INCOSE San Diego
December 2017 Newsletter
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From the President
Recent Events and Plans: This past month in the INCOSE
San Diego chapter has been jam-packed. We held our annual STEM Event at
Legoland on 17 November: A change from the perennial trip to the Midway.
We’ll continue to mix it up a bit going forward, aiming for at least
three venues we can rotate through each year. But more on all that
elsewhere in this newsletter.
We held our annual San Diego Regional Mini-conference on 2 December. It,
too, was a big success – wish you all could have made it. More on that
later in this newsletter, too.
And planning has begun on an annual (TBR) Western States Regional
Conference (WSRC) starting next year in Seattle…or possibly starting in
Salt Lake City or Los Angeles in 2019 – plans are just beginning. The
hope is to rotate it around the western region from year to year. We
need to consider when San Diego might host it.
And we have just sent out the ballot for our slate of board members for
2018. If you haven’t voted yet, and you get this in time, please do so.
And fair warning: Next year I will be point for finding volunteers to
serve in 2019. You might run, but you can’t hide!
Wrapping Up Our Theme this Year: In this newsletter
column this year we have discussed interoperability, systems-of-systems
engineering, Big Systems engineering, and how the phrase “evolution in
action” applies to all that. And if you attended our Mini-conference
this month you heard me wax eloquent – or at least drone on – about it
all.
But if you missed the mini-conference, let me just sum things up with
this. Net-centric/net-ready are neither necessary nor sufficient to
achieve interoperability. But they help. System-of-Systems and Big
Systems Engineering are pretty much synonymous, since large monolithic
systems aren’t practical at the scales we are now addressing. And one
man’s system is another woman’s subsystem is another person’s
system-of-systems.
And our systems have become big…very big…even, in the word of President
Trump, HUUUGE. And they’ll get huger. Systems of systems of systems of
systems of….
Anybody thinking SkyNet yet? Well, the sky isn’t really the limit. We
already have trans-atmospheric systems such as satellites and other
spacecraft. We are going to have more. There is, once again, somewhat
serious talk of going back to the moon or to Mars. The systems built to
turn those dreams into realities are going to be extremely complex, and
absolutely critical to those risking their lives on such missions. Our
solutions must be accordingly complex. And the systems and the processes
to build them effectively must evolve to meet the needs.
But, in the words of Albert Einstein, they should be as simple as
possible, but not simpler. In other words, we should strive to make them
as simple as possible – such systems by need are complicated enough
without making things more complicated – but if we make them simpler
than necessary, then they will fail utterly.
Who best to take on such tasks? The [Big] Systems Engineer of course!
(In conjunction with many, many others). We have a HUGE role in this.
And as the systems making up the system of systems of systems must
interoperate to perfection, the interoperability engineer will be vital.
What a challenge! What fun! What job security!
Fare Thee Well: My time at this column is at a close.
It has been a pleasure sharing my thoughts with you fellow systems
engineers this year. I will be passing this baton to next year’s INCOSE
San Diego Chapter President, Ted Mulder. The baton will be in good
hands.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year,
Richard Bryson
San Diego INCOSE Chapter President, 2017
Interoperability: It’s more than just a ping test.
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SD INCOSE Holds Successful Teacher/Student STEM Night
On November 7th the STEM teacher/student event for 2017 was held at the
LEGOLAND Aquarium in Carlsbad. And, as they say, a great time was had by
all!
About 85 people attended the event with 40% being kids. The aquarium was
a winning environment and the Ray feeding was a big hit.
We had 4 teachers speak about how they used their INCOSE STEM teaching
grants that were sponsored by Cubic, ViaSat, SAIC, and INCOSE members.
We also had 5 teacher/student demonstrations set up to show examples of
how the grants were used and helped the kids learn about STEM
subjects.Both the teachers/students as well as the attendees enjoyed
interacting and learning about the demonstrations.
Please make plans to attend next years STEM Teacher/student event. It will be another fun and encouraging time.
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2017 STEM Teacher Grants Ready to Award
This year we have received 16 proposals from 4th - 12th grade teachers
in San Diego County. Per our Request for Proposals, the proposals are
seeking from $600 - $1100 to fund many worthy projects and needs that
will help these teachers better teach STEM subjects with the purpose of
motivating our students to pursue STEM studies and careers.
Proposals were received from many elementary and middle schools, with
one from a high school. The proposals came from North, Central, and East
San Diego County.
We do not have sufficient funds donated by local companies and
individuals to fund all of the proposals. We will be funding as many as
the donated funds allow. We are continuing to look for additional funds.
You can help. How about asking your company to help with a $1K or 2K
tax deductible donation? Contact Jim Gottfried, 619-540-3830 for more
information or help in speaking with your company.
You can also contribute to this very worthy program by making an
individual tax deductible donation of $20 or $50 or $100 or more to the
INCOSE Foundation at http://www.incose.org/about/Foundation/FoundationDonate
Select the drop down and select “San Diego STEM Teacher Grants”,
then just enter the amount and hit continue at the bottom of the
page.
This is SD INCOSE's 6th year of making STEM Teacher grants. To date we
have made over $60K in grants to over 65 San Diego County teacher. We
estimate that we have improved the STEM teaching experience for over
3,500 students.
We'd like to see more members involved with this worthy program. If you'd like to get involved contact Jim Gottfried, gottjim50@gmail.com.
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The 2017 INCOSE San Diego Mini-Conference
Thank you to all who attended the 2017 INCOSE San Diego Mini-Conference!
We had 15 systems engineering presentations and one panel on subjects
ranging from Interoperability to System of Systems (SOS) to the Science
of Lawmaking, with 17 speakers. It was a great day and very nicely
attended, and we are looking forward to an even better mini-conference
next year. For those of you who could not make it, or simply want to
read more, the presentation slides are on our chapter website at https://sdincose.org/resources/documents/ . Please continue to check back, as we continue to load more presentations as permissions to do so become available.
Also, special thanks to our sponsor Jama Software. Please visit their website at www.jamasoftware.com. You may also see their presentation slides on our chapter website at https://sdincose.org/resources/documents/.
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Upcoming Events
Annual Social & Membership Meeting
- When: 17 January 2018, 5:30 - 8:30 pm
- Where: Oggies Pizza Carmel Mountain
10155 Rancho Carmel Dr
San Diego, CA 92128
- Appetizers & Food will be provided.
- Please bring any guests or others interested in joining INCOSE SD
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Did you know…?
INCOSE San Diego is now accepting articles from members for presentation
in the quarterly newsletter. Each newsletter will present one article,
with the goal being to provide deeper understanding of specific S.E.
topics for our readers. To apply to have your topic in the newsletter,
please submit your
proposed article (one page in length or less) to both the Chapter President and the VP of Administration. Thank you.
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 2017 INCOSE San Diego Board Contacts
Questions or suggestions? Please feel free to contact any of the 2016 board members at the following email addresses:
Richard Bryson, President
richard.alan.bryson@gmail.com
Ted Mulder, President-Elect
ted.mulder@ngc.com
Ray Madachy, Past President
madachy@ieee.org
Abbas Rostami, Treasurer
abbas.rostami@gmail.com
Jack Turner, Ch. Development
jack.l.turner@xsitellc.com
James Meng, VP of Tech Development
mengjc@mit.edu
Mark Halverson, Secretary
mark.halverson@ngc.com
Andy von Stauffenberg, VP of Admin & Newsletter
avs@vstarsystems.com
Jim Gottfried, 2-year Director
gottjim@roadrunner.com
Greg Bulla, Website
gbulla@yahoo.com
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