Vol 16 No 3
www.ieeer8.org
December 2013
Published quarterly and distributed to more than 70,000 IEEE members across Region 8
Scan me with your
smartphone to reach
the R8N website.
IN THIS ISSUE
Region news....................1–5
THE 101st IEEE Region 8 Committee
meeting was hosted by IEEE Bosnia and
Herzegovina section in the city of Sarajevo. More than 100 Region 8 members
and IEEE staff gathered on 4–6 October
for a busy agenda discussing and planning activities and developments.
Region 8 Director Martin Bastiaans
and Aleksander Szabo, vice chair of
Member Activities, reported an increase
in membership, albeit slower than in
recent years. Sections were asked to be
active in recruiting new members and to
encourage renewals.
Tony Davies, History Activities coordinator, reported on two new IEEE
Milestone dedications: 12 June to celebrate the 1947 invention of holography
in London (UK&RI Section), and 5 July
to commemorate the 1895 Krka-Šibenik
Hydro Power System in Croatia.
Next year we will see some big events
in our Region. IEEE Sections Congress
2014 will be hosted in Amsterdam, Netherlands, at the Rai Convention Center
from 22–24 August. This worldwide as-
100+ members convene in
Sarajevo for R8 Committee
Far left:
Region 8
directorelect
candidate
debate
Left: IEEE’s
just desserts
sembly of IEEE volunteers will be taking
place outside North America for the first
time.
There’s also the Student Branch Congress 2014 planned in Krakow, Poland,
from 7–10 August, organised by the local
Student Branch.
Meanwhile, three important conferences will be organised by the region:
MELECON 2014 in April in Beirut, Lebanon; ENERGYCON 2014 in May in Dubrovnik, Croatia; and HISTELCON 2014
in September in Israel.
IEEE GOLD Graduates of the Last
The closing dinner
was held in
Munich’s elegant
Künstlerhaus
Germany experiences day of
time travel for 50th birthday
ON 5 April 2013, IEEE Germany Section celebrated its 50th Anniversary
where it all started, on 9 April 1963,
at the Technical University Munich.
Our celebrations began in the
afternoon with a colloquium introduced by Prof Kennel as a “time
travel” series of talks.
The first, by Prof Helmut Schramm, ‘Where we come from:
Electrical Technology in Germany
in the early 1960s’, described how
electric disciplines moved from
military applications to the present, with thanks to our predecessors who passionately built power
engineering, communication and
information technology as we know
them today.
Our trip arrived at the present
with Prof de Doncker’s presentation,
‘Power Electronic Substation – Edison’s Missing Link to realise the EnergieWende’. The new energy trend
set by Germany, now in the spotlight
...continued on page 2
Decade was given the new name ‘IEEE
Young Professionals’. The YP criteria will
be adjusted by adding an opt-in option,
and it will be a form of membership.
Good news for you: there are to be
new benefits for IEEE members. The
most important is GoogleApps@IEEE,
a suite of online products – mail, contacts, calendar and a collaboration toolset
– made available at no cost. Please go
ahead and try it out.
There are also improvements to IEEE
member discount programs for Rosetta
IEEE contacts........................ 4
Section and
Chapter news..................5–7
GOLD/YP news.................... 8
Student news................ 9–12
...continued on page 2
Young Professionals refresh GOLD
program with increased visibility
AFTER many years of operation, the Graduates of the Last Decade (GOLD) program is
to be relaunched.
Primarily, the name will be changed to
‘Young Professionals’, designed to appeal
to a broader audience and correspond to
an increased visibility strategy.
Although the name is the most significant visible change, several Young Professionals will be re-organising the programme
to make it better serve the community of
young engineers.
The Young Professionals program requires changes at several levels: governance,
branding, classification and communication.
Therefore, the Region 8 GOLD/YP SC together with MGA GOLD/YP and staff members
are working hard on making the transition of
GOLD to YP smooth and successful.
The new program should result in improved member awareness and retention,
and increased member engagement by
making opportunities easier to find.
Although the process is planned to be
finalised in the middle of 2014, the first transitions are already visible. For example, the
Region 8 Student Branch and GOLD Congress (SBC) is changing its name: it will be
officially known for the forthcoming event
in Krakow in 2014 as Region 8 Student and
Young Professional Congress (SYP).
Certainly, many of us will shed a tear for
Graduates of the Last Decade but it is time
to move on, say goodbye to GOLD and say
“Hello, Young Professionals, how are you
doin’?”
Rafal Sliz
Region 8 Young Professionals