Cheatham Moves Up As Dean - Middle Tennessee State University

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The Year in Review…
classes. In summer 2001, Dr. Detmer
taught a class in functional programming
language theory. In summer
2002, Dr. Li taught a class in mobile
robotics. The latter was much more
popular than the former! Although not a
new class, Dr. Untch offered our senior/
graduate software testing class in summer
2002.
Most of our classes continue to be
filled to capacity, but overall enrollments
are slightly down. The main reason
is that classroom capacity has declined.
Last year there was a major
campus effort to replace old classroom
furniture, and the department got nice
new desks and chairs. However, because
of a change in fire codes, the
number of seats in each classroom had
to be reduced as they were refurbished.
We were unable to add enough
sections to compensate for the smaller
seating capacity.
There is also a national trend
toward decreasing numbers of computer
science majors. This is happening at
least partially because the dot-com bust
has made jobs in computing more difficult
to find. Although most schools
reported declining numbers of majors
as early as two years ago, the trend just
hit MTSU this year—our count of 394
majors is the lowest since 1997. Fall
2001 had the highest-ever number at
457. Computer science being the challenging
discipline that it is, our number
of graduates has always been smaller
than one might expect from the number
of majors, but so far these counts have
continued to show slow increases.
There were 35 bachelor’s and 13 master’s
graduates in 2001-2002.
The department is dealing with
cramped quarters and budget uncertainty.
However, we still produce topquality
graduates that we’re proud to
send out to be computing professionals.
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Editor: Judith A. Hankins
Editorial Assistant:
Michelle Higdon
Layout: MTSU Publications and
Graphics
Printing: MTSU Printing Services
The Internet at MTSU
by Richard Detmer
In 1991, Professor Al
Cripps received a National
Science Foundation grant for a
56kbps link to the Internet via
SURAnet (Southeastern Universities
Research Association
Network). Through Dr.
Cripps’s efforts, MTSU
received a class B
address space, now virtually
unobtainable. Originally,
MTSU reached the Internet via
a leased phone link to Vanderbilt
University.
Internet access has improved each
year at MTSU. There are now several T1
lines connecting the campus to the
world. The on-campus standard today is
100 Mbps switched Ethernet to the desktop,
providing a full 100 Mbps dedicated
connection to the campus data network.
A gigabit switch provides even faster
connections within the Computer Science
Department itself.
In 2002, Dr. Richard Detmer, department
chair, received another NSF grant,
this time to provide MTSU with a highperformance
network connection. A highspeed
connection to Abilene, the network
that is the backbone for the Internet2
consortium, was established in
February 2003. Abilene is a high-speed
communications network separate from
the “regular” Internet. The connection
is the result of collaboration
between MTSU departments, MTSU’s
Cheatham Moves Up…
Information Technology
Division, and Vanderbilt University.
Internet2 is a consortium led by 200
universities working in partnership with
industry and government to develop and
deploy advanced network applications
and technologies, accelerating the creation
of tomorrow’s Internet. Internet2 is
recreating the partnership among academia,
industry, and government that fostered
today’s Internet in its infancy. The
primary goals of Internet2 are to
• create a leading-edge network
capability for the national
research community;
In addition to Tom’s duties as dean and his teaching, he has been extremely active
in grant writing. He (together with other co-PIs) has received over $1.2 million in
grants for projects ranging from NSF CSEMs grants to a U.S. Department of Education
Student Support Services grant. He has always been active in research, and since
becoming dean of the college, things haven’t changed. He found time to publish
(together with coauthor Ray Phillips) “Focused Recruiting and Mentoring of Faculty by
Chairpersons” in the Proceedings of the Academic Chairpersons Eighteenth Annual
Conference.
In his leisure time, Tom enjoys a game of racquetball with his students and friends,
going boating on the lake, and watching University of Kentucky basketball. The faculty
in the department would like to say that we have appreciated all of Tom’s work for our
University in the past, and we look forward to working with him in this new capacity in
the future. Congratulations!! �