OOPSLA'99 Application for Educator Scholarships

Name: Bina Ramamurthy

Contact Information at your educational institution:

University:  SUNY at Buffalo

Department:  Computer Science and Computer Engineering Department

Address: 226 Bell Hall, North Campus

City: Buffalo  State: NY  Country: USA

Voice: 716-645-3180_ Fax: 716-645-3464

Email: bina@cse.buffalo.edu

Your position in the department: Teaching Assistant Professor

Have you received prior support for attending OOPSLA conferences?

YES: ____ NO:  X

If YES, please describe briefly the support you received, and how the

experience of attending OOPSLA helped you and your educational institution

to further OO education and training:

Have you applied for any other support for attending OOPSLA'99:

YES:____ NO:____

If YES, indicate what kind of support have you applied for:

Student Volunteer: ________

Doctoral Symposium: ________

Tutorial Speaker: ________

Other (Please Describe): ___________________________

Name courses (along with number of students enrolled annually) in your

department addressing OO technology.  Clearly note the ones that you are

involved in teaching.

        Course Description      Number of Students Annually

1) Introduction to Computer Science I    300*

2) Introduction to Computer Science II   200*

3) Programming Languages                 100

4) Operating Systems                     100*

* I am involved in teaching these courses at least once annually.

Briefly describe any activities and/or related to OO technology in your
department
or college, and your involvement them.

Distributed Object Brokering Systems ( DOBS ) : I head this research group which is composed of both graduates and undergraduates.  It deals with performance issues in CORBA-compliant middleware.
See http://www.cse.buffalo.edu/pub/WWW/dobs.
Two of the undergraduate group members under my guidance won Second place in ACM International Undergraduate Research Contest at SIGCSE 99, New Orleans, LA.

Enterprise Computing : This is a newly formed group of undergraduates and it deals with the recent innovations in OO technology such as component programming, message objects and name resolution. I head this group also.

Object Oriented Systems : This is primarily a research group with many prospective Ph.D. students and is headed by Dr.Jayaraman whose primary interest is in Programming Languages. As a member of this research group I am researching Constrained Objects and XML.

List your objectives for attending OOPSLA'99.

1. To meet the educators involved in object oriented curriculum design and teaching to discuss problems and   solutions in designing and teaching OO based courses.
2. To learn about OO technology from industry's perspective and about new tools and techniques.
3. To learn about ongoing research in the area of OO technology.
 

Describe how you will satisfy these objectives at OOPSLA'99.

1. I benefited greatly by attending the educator's conference at  OOPSLA 98. I made many professional contacts with whom I continue   to keep in touch with and work with, through SIGCSE. I plan to develop some more contacts this year. These contacts help me in assessing our department's status in teaching CS2 like courses and to learn about the problems other educators are facing and how they solve these problems.

2. I realized that OOPSLA has an excellent representation from academics as well as industry. Panels comprising of people from industry give us a good perspective of where the industry is heading. Workshops from industry leaders in such technology as CORBA   will refresh and replenish my knowledge of the area with state of the art technology.

3. Technical paper presentations and BOF sessions will help me evaluate and to get some ideas for my research.

Explain how you will use your experience at OOPSLA'99 to promote OO
technology within your department or college. (Be specific, and provide time
frames for achieving each objective.)

1. I teach CS2 every semester. I will be able to use the information I gather at OOPSLA Educator's conference to improve my instruction, contents, and teaching methodologies (I still use the Fish Bone facilitation method I learned at OOPSLA 98).

2. I am involved in national forums dealing with OO-based undergraduate courses. I plan to do a poster session at OOPSLA 99 and a technical paper at SIGCSE 2000.

3. I regularly conduct training courses in OO technology for local industry. I am scheduled to do a OO design and programming course in Java in Fall 1999. Information I gather at OOPSLA will be used in such industrial training.

Reply to each of the following:
YES  I am able to attend the complete conference, from 1 November
through 5 November.
YES I intend to participate in the Educators Symposium in some way, by
submitting a paper, doing a presentation, contributing to the poster board,
moderating a session, or wherever I am needed.
YES  I am able to submit my expense report by the November 20, 1999
deadline.
YES I will submit my conference experience report by the December 1,
1999 deadline.
 

Include any other information that will help explain your need and desire to
attend OOPSLA'99.

Recommendation Letters supporting this application will be emailed to you directly from:

1. Dr.Stuart Shapiro
   Chairman
   Computer Science and Engineering Department
   226 Bell Hall
   Amherst
   NY 14260-2000
   Tel: 716-645-3180 (125)
   e-mail: shapiro@cse.buffalo.edu

2. Dr.Bharat Jayaraman
   Professor
   Computer Science and Engineering Department
   226 Bell Hall
   Amherst
   NY 14260-2000
   Tel: 716-645-3180 (111)
   e-mail: bharat@cse.buffalo.edu