1871’s Tech Challenge, Thursday & Friday, October 15 – 16 offers a great opportunity for students to sharpen their coding skills and gain a pathway forward into a career in technology. The 1871 Tech Challenge, presented by State Farm, will continue to connect, inspire, and strengthen the extraordinary talents of students. For full details click the graphic above or go to https://1871.com/tech-challenge/.
The Information Technology and Management Faculty held their Spring 2018 faculty meeting at Lee Wing Wah in Chicago’s Chinatown on May 7, 2018. A highlight of the meeting was the awarding of the 2018 Jeffrey Kimont Memorial Teaching Award. Named in honor and memory of the first full-time ITM faculty member, the Jeffrey Kimont Memorial Teaching Award honors an outstanding adjunct faculty member. This year’s recipient is Vasilios “Billy” Pappademetriou. As the key instructor for ITM 301, Billy introduces every first-year ITM student into the fundamentals of not only hardware and operating systems but the IT profession as well.
Jeff Kimont was a founding faculty member in Information Technology and Management and shaped the application development curriculum of the program. A BSEE graduate of Midwest College of Engineering (now part of IIT and the foundation of the Rice Campus in Wheaton), Jeff earned his Master of Computer Science at North Central College and a Masters Certificate in Bioengineering and Bioinformatics at the University of Illinois at Chicago. After retiring from Bell Labs, he became the first full-time faculty member in Information Technology and Management but later left that role to pursue a full-time career as a lead software developer. A jazz musician as well as a talented coder and teacher, Jeff was the father of four. He passed away due to cancer at the age of 58 in 2013.
Previous winners of the Jeffrey Kimont Memorial Teaching Award include Jason Lambert, Dennis Hood, and Shawn Davis. (Photo by Angie Jarka.)
Student Awards for Spring 2018 were presented at the ITM Student Awards Luncheon on May 7, 2018. The following awards were presented:
Congratulations to these outstanding graduates. The awardees received a framed certificate and a medallion to be worn with their cap and gown at commencement.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the National Security Agency have designated Illinois Institute of Technology as a National Center of Academic Excellence in Cyber Defense Education, effective until 2020. Our ability to meet the increasing demands of the program criteria will serve the nation well in contributing to the protection of the National Information Infrastructure. The Presidents’ National Strategy to Secure Cyberspace, February 2003, and the International Strategy for Cyberspace, May 2011, addresses the critical shortage of professionals with these skills and highlights the importance of higher education as a solution to defending America’s cyberspace: “Like all nations, the United States has a compelling interest in defending its vital national assets, as well as our core principles and values, and we are committed to defending against those who would attempt to impede our ability to do so.” Education is the key to promoting these ideals.
This designation recognizes the accomplishments of IIT in the areas of cyber security and digital forensics education, spearheaded by the Department of Information Technology and Management (ITM) and the IIT Center for Cyber Security and Forensics Education (C2SAFE). The ITM Department’s key offering in this area is the Master of Cyber Forensics and Security degree, designed to help students, and experienced information technology professionals become cyber security and forensics practitioners, investigators, managers, and leaders. This degree is intended for students who are interested in cyber security, digital forensics, risk control, and information assurance, and draws on the extensive professional experience of our ITM faculty.
The Center of Academic Excellence (CAE) in Cyber Defense (CD) designation is a new designation based on updated academic criteria for Cybersecurity education and affords each CAE institution the opportunity to distinguish its strengths in specific focus areas. The updated criteria benefit not only the institution, but also students, employers and hiring managers throughout the Nation.
Official letters of notification of IIT’s designation were sent to the university, the Governor of Illinois, Members of Congress, and appropriate Congressional Committees. The official CAE Certificate will be awarded during a ceremony at the CAE Community Meeting being held in conjunction with the NICE (National Initiative for Cybersecurity Education) Conference in San Diego, California, November 3-4, 2015.
ITM students Bill Wesselman and Maya Embar display their award for ACM RIIT 2014 Best Paper.
The Best Paper Award at the 3rd annual Association for Computing Machinery’s Research in Information Technology conference was won this year by the IIT ITM student team of Maya Embar, Louis McHugh, and William Wesselman for their paper “Printer Water-Mark Obfuscation”. Also presenting at the conference was ITM student Ben Khodja ( “Probabilistically Detecting Steganography withinMP3 Files” ) and ITM alumnus David Stacey (“Passive Warden Using Statistical Steganalysis”). The IIT papers were presented at a session chaired by Industry Professor Ray Trygstad, Associate Chair of IIT’s Department of Information Technology and Management. The RIIT conference was held in conjunction with the annual conference of the ACM Special Interest Group for Information Technology Education, October 15-18, 2014 in Atlanta, Georgia. Congratulations to Maya, Louis, and Bill for this recognition of their accomplishment.
This is the second year that an IIT paper has won the Best Paper award at RIIT. At last year’s RIIT conference in Orlando, Dr. C. Robert Carlson, Dean of the IIT School of Applied Technology, along with Dr. Sargon Hasso, a former PhD student of Dr. Carlson’s, won the award for their paper “Design Patterns as First-Class Connectors”.
ITM faculty members and students will not only attend, but will present and chair sessions at the 14th Annual Conference in Information Technology Education (SIGITE) and the 2nd Annual Conference on Research in Information Technology (RIIT) in Orlando, Florida, October 9-12, 2013. This dual conference, conducted by the Association for Computing Machinery’s (ACM) Special Interest Group in Information Technology Education (SIGITE), provides a forum for sharing and developing ideas relating to Information Technology research, education, applications, IT-industry-academia relationships and our roles as professionals, educators, and advocates for the effective use of Information Technology.
School of Applied Technology Dean Dr. C. Robert “Bob” Carlson will chair Paper Session A2: Mobile and will present a paper, “Design Patterns as First-Class Connectors.” ITM graduate student Mikhail Zaturenskiy will present his paper “MP3 Files As A Steganography Medium” while graduate student Fernando Seror Garcia will conduct an RIIT Poster Session session entitled “DNS (Do Not Suspect).” ITM Associate Chair Ray Trygstad will also attend the conference.
New Members of IIT’s Beta Chapter of Gamma Nu Eta, the National Information Technology Honor Society, were inducted on Monday, August 26th, 2013. Pictured above are Lei Zhang MITM; Industry Professor Ray Trygstad, Beta Chapter Adviser and ΓNH Professional Member; Srissa Dharampal MITM; Jeremy Stell ’14; Ziena Abdul-Samad ’15; Adjunct Industry Associate Professor Madeleine England ’11 MITM ’12, Beta Chapter Administrator and Past President; Brian Bailey MITM; Bartlomiej A. Dworak ’15; Ilo Miladinoski ’13; Michael Meier ’14; Justin Callanan ’14; Annie Ross MITM; Amulya N. Pothapragada MITM; René Tapia ’12 MITM; Ye Li MITM; Kumaran Ramanujam MITM; and Professor Bob Carlson, Dean of the IIT School of Applied Technology and ΓNH Professional Member.
Not pictured: Mark Adams ’13.
The Induction Ceremony took place in the Ballroom of IIT’s McCormick Tribune Campus Center, Chicago, Illinois. A reception followed the ceremony. Photos of the ceremony are available on the SAT Facebook page.
IIT Information Technology and Management students presented and demonstrated their Real-Time Communications projects to 
a crowd of communications professionals on May 1. Students were challenged to conduct research,and test and deploy solutions as part of the project-based learning approach at IIT School of Applied Technology. Unlike a final exam, these students had to provide a working system and defend it in front of a crowd of industry professionals—some with 30 years of experience.
Sponsors of the event included IIT School of Applied Technology, IEEE ComSoc and IEEE Fox Valley Subsection. Professor Carol Davids chaired the sessions and coordinated the student projects. The NG911 project was mentored by Joe Cusimano of Data-TelSystem Solutions. Several former IIT students also attended the event.
Dr. Gregory N. Hughes of RPI is inducted into Gamma Nu Eta by Bill Wesselman, IIT Beta Chapter president
The 2013 National Conference of Gamma Nu Eta, the National Information Technology Honor Society, was hosted by IIT’s School of Applied Technology on April 5th through the 7th. Industry Professor of Information Technology and Management Ray Trygstad is the Chair of the ΓNH National Board of Directors and the Adviser of IIT’s Beta Chapter. IIT Beta Chapter’s Charter President, Madeleine England–who now serves as the Chapter Administrator–and Beta Chapter President Bill Wesselman are also members of the National Board of Gamma Nu Eta. During the meeting, Bill Wesselman inducted Dr. Gregory N. Hughes, founder of the information technology degree program at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York, as a Professional Member of IIT’s Beta Chapter of Gamma Nu Eta. Prior to his appointment as the first Vice Provost for Information Technology at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Dr. Hughes had a distinguished career as a senior executive at AT&T/Lucent Technologies, and as President of AT&T’s Transmission Systems Business he received the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award from President George Bush.
IIT′s Beta Chapter of Gamma Nu Eta, the National Information Technology Honor Society, was privileged to induct fourteen new members at their fall Induction Ceremony on Friday, September 14th. Newly inducted members include Benro Adeyemo, Sabae Aye, Adrian Cabrera, Xio Long Chen, Jason Choe, Jason Crawford, Mariusz Gladys, Robbie Parish, Indhi Powlette, Mulin Shen, Phillip Shriner, Tianjiao Sun, Carly Swanson and Kbrom Tewoldu. You can see more photos of the ceremony on the Gamma Nu Eta Facebook page. Congratulations to all these students for this recognition of their sustained superior academic performance!
