýLR computer science faculty mentors in the program, Chiang is interested in providing research projects in the area of database security. He will choose a project for a student based on computer background, such as preference of programming languages, programming skills, and courses taken. By the end of the program, Chiang expects all the students to successfully learn to be an independent researcher. There is such a diverse range of topics in the program that non-engineering and science students also find topics they are interested in studying. “English majors may like to conduct research in the area of natural language understanding, and history majors can investigate the area of history in multimedia systems,” Chiang said. “All in all, the program is not exclusive to students studying engineering and science. Students studying other majors are also encouraged to apply.” Applicants to the program must be U.S. citizens or permanent residents with a 3.0 or higher grade point average. They are rising sophomores, juniors, or seniors majoring in computer science, computer engineering, math, physics, electrical engineering, or other computing-related major. This year’s commencement ceremony for the program took place Friday, July 31, at the , Reynolds Building, Room 103.

Computer Science teams’ achievements twice as nice

Gloria King — Tue, 24 Mar 2015 17:57:12 +0000

Students from the ��Vlog��ýLR’s Department of Computer Science added to a long list of achievements in March, including a recent win at the Acxiom Programming Contest in Conway and a strong finish in the 2015 Southwest Regional Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition in San Antonio. ACM student chapter team “Best in State” Two teams from ��Vlog��ýLR’s Association for Computing Machinery student chapter competed in the Acxiom Programming Contest at the University of Central Arkansas March 10, with one of the teams capturing the “Best in State” title.

Pictured, left to right, back to front: Brandon Gray, Matt Marshall, Aziel Burnett, Jeff Long, Stu Hiltenbrand and Thoren Paulson

The first-place team, comprised of members Thoren Paulson, Jeff Long, and Matt Marshall, finished first from among 12 competing teams from across Arkansas. The team successfully completed seven out of seven programs due to its efficiency, meaning the team made only two submission errors over the five-hour competition. The other ACM team members included Brandon Gray, Stu Hiltenbrand, and Aziel Burnett. The team consecutively dominated state-level competitions from 2010 to 2012, but lost the momentum during which the top position was taken by their rivals such as Hendrix College and the University of Arkansas, according to Dr. Keith Bush, ACM faculty mentor. The ��Vlog��ýLR ACM team has won first place in Arkansas many times in the last five years, and also has regularly competed at the regional levels. “Now our team is back with a combination of experienced programmers and several younger, promising new members,” he said. Hendrix College, last year’s winner, finished second, followed by Ouachita Baptist, both of which completed all seven programs. The ��Vlog��ýLR ACM Club has weekly open meetings from 3-5 p.m. Mondays in room 203 of the Engineering and Information Technology Building.

Front row, left to right, Vineet Agrawal, Dr. Mengjun Xie (Advisor), Yanyan Li, and Tommy Haycraft. Back row, left to right, Nathan Ellis, Dylan Hailey (Team Captain), Connor Young, Andrew Lewis, and Jeffery Wooldridge

��Vlog��ýLR Cyber Security Club finishes strong Students also had a strong showing in the 2015 Southwest Regional Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition (SWCCDC) March 7-8. The competition, hosted by Texas A&M University-San Antonio, saw ��Vlog��ýLR’s team emerge with a fifth place win after defending cyber attacks from a team comprised of real-world professionals who simulated the role of external hackers attempting to gain unauthorized access to competition teams’ systems. “It really was a fierce battle between blue teams (all participating teams) and the red team (attackers),” said Dr. Mengjun Xie, faculty mentor for the ��Vlog��ýLR team. Xie said the team defended the cyber attacks well and learned much through the process. He said simply participating will help the team compete at a stronger level in the future. “Though they did not place in the top three, which were primarily occupied by former regional champions, they have proven the ��Vlog��ýLR team is the best in our state,” he said. The ��Vlog��ýLR team exhibited the best performance among all first-time players, which included Sam Houston State University and New Mexico State University, according to Xie. ��Vlog��ýLR’s Cyber Security Club was formed less than two years ago and is already earning name recognition in the region. ��Vlog��ýLR Cyber Security Club regularly meets from 1-2 p.m. Fridays in room 555 of the Engineering and Information Technology Building. Contact Dr. Mengjun Xie at mxxie@ualr.edu for more information. “Our students deserve the spotlight for consistently improving their talent,” said ��Vlog��ýLR Computer Science Chair Dr. Kenji Yoshigoe. “I have no doubt that these members have great professional careers ahead of them.” Yoshigoe encouraged interested students to join their classmates in applying their academic backgrounds, while also developing powerful skills, beyond the classroom. ��Vlog��ýLR’s Department of Computer Science, located in the Donaghey College of Engineering and Information Technology, is among the most highly regarded in the state. The department offers bachelor and master of science degrees in computer science as well as a Ph.D. in integrated computing.

- University News Archive - ����Vlog��ý Little Rock