Defence Logistics Agency Project

Congratulations to Dr. Izurieta and Dr. Sheppard, who secured $300K in funding from the Defense Logistics Agency to continue their cooperative research efforts with TechLink. The funding supports two graduate students through the summer of 2019. Dr. Izurieta's research focuses on the development of cybersecurity measurements to enhance the quality assurance solutions of the Construction Engineer Research Laboratories (CERL).  Dr. Sheppard's research focuses on the investigation of work plan optimization using risk-based analysis methods for incorporation into CERL's ESMS software suite. [December 2017]

Presidential Emerging Scholar Awards

Congratulations to Computer Science majors Nazmul Kazi and Jachi Madubuko, who received MSU Presidential Emerging Scholar Awards.  Naz will attend the Rocky Bioinformatics Conference and develop a decision support system for psychiatrists.   Jachi will attend the San Francisco Search Inside Yourself Conference, visit the California College of Arts and learn about Pixar and Dreamworks.  [November 2017]

ACM Regional Programming Contest

Two teams of Montana State University Computer Science majors traveled to the Colorado School of Mines to compete in the ACM Regional Programming Contest on November 11th.  One team (Matt Doran, Carl Fee, Keegan Millard) solved four problems and the other team (Tyler Bass, Sam Congdon, Chris McCabe) solved three.  Congratulations on a strong showing! [November 2017]

Spring Semester 2018 Notable Offerings

  • CSCI 215, Social and Ethical Issues in CS is typically a fall offering
  • CSCI 441, Computer Graphics is offered in place of CSCI 476, Computer Security
  • CSCI 455, Robotics is offered every second year
  • CSCI 520, Distributed Systems is offered every second year
  • CSCI 535, Computational Topology is offered every second year
  • CSCI 547, Machine Learning is offered every second year
  • ESOF 422, Advanced Software Engineering is offered every second year
  • ESOF 491 (soon to be ESOF 423), Software Engineering Applications is a new course

OIP Featured Faculty Member

Congratulations to Dr. Indika Kahanda, who was named by MSU's Office of International Programs as the September Outstanding Faculty Member of the Month.  More information.  [October 2017]

Holter Museum CAVE Exhibit

A collaborative artscience project is on exhibit at the Holter Museum in Helena.  Computer Science collaborators include Dr. David Millman, Dr. Brittany Fasy undergraduates Brendan Kristiansen, Carie Pointer and alumnus Chris Huvaere.  [October 2017]

Undergraduate Scholars Program Funding

  • Britney Gibbs will work with Dr. Brendan Mumey on Organizing and Analyzing Diverse Biofilm Data Types Using Ontology and Bayesian Networks
  • Nazmul Kazi will work with Dr. Indika Kahanda on An Automated Case Notes System for Psychiatrists Using Machine Learning
  • Jachi Madubuko will work with Dr. Brittany Fasy on Using the 3D Programming Software Alice to Teach Computer Science with Storytelling
  • Marie Morin will work with Dr. Clem Izurieta on A Longitudinal Study of Technical Debt in Gaming Systems
  • Carie Pointer will work with Dr. David Millman on Share Code: An Active Learning Tool for Computer Science

IEEE AUTOTESTCON 2017 Best Paper Award

Dr. John Sheppard and recent graduate Dr. Shane Strasser received the Walter E. Peterson Best Paper Award at IEEE AUTOTESTCON 2017 for their paper titled, "A Factored Evolutionary Optimization Approach to Bayesian Abductive Inference for Multiple Fault Diagnosis."  Congratulations! [September 2017]

Upsilon Pi Epsilon Scholarship Awards

Upsilon Pi Epsilon is a Computer Science Honor Society with a newly formed chapter at Montana State University.  Recently, Ph.D. student Sam Micka received a UPE Academic Achievement Award and undergraduate Nate Tranel received a UPE Scholarship Award.  Congratulations! [September 2017]

ACM BCB Best Paper Award

Congratulations to Ph.D. student Alan Cleary who co-authored a paper entitled Exploiting Frequented Regions in Pan-Genomic Graphs.  The paper received the Best Student Paper Award at the ACM BCB Conference, a premier conference for computational biology research.  Paper co-authors included faculty members Dr. Indika Kahanda and Dr. Brendan Mumey.  Congratulations!  [August 2017]

NSF Biological Informatics Grant

Congratulations to David Millman (PI) and Brendan Mumey (co-PI) who received a three year, $300K grant entitled Biofilm Resource and Information Database (BRaID):  A Tool to Fuse Diverse Biofilm Data Types. The project is a collaboration with MSU's Center for Biofilm Engineering, as well as the National Center for Genome Resources (NCGR) in Santa Fe.  BRaID will serve as a bioinformatics community resource, containing both data and the metadata (where or how data was collected, processed, and interpreted).  More information.   [July 2017]

Vienna Study Abroad Trip

12 Montana State University computer science students completed a study abroad course at TU Wien during the first six week summer session.  Check out these photos!  The next computer science study abroad course will likely take place in 2020.  [June 2017]

2017 Excellence in Teaching Award

Congratulations to Clem Izurieta, who received the College of Engineering's Excellence in Teaching Award! [May 2017]

2017 School Awards

  • Outstanding Ph.D. Researcher: Guangchi Liu
  • Outstanding Ph.D. Researcher: Logan Perreault
  • Outstanding Teaching Assistant: Jici Huang
  • Outstanding Undergraduate Course Assistant: Ashley Bertrand
  • Outstanding Faculty Research: Brittany Fasy
  • Outstanding Faculty Service: Binhai Zhu
  • Student Selected Professor of the Year: Qing Yang

NSF Storytelling Grant

Congratulations to Brittany Terese Fasy (PI), Mike Wittie (co-PI) and Sweeney Windchief (co-PI, Native American Studies) who are among the proposers of a newly funded, three year, $1,166K grant entitled Improving the Pipeline for Rural and American Indian Students Entering Computer Science Via Storytelling.  This project will develop and research storytelling as a culturally responsive way to engage middle school American Indian and rural Montana students in learning computer science and computing skills. Resources for teachers will be developed to meet the requirements of Montana's Indian Education for All (IEFA) Act, which was mandated by the state legislature in 1999 and remains a difficult requirement for many middle school teachers to incorporate in their classrooms.  More information.  MSU news article.   [March 2017]

Fall Semester Notable Offerings

  • CSCI 112, Programming with C, 3 credits.  CSCI 112 is normally only offered in the spring.
  • CSCI 127, The Joy and Beauty of Data, 4 credits.  This course replaces CSCI 111 in the curriculum starting this fall.  Students who have passed CSCI 111 (or a successor course such as CSCI 132) are not eligible to take CSCI 127.
  • CSCI 232, Data Structures and Algorithms, 4 credits.  CSCI 232 is normally only offered in the spring.
  • CSCI 447, Machine Learning, 3 credits.  This course is offered every second fall.
  • CSCI 451, Computational Biology, 3 credits.  This course is offered every second fall.
  • CSCI 540, Advanced Database Systems, 3 credits.  This course is offered every second fall.
  • CSCI 551, Advanced Computational Biology, 3 credits.  This course is offered every second fall.

Summer Session Offerings

First Six Week Session:

  • CSCI 112, Programming with C, 3 credits
  • CSCI 132, Basic Data Structures and Algorithms, 4 credits
  • CSCI 215 Social & Ethical Issues in Computing, 3 credits
  • CSCI 246, Discrete Structures
  • CSCI 477 (co-listed as EIND 422), Simulation, 3 credits

Second Six Week Session:

  • CSCI 111, Programming with Java, 4 credits
  • CS 145, Web Design, 3 credits
  • CSCI 232, Data Structures and Algorithms, 4 credits

Full Twelve Week Session:

  • EELE 261, Logic Circuits, 4 credits

Women's Center Student of Achievement Award

CS senior MacKenzie O'Bleness will receive a Student of Achievement Award from the MSU Women's Center.  At MSU, MacKenzie has promoted diversity in computing by serving as president of the Association for Women in Computing, serving as student leader to the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing Conference, organizing high school outreach efforts, and more.  Congratulations!  [March 2017]

Three Minute Thesis Competition

Congratulations to Ph.D. student Utkarsh Goel who competed in the College of Engineering's Three Minute Thesis Competition on March 3rd.  Utkarsh received the people's choice award for a presentation entitled Changing Perception with Augmented Reality.  Utkarsh is advised by Dr. Mike Wittie.  [March 2017]

Air Force Project

Dr. Clem Izurieta has secured $200K in funding from The Air Force (via TechLink) to support the research and development of Quality Assurance of Sustainment Management Systems (SMS).  The award also supports the development of the Risk Management Framework: a new approach for validating software and systems in government.  As the project is carried out, several computer science students will be employed and gain valuable software engineering experience.   [March 2017]

Awards for Excellence

Computer Science seniors Ashley Bertrand and MacKenzie O'Bleness were recognized among the 40 outstanding seniors at the MSU Alumni Association / Bozeman Chamber of Commerce Awards for Excellence banquet on February 21st.  Recipients excel academically and through service.  Ashley selected John Paxton and MacKenzie selected Clem Izurieta as inspirational mentors.  Congratulations!  [February 2017]

NSF REU Site Award

Dr. Clem Izurieta (PI) and Dr. Brendan Mumey (Co-PI) have received a $288K NSF REU Site award from the National Science Foundation.  The award is titled Research and Development of Algorithms in a Software Factory and enables cohorts of eight students from across the U.S. to live in Bozeman while participating in our Software Factory during each of the summers of 2017, 2018 and 2019.  More information. Congratulations!  [February 2017]

Assistant Provost for Curriculum Development

Dr. Brendan Mumey was recently appointed to serve part-time as the Assistant Provost for Curriculum Development.  In this position, Dr. Mumey will work closely with faculty, department chairs and program directors in the development and enhancement of new academic offerings, including courses, certificates, minors and majors.  Congratulations! [January 2017]

National Science Foundation Grant

Dr. Upulee Kanewala is the sole PI of a two-year, $156K NSF grant entitled Toward Sustainable Software for Science - Implementing and Assessing Systematic Testing Approaches for Scientific Software.  The grant begins in May.  Congratulations! [January 2017]

Professor Emeritus of Computer Science

Dr. Rocky Ross will receive the title of Professor Emeritus of Computer Science during the January 12th Board of Regents meeting.  During his 1983-2015 career, Rocky received numerous awards that include the College of Engineering’s Excellence in Teaching Award, an MSU Alumni Foundation / Chamber of Commerce Award for Excellence, multiple departmental teaching awards, and the ACM SIGACT Outstanding Service Award. Rocky also served as interim department head for a half year. Thousands of students benefited from Rocky's mentorship.  Congratulations, Rocky - well deserved!  [January 2017]

Sit With Me Campaign

SitWithMe.org is a national organization that shares, supports and celebrates the importance of women's participation in computing and technology.  Montana State University's Gianforte School of Computing is one of six organizations featured by SitWithMe.  Learn more, see photos and watch a video.  A big thanks goes to Sharlyn Izurieta for organizing this initiative and to everyone who has participated in our efforts. [January 2017]

Undergraduate Scholars Program Funding

Computer science major Hayley Smith  received funding from MSU's Undergraduate Scholars Program to participate in a storytelling project.  Hayley will be advised by Dr. Brittany Fasy and Dr. Roger Fisher (Gallatin College).  Congratulations! [January 2017]