We have recently submitted to SHPE National Office our 2011 Mid Year Report:

In the Cover Letter, Jorge Seda, our President, stated:

The Cincinnati Professional Chapter of the Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers is proud to present our 2nd Report under the new National Reporting Program for your review. This report highlights our 2011 goals as well as our accomplishments and challenges during the second half of the current fiscal year.

The focus for the last six months of 2010 was to support the AHETEMS goal for high school student visitation and workshops during the National Conference, market the new chapter to potential new members and supporters, and help with a Science Camp organized by Northern Kentucky University. Thanks to the hard work and commitment of Chapter members, we took 46 high school students from Cincinnati Public Schools, Lakota School and Northern Kentucky Schools to the AHETEMS pre-college program Symposium during the 2010 SHPE Conference in Cincinnati. In addition, our members supported the 2010 SHPE National Convention held in Cincinnati in October.

SHPE Cincinnati Professional chapter had a busy 2011 first half. On Feb. 17th, our chapter had its 2nd networking meeting at AMIS (Academy of Multilingual Immersion Studies). Representatives from iSPACE presented their Robotics programs that we plan to use in the Robotic Clubs at local schools with high number of Hispanic students. SHPE Cincinnati selected AMIS (Cincinnati Public Schools) and Hopewell Jr. High (Lakota School District) for our initial plan to sponsor and mentor at the next iSPACE competition.

On February 19th, SHPE Cincinnati members volunteered as judges in the First Tech Robotics Final Competition at the iSPACE Center in Sharonville, Ohio. This event served as a great learning lesson for our members as they prepare to form teams for the next competition at iSPACE. In March and April, we held “Career Awareness” events for Hispanic kids at Hopewell Junior High and AMIS. The goals are to introduce students to STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) fields, motivate them to go to college, and make raise awareness to available opportunities to them. It was a great experience for SHPE members that interacted with young thriving kids with lots of questions on college and STEM fields.

This year we started building K-12 outreach partnership with local school district officials and launched new members networking/recruiting meeting in order to continue building the pipeline for local Hispanic engineers and revitalize the SHPE student chapter at the University of Cincinnati.

We are driving participation in SHPE National events to further our knowledge and expand our network. Two chapter EBOD members attended the 2010 NILA Conference and another extended board member is planning on attending the 2011 NILA Conference. Several chapter members are planning on attending the 2011 National Conference in Los Angeles.

Our new professional chapter is working for the growing Hispanic community in this area of the country. Our main challenge continues to be that while there is a large Hispanic population in K-12 that can greatly benefit from SHPE programs; there is still a very limited pool of local Hispanic STEM Professionals to support all the events.

We look forward to learn from your feedback as we strive to become a more effective chapter.

Sincerely,

Jorge F. Seda, PE
Cincinnati Professional Chapter President

You can download the Full Report here