McNaughton Center Proceeding NECEC ’98 Conference
Annual Lobster Boil Highlights Annual General Meeting
The Newsletter of the Newfoundland and Labrador IEEE Section, Volume 98, No. 1
NECEC
’98 to go ahead November 13
The 8th Newfoundland
Electrical and Computer Engineering Conference (NECEC), presented by IEEE
Newfoundland and Labrador Section in cooperation with Memorial University
of Newfoundland will be held Friday, November 13, 1998.
The aim of NECEC ‘98 is to provide a forum where professionals in electrical, electronic, computer engineering and information technologies can present their work to the growing technical community within the province. The conference will focus on technical concepts, innovations and implementations. NECEC ‘98 will be structured in a format similar to that found successful in previous years. A new technical feature will be a live Webcasting of the conference opening and plenary session presentation. The Conference this year will include a Technology Showcase followed by a complementary wine and cheese closing reception.
The Conference Chair will be Ray Miller, P.Eng. of NewTel Communications and the Technical Chair will be John Robinson, Ph.D., P.Eng. of Memorial University. The keynote speaker is David Collett P.Eng. and he will discuss the Lower Churchill Development Project.
Presentors will be allocated 20 minute sessions and will represent a wide variety of academic and industry interests. Topics cover many aspects of Electrical Engineering ranging from Communications to Image Processing, Geomatics, Power, Controls and Instrumentation.
Conference revenues in excess of expenses will go towards establishing an engineering scholarship fund at MUN. The NECEC ‘98 conference will be eligible for APEGN Professional Development Hours.
Important Dates
Registration Fees
After October 20, 1998
Members $70 Non-Members $80
Students $45
Please note that additional information can be obtained from http://www.necec98.nfld.net/
A Registration Form is enclosed for your convenience but copies can also be obtained at the NECEC ’98 WebPage. For further information please contact Yvonne Raymond at Continuing Engineering Education Telephone: (709) 737-7467 Telefax: (709) 737-3056
McNaughton Center
The McNaughton Student Learning Center will soon be operational at MUN thanks to grants from IEEE Canada and the Newfoundland and Labrador IEEE Chapter. An official opening and social is scheduled for Oct. 28
To remember General McNaughton
for his contributions to the engineering profession in Canada, IEEE Canada
awards the McNaughton medal to recognize outstanding Canadian engineers.
The IEEE Canadian Foundation awards McNaughton scholarships to recognize
outstanding Canadian students, and grants to establish and develop
McNaughton Learning
Resource Centres
By Christopher Whitt
Engineering Student &
IEEE Student Branch Chair,
Faculty of Engineering and
Applied Science,
Memorial University
During the 1998 Winter semester the Memorial University Student Branch 'A'prepared a proposal for the establishment of a McNaughton Resource Centre. The proposal was for a McNaughton Centre focused on audio engineering and signal processing.
Recently the proposal was accepted and the student branch was granted funding to purchase equipment for the Centre. The cost of the proposed centre is $8800, of which the IEEE Canada Foundation grant will provide 75%. The Newfoundland and Labrador Section offered to fund the remaining 25% which will allow us to begin implementing the proposal immediately. We hope to have the Centre fully-equipped part-way into the Fall Semester.
Another recent development has helped the preparation of the proposal: during the past Winter Semester, the student branch was given a room in the S.J. Carew Building at MUN. This room is the branch office, and will also house the McNaughton Centre. The McNaughton Centre will be equipped with a powerful Intel-based personal computer with a professional sound card, a reference power amplifier, loudspeakers, headphones and a calibrated microphone. The faculty owns an acoustic measurement system to which we will have full access.
The equipment will allow interested students to experiment in software-based audio DSP, recording technologies, analog audio electronics,and perhaps even acoustics. Audio recording, manipulation and reproduction are areas not emphasized in the curriculum, so the Branch executive hopes the McNaughton Centre will be an eductional resource for all students.
General Andrew McNaughton (b. 1887) was a McGill University Graduate, holding the degree of Master of Science, with Honours in Electrical Engineering. His many accomplishments include:
The new McNaughton
Center at MUN will be officially opened on October 29, 1998. All members
are invited to join in the tour of the new center. There will be a social
after the tour. The evening will begin at 7:00 p.m. in the boardroom of
S.J Carew Building, Faculty of Engineering and Applied Science, Memorial
University of Newfoundland.
Annual Lobster Boil
On May 29, the annual Lobster Boil was held at the Elks Club. The evening featured enjoyable entertainment, provided by the IEEE Executive’s own multi-talented John Robinson. The food was tasty, the turnout was high and a good time was had by all. The tradition will continue next year.
Below are
some photos of the live entertainment featuring John Robinson on guitar,
keyboard and vocals.
IEEE Newfoundland
& Labrador Executive
Introducing
the 1998 IEEE Newfoundland and Labrador Executive as seen at the last meeting
held Sept. 28, 1998.
L-R (Janet Higgins, Cecelia Moloney, John Robinson, Tony Hancock, Gervase White, Yves Fontaine, Siu O’Young, Doug Squires, Chris Whitt, and Stephen Hiscock on the phone)
Missing from photo is Brian Couves.
The executive committee is comprised of the following members and functions:
The Annual Lobster Boil presented an opportunity to recognize the efforts of several past chairs of the local IEEE Newfoundland and Labrador Chapter. Each past chair was presented with a pin to honour their contributions in previous years. Seen below, L-R are: Gervase White, P.Eng.; Cecelia Moloney, Ph.D.; Frank Davis, P.Eng.; Ramachandran Venkatesan (Venky), Ph.D., P.Eng.; and Gerard Dunphy, P.Eng.
Upcoming Events
McNaughton Centre Official Opening and Tour: October 29, 1998 at 7.00 p.m. at the S.J. Carew Building, MUN. Please meet in the boardroom on the 4th Floor. Refreshments to follow.
Technical Activites: A tour of The Evening Telegram Computer Automated Facilities will be scheduled for later in the year. A separate notice will be sent when arrangements are finalized.
Annual General Meeting: Scheduled for December 9, 1998 in the Boardroom of the S.J. Carew Building at 7:00 pm. All members are invited to please attend.
Message from the Chair
By Gervase
White, P.Eng.
The summer is over and it’s back to business as usual. I hope everyone had a safe and enjoyable vacation. I am enjoying my term as your Chair and had the pleasure of representing our Section on the Regional Committee level at the spring meeting in Waterloo and will be attending the fall Regional meeting in Quebec City later this month.
This is the 20th anniversary for our section and I have to say we are alive and well. Being one of the smallest sections in Canada doesn’t appear to be a problem for the Newfoundland and Labrador Section. Year after year we continue to have an active executive and are lucky to have strong
support from the technical community in putting together a varied technical program. We are on sound financial ground and will have a
small surplus again this year. We continue to support the Electrical Engineering students with the awards and refreshments for student presentation night. Our $1000.00 annual scholarship for Term 6 Electrical Engineering students will be finalized before the end of 1998.
We have had a pretty eventful year to date with three technical meetings including the student presentation night, our annual lobster boil, and five executive meetings. The student executive under the guidance of Dr. Siu O’Young has successfully obtained approval for a McNaughton Centre focusing on audio and audio processing at MUN. Congratulations to the student branch and Dr. O’Young on a job well done.
The growing emphasis on professional development and life long learning is presenting opportunities for our IEEE section. Our members presenting or attending local technical meetings are accumulating professional development hours (PDHs) required
as part of the APEGN registration for 1999. The next time you get a technical meeting notice join us and bring a friend. I would appreciate hearing from any of our members on suggestions for technical meetings on issues relating to electrical engineering. I can be reached by e-mail at gjwhite@newtel.com.
Our most significant technical event of the year will be held at MUN on November 13, 1998. NECEC’98, the 8th annual Newfoundland Electrical and Computer Engineering Conference is truly an electrical day. It will feature technical presentations from MUN and local utilities and high tech companies. We are hoping for a strong attendance again this year.
In closing I would like to thank our previous newsletter chair, Mr. Paul Thorburn, for his work over the past several years and welcome our new newsletter chair - Ms. Janet Higgins.
Yours truly,
Gervase White,
P.Eng.
Chair – IEEE,
Newfoundland and Labrador Section
Newsletter Submissions
Any events
notices, technical information, potential technical activities or suggestions
are welcomed for Newsletter Submission. Please email any suggestions to
higginsj@nortel.com and again, we welcome all suggestions.