Hotep! BDPA Education & Technology Foundation (BETF) exists to provide financial support for BDPA. We share information about fundraising, funding sources and BDPA programs on this blog. The postings on this site are my own and don’t necessarily represent BDPA’s positions, strategies or opinions.
Showing posts with label BDPA Greater Columbia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label BDPA Greater Columbia. Show all posts
BDPA Education and Technology Foundation (BETF) is proud to announce that Jalil Peterman will use the Bemley Scholarship awarded all the members of the BDPA Greater Columbia High School Computer Competition (HSCC) team with a $1,000 college scholarship to support his study of graphic design at the Coastal Carolina University. Jalil is a 2017 graduate from Dutch Fork High School. Regarding career goals, Jalil plans to study graphic design at Coastal Carolina University to gain better knowledge of this field and become a Graphics Designer for a shoe or clothing company.
We asked Jalil to share his thoughts on BDPA:
"The most memorable moment from BDPA that I can take with me would of course be the experience of the HSCC competition. From the day we left for the conference until the day we got home, we had a very unique experience. I remember our instructor coming over to our room to give us presenting tips and reviewing key words with us. The day of the competition had my mind everywhere, being in a room full of other competitors that possess the same skill as us but only few could come out on top. On the day of the award ceremony I was very surprised when they called our name for coming in third place. Knowing you worked hard on something and it paying off like that is something I will never forget.
BDPA Gr. Columbia (Braxton, Briana, Jalil)
Participating in the BDPA program has left me with a more open mind about how to solve problems and most definitely how to interact with others and present myself to others. I have also taken away 'how to plan out' and 'how to get certain task done' is a much better use of my time."
BDPA is blessed to have such a young and talented student as a winner of the Bemley Scholarship. We look forward to supporting Jalil's career as he seeks to advance in the technology industry!
The 2015 National BDPA High School Computer Competition (HSCC) championships were held in Washington DC. We had 15 teams competing in 2015. The two-day competition was fierce and we had a new champion from Atlanta! The 2014 HSCC Champion were from BDPA Atlanta and they earned HP laptops and a $2,000 Dr. Jesse Bemley Scholarship for attending college. They beat out the defending championship team from BDPA Washington DC and the team who placed won the silver medal at the 2014 competition from BDPA Greater Columbia.
Here are the rankings for all 15 teams that competed in 2015 national HSCC championships with the scholarship winnings for each student in parenthesis:
Atlanta ($2,000 Bemley Scholarship for each student)
Washington DC ($1,500 scholarship)
Greater Columbia ($1,000 scholarship)
Southern Minnesota ($750 scholarship)
New Jersey ($500 scholarship)
St Louis
Cincinnati
Middle Tennessee
Indianapolis
Chicago
Dallas
Twin Cities
Triangle
New York
Milwaukee
Our foundation seeks to increase the number of students that receive Bemley Scholarships. To do so, we need your help. Please consider making an online donation to help us interest young people in science and technology.
BDPA Education and Technology Foundation (BETF) awarded BDPA Greater Columbia with a $4,000 grant in support of its 2017 Student Information Technology Education & Scholarship (SITES) program. The funds will be used for 2017 BDPA Conference registration, lodging, airfare, incidentals for Youth Technology Students, expenses for chaperones, classroom instruction and college scholarships.
BDPA Gr. Columbia Students
BETF seeks to provide funding for National BDPA and its 46 local chapters. We encourage you to support our BDPA Greater Columbia chapter by making a secure online contribution.
BDPA has a strong relationship with BlueCross BlueShield of South Carolina as three of our past presidents from our BDPA Greater Columbia chapter were employees of the company. As such we are pleased to announce that BlueCross BlueShield of South Carolina made a donation of $4,000 to support our BDPA Greater Columbia chapter.
Enclosed is BlueCross BlueShield of South Carolina's donation in the amount of $4,000 for the BDPA Greater Columbia Youth Computer Program grant ... We extend our best wishes to you for continued success and look forward to hearing about your accomplishments during the year."
This funding will support BDPA Greater Columbia efforts to bring more young people to the annual BDPA Technology Conference!
Kevin Rabinovich has been a long-time member of the BDPA Greater Columbia chapter. Kevin is a pianist, designer, developer, and director of TEDxYouth@ColumbiaSC. He's passionate about ideas, design, and coding. He founded TEDxYouth@ColumbiaSC, Columbia's by-youth, for-youth conference in 2011, which has attracted over 500 attendees and over 30 speakers from around the world in total.
Kevin has been playing piano since 5 years old. He was in the A. C. Flora High School jazz band and accompanies school chorus concerts and musicals. He led the FalconProgramming club at his high school, teaching club members about programming and game and product design. He also directs the school-wide Hour of Code, in which students are introduced to programming through a game created by FalconProgramming. Kevin was also part of CodeDay Columbia, a 24-hour hackathon for Columbia's high school and college students.
Kevin wrote, “My most memorable BDPA moment was when my team (Greater Columbia) got second place at the national High School Computer Competition championship. It was very rewarding, because all of our team’s hard work and preparation had finally paid off, and we were happy to beat the team who had previously beat so many others by showing them the power of teamwork and collaboration.”
Participating in BDPA has allowed him to gain access to a variety of scholarships, which are very relevant to his chosen field in technology. Kevin majors in architecture at Clemson University. His career goal is to become an MLG interaction designer.
Rick Giraudy has a powerful legacy within BDPA. He served for many years as our National BDPA VP-Finance. E arlier this year Rick took on leadership of BDPA Greater Columbia chapter.
This blog wanted to get a more personal look into the personality of this rising BDPA leader. We asked Rick to give brief answers to some odd questions. We hope you enjoy this new feature that we simply call, 'Long Story Short...'
Craziest thing you've ever done?Jumped off of a 90-foot cliff in to a lake.
Rick Giraudy * BDPA Gr. Columbia
Favorite food you'd take with you on a desert island?Fresh baked Italian bread. Still warm on the inside. YUM!
Favorite way to exercise?Spin class!! Gets me moving blood circulating and my knees don't hurt.
Simple things that make you happiest?A hug from my daughter who is starting her 3rd year at Georgia Southern University. Heck these days a phone call without asking for money would be great!
Who You'd Like to Meet?Wish I would have met Heavy D and Whitney Houston... My favorite people of all time are my grandfather Sid (knew him well), General Colin Powell (got to meet him twice) and President Obama: I got a salute from him.
Anthony Coleman capped off his BDPA experience in high school by winning two scholarships -- Dr. Jesse Bemley Scholarship and the Human Capital Logistics Scholarship. He will use the scholarships to help fund his Computer Technology degree at Midlands Technical College and Winthrop University. Anthony grew up in a military family. Both his father and grandfather served in the Armed Forces for over 20 years. Anthony was born in Richmond, Virginia, however he has lived in five different states, including Alaska. The constant movement that comes with being a 'military brat' was stressful at times, however, it allowed Anthony to become an adaptive and resilient person.
Anthony graduated from Dutch Fork High School where he was actively involved in numerous extracurricular activities, such as the Beta Club, Future Business Leaders of America, and Distributive Education Clubs of America. He also graduated from the Youth Corps leadership program, and was the team captain of the BDPA Greater Columbia High School Computer Competition (HSCC) team from 2012-2014. He capped his BDPA experience on the HSCC team by taking home the silver medal at the 2014 National HSCC Championship held in Indianapolis, IN.
He spent his first year of college studying Computer Information Systems at Winthrop University. He is currently attending Midlands Technical College this fall to continue to work towards his career aspiration of becoming employed as a Computer Programmer. He plans to return to Winthrop complete his college education.
Anthony shared his testimonial on being part of the BDPA Student Information Technology Education & Scholarship (SITES) program:
After being a part of BDPA for 5 years, I can definitely say that BDPA has helped steer me in the direction of studying Computer Science in college. Before joining BDPA, I had already developed an interest in working with computers. However, I did not have an outlet to further explore my interest and develop skills in the field. When my mom first introduced me to BDPA, I was intrigued because I would be able to do something that I enjoyed while being with my friends from school. As time passed, my friends lost interest in the program due to the early meeting times on weekends. Nevertheless, I stayed with it as my passion for Computer Science and Web Design grew.
By the end of the year, I was a part of the High School Computer Competition (HSCC) team. After my first competition, my team finished in the lower half of the standings. I was not discouraged after this result; it only proved that we had room to improve.
At the start of my second year in BDPA, there was a new focus within the chapter. There were new students and instructors, but there was clearly a different mindset. Everyone felt like we could really compete with the top teams. We took this new attitude straight to the HSCC competition in Baltimore. We finished the competition 7th overall. Although this finish might not seem that meaningful, it was huge step up from how we had performed in previous years. We believed that with a few tweaks to our formula we could easily make it into the top five. With this in mind, we trained harder than ever for the next competition in Washington, DC. I was even named captain of the team before heading to DC. On the night of the Gala, we all expected to finish in the top five. Unfortunately, we ended up finishing in the exact same spot as last year. I felt discouraged after such a disappointing result.
2014 BDPA Greater Columbia HSCC Team
Heading into my final year being a part of the HSCC team, I was determined to have my best performance ever. I was not aiming to merely finish in the top five; my goal was to win the competition. We showed up to the competition more focused than ever. Each day of competition our team was like a well-oiled machine. After the last day of competition, I had no doubt that we would have a great finish. At the gala, my teammates were nervous about the results, but I was calm. When we found out that we had finished second, I was elated. All the hard work and training I had endured had finally paid off. It didn’t even bother me that we missed winning by only a couple points. I was content with our success.
Being a part of BDPA helped me in so many ways. I have greatly helped my public speaking skills and taught me how to lead a group of people to common goal. This was a bonus to all the knowledge I would receive in Computer Science that would aid me during my first year of college. I am eternally grateful to my BDPA teachers, teammates, and chapter leaders.
We are very proud of the work that Anthony has put in over the years and we're glad that these college scholarships will help him further his education. Our hope is that those of you reading this message will support the young people being trained in BDPA Greater Columbia.
Kevin Rabinovich has been a long-time member of the BDPA Greater Columbia chapter. Kevin is a pianist, designer, developer, and director of TEDxYouth@ColumbiaSC. He's passionate about ideas, design, and coding. He founded TEDxYouth@ColumbiaSC, Columbia's by-youth, for-youth conference in 2011, which has attracted over 500 attendees and over 30 speakers from around the world in total.
Kevin has been playing piano since 5 years old. He was in the A. C. Flora High School jazz band and accompanies school chorus concerts and musicals. He led the FalconProgramming club at his high school, teaching club members about programming and game and product design. He also directs the school-wide Hour of Code, in which students are introduced to programming through a game created by FalconProgramming. Kevin was also part of CodeDay Columbia, a 24-hour hackathon for Columbia's high school and college students.
Kevin wrote, “My most memorable BDPA moment was when my team (Greater Columbia) got second place at the national High School Computer Competition championship. It was very rewarding, because all of our team’s hard work and preparation had finally paid off, and we were happy to beat the team who had previously beat so many others by showing them the power of teamwork and collaboration.”
Participating in BDPA has allowed him to gain access to a variety of scholarships, which are very relevant to his chosen field in technology. Kevin majors in architecture at Clemson University. His career goal is to become an MLG interaction designer.
BDPA Greater Columbia chapter proudly announced the renewal of its Bronze-level sponsorship from IT-oLogy. IT-oLogy is a non profit collaboration of businesses, academic institutions and organizations dedicated to growing the IT talent pipeline, fostering economic development and advancing the IT profession. The organization works tirelessly to promote, teach and grow information technology with its programs and services.
BDPA Greater Columbia receives in-kind facilities donation to conduct its annual computer camp impacting 8th-thru-12th graders as well as its monthly program meetings for IT professionals in South Carolina.
Lonnie Emard
"IT-oLogy values the partnership and alliance with BDPA because combining our efforts to solve our national IT talent shortage is creating a winning formula for employers, professionals, students and ultimately for the economic condition of the USA," says IT-oLogy president Lonnie Emard.
IT-oLogy provided a college scholarship to BDPA student member Jerron Jamerson. Jerron is now an IT intern with Duke Energy as he completes work on his computer science degree from Winston-Salem State University. BDPA is very proud of its long-term partnership with IT-oLogy.
BDPA Greater Columbia (chartered May 1997) reminds me of the little engine that could. The chapter has trained hundreds of K-12 students in its Student Information Technology Education & Scholarship (SITES) program over the years. The chapter has great community and corporate support through sponsors such as IT-oLogy. Many wonderful students, such as Anthony Coleman, Raven Stevenson and Brandi Taylor, from this chapter have received college scholarships as a result of their BDPA activity.
The next logical step is for BDPA Greater Columbia chapter to win the national BDPA HSCC championship. Could it happen this year?
BDPA Columbia chapter trained 15 students this year. Chapter volunteers worked with these students to develop and increase Information Technology skills and knowledge with seminars and workshops in web development (asp.net), programming (vb.net) databases (mysql), java script, system development life-cycle, web site story boarding and agile project management methodology. Also, these students participated in workshops focused on video creation and editing, creating web page profile, and oral presentations.
L-R: Perry Cates, Kevin Rabinovich, Joel Schirmer, Cody Shearer, James Smith,
Jalil Peterman, Makayla Ishaml, Constance Elkins and Braxton Robinson
The lifeblood of any nonprofit association is its membership. We are proud to announce that membership has grown for the 4th straight month to its highest level since January 2010. In fact, the total membership increased by 21% so far this year... and up 50% from this time last year! The membership growth is a direct result of efforts by local, regional and national leaders to provide a value proposition to members (and potential members) with its programs, scholarships and services. Kudos to the National BDPA presidentCraig Brownand his team for the continued positive trending in this core metric.
For the third month in a row we pay homage to BDPA Cincinnati chapter (president Dalric Webb) for its continued success in terms of membership retention and recruitment. BDPA Cincinnati added more members in April than any other chapter in the nation as it became the 2nd largest chapter in the nation. Most of these new members came from sponsorship decisions made by Cincinnati Bell and Procter & Gamble.
LaDonna Crum
Two other chapters deserve recognition for their membership growth in April. BDPA chapters in Greater Birmingham (president, LaDonna Crum) and Greater Columbia (president, Mildred Allen) managed to grow their chapters by 30% and 20%, respectively last month.
We believe in the management maxim -- you get what you measure. Let us assess the numbers in order to honor those local BDPA chapters who are demonstrating success in their efforts to recruit and retain members. Let's take a look at the ten largest chapters in BDPA-Nation:
The top five chapters on the list remain in the 'BDPA Century Club'! The benefit ofhaving powerful leadership is obvious when we see that Atlanta, Chicago, Cincinnati, Philadelphia and Washington DC each have over 100 members. One of the common denominators for each of these chapters is that they place a high premium on the delivery of quality programs and services to their members. These chapters work hard to ensure that there is a strong return on the $100 investment that each member makes thru annual dues.
What are your thoughts about the value of BDPA membership?What can your local chapter do to improve the value-proposition for you on a personal or professional level?
BDPA Education and Technology Foundation (BETF) is pleased to announce approval of $2,550 grant disbursement to BDPA Greater Columbia chapter. This grant disbursement flows smoothly with our vision to achieve, through investment in education and technology, an informed Black community prepared to lead and leverage the knowledge revolution for the benefit of the community-at-large.
BDPA Gr Columbia Students
BDPA Greater Columbia chapter presidentMildred Allen requested the funding to pay for the High School Computer Training Program and High School Computer Competition (HSCC) program in 2013. Twenty-five students participated in the 2013 program on a local level in South Carolina. Ten of these student members participated in the National HSCC and the Youth Technology Camp during the 2013 BDPA Technology Conference in Washington DC.
Congratulations to BDPA Greater Columbia for its strong efforts to provide meaningful STEM-related programs to its young people. BDPA is making a difference in its efforts to promote the 'future faces of technology'.
BDPA Education and Technology Foundation (BETF) is very grateful to IBM for its recent grant award of $3,000 that recognizes the volunteer work done by IBM retiree Paulette Johnson-Davis. Paulette is a long-time BDPA leader who currently serves as the vice president of business management for the BDPA Greater Columbia chapter. She submitted an IBM Community Grant request for funding in mid-July. We learned today that the request had been approved! The grant approval letter read, in part:
Dear Mr. Wayne Hicks,
On behalf of International Business Machines Corporation, I am pleased to tell you that a cash grant of $3,000.00 has been approved to support BDPA Education and Technology Foundation's IT Training Support program. This grant has been awarded in recognition of the volunteer service of Paulette Johnson-Davis. IBM's Community Service grants are based on requests from employees or retirees who have a record of active and ongoing involvement with not-for-profit organizations and schools.
We are pleased to support BDPA Education and Technology Foundation and extend our best wishes for continued success of your programs.
Sincerely,
Wanda Guy
CCCA Program Administrator
International Business Machines Corporation
Paulette's volunteer efforts have been in support of the Student Information Technology Education & Technology (SITES) program implemented by BDPA Greater Columbia chapter. The funds from this volunteer grant will be restricted for the benefit of her chapter.
Anthony is a senior at Dutch Fork High School with a STEM course concentration in computer science. He has been a member of the High School Computer Competition (HSCC) team trained by BDPA Greater Columbia chapter for the past three years. He was the HSCC team captain this year! Anthony is already making plans to participate in the 2014 BDPA Technology Conference as a participant in the BDPA IT Showcase.
Anthony is also involved in the Junior League of Greater Columbia leadership program and serves as a student liaison for his school district Cyber Saturday Technology event. BDPA is very proud to recognize Anthony as a 'future face of technology'!
Brandi is the proud daughter of Jessie and Yvette Taylor. She is currently a 10th grade student at Irmo High School in Columbia, South Carolina. Brandi participates in many extracurricular activities including, Track, Girls Scouts, National Beta Club, National BDPA and her local church. She has won numerous awards such as, National Junior Scholar (2009-2010) and Academic Excellence (2010-2011).
Brandi is a two-time participant in the BDPA IT Showcase. Her IT Showcase research and presentation was entitled, 'Penetrating the Cloud: Exploration of Cloud Computing.' Brandi’s current career plan after high school is to become a Nurse. Her ultimate motto is “I can do anything if I put my mind to it.”
BDPA Greater Columbia chapter is one of the most remarkable local BDPA chapters in the nation. They have shown a commitment to providing meaningful STEM learning experiences for K-12 students in South Carolina. The training is conducted under the umbrella of the Student Information Technology Education & Scholarship (SITES) program. Chapter leaders and volunteers are offering seminars and workshops in web development (asp.net), programming (vb.net) databases (mysql), java script, system development life-cycle, web site story boarding and argile project management methodology. The students in the chapter's SITES program are also taken through a series of workshops in video creation and editing, creating web page profile, and oral presentations.
L-R: Perry Cates, Jr., Kevin Rabinovich, Joel Schirmer, Cody Shearer, James Smith,
Jalil Peterman, Makayla Ishmal, Constance Elkins, and Braxton Robinson Not pictured: Horace Bookman, Brandon Elkins, Amber Goodman, Kayla Jackson,
Ashley Taylor, and Anthony Coleman. Instructors: Kelvin Robinson and Alex Rabinovich
The funding for training these young people comes from corporate sponsors (BlueCross BlueShield of South Carolina and IT-oLogy), membership dues and supportive donors like yourself!
BDPA Greater Columbia chapter presidentMildred Allen and I were honored to be present at the Naval Reserve Officers Training Corps Commissioning ceremony on Friday, May 10th at the Duke University Chapel, Duke University, in Durham, NC. Raven Stevenson, a graduate of our local High School Computer Competition (HSCC) training program, was commissioned in the United States Navy on Friday, and she received her Bachelor’s Degree in Biology from Duke University on Sunday. What an outstanding set of achievements!
You may remember Raven as the HSCC student who won the $180,000 scholarship in 2009 while competing at the HSCC competition in Washington, DC. Her fellow team members were Dominique Geiger and Sami Patel.
L-R: Rick Leggett, Paulette Johnson-Davis, Perry Carter, Mildred Allen, Ensign Raven Stevenson, Monique Berry and Carl Hill
After the Commissioning Ceremony, the BDPA Triangle Chapter hosted a reception for Raven and her family at the First Flight Venture Center in Durham, NC. The reception was attended by members of Raven’s family, National BDPA president Monique Berry, as well as by members of the BDPA Triangle, BDPA Washington DC and BDPA Greater Columbia Area chapters.
Ensign Stevenson will report in August 2013 to CG 66 USS HUE CITY in Mayport, Florida. We congratulate Raven on her outstanding accomplishments and wish her every success in the future.
Sincerely, Paulette Johnson-Davis
Vice President of Business Management
BDPA Greater Columbia Area Chapter
BDPA Greater Columbia chapter has created quite a legacy for itself since being chartered in 1997. For example, one of the young people trained by the chapter is currently enrolled at Duke University on a $180,000 college scholarship that she won during a national BDPA conference from the United States Navy [SOURCE].
Mildred Allen
The chapter is also a ripe source of national leadership. Two members of the chapter have served as national officers in recent years. Mildred Allen did remarkable work as National BDPA vice president of membership management. The national organization created a new membership database and web portal under her leadership. Paulette Johnson-Davis (BlueCross BlueShield of South Carolina) implemented new and improved programs for BDPA in her role as our National BDPA vice president of member services. Both of these women have also been active leaders in past national BDPA technology conferences.
BDPA Greater Columbia is blessed to have some remarkable and visionary women as its past presidents since 1997:
2004-2005: Tonya Dorsey (BlueCross BlueShield of South Carolina)
2010-2011: Phyllis Coleman (BlueCross BlueShield of South Carolina)
My joy with the chapter has been its commitment to the education and mentorship of young people. Scores of students have been trained by BDPA Greater Columbia in the past few years ... in fact, the chapter hosted a regional conference with participation from students in Atlanta, Charlotte and elsewhere.
BDPA Education and Technology Foundation (BETF) is very happy to report that our $2,000 grant proposal to Walmart Store #4379 has been approved. This funding will be used to support the Student Information Technology Education & Scholarship (SITES) program located in Columbia, South Carolina. BDPA Greater Columbiachapter presidentMildred Allen and about a dozen students, volunteers and leaders were in Baltimore last week to participate in the 34th annual BDPA Technology Conference. This funding will help the chapter continue on its quest to provide meaningful science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) experiences for exceptional students who want to 'win the future'.
The approval letter read as follows:
Dear Wayne Hicks,
The Walmart Foundation and Facility # 4379 are pleased to inform you that your organization has been selected to receive a grant through the Local Community Contribution/Hunger Outreach Grant Program in the amount of $2,000.00. We believe that your organization is doing important work to the communities you serve, and we are proud that we are able to support you in your efforts.
Your grant payment will be awarded to you by check, and it will be sent to the address listed in your grant application. Your grant check will be issued within the next few weeks and mailed to your organization as quickly as possible.
Thank you for the work your organization does to create opportunities so people can live better.
Sincerely,
The Walmart Foundation
BETF would like to aggressively approach the Walmart Foundation to support community initiatives where we have co-located BDPA chapters.Who wants to be next?
BDPA is a strong offering of programs in 45 cities around the nation. Are you taking advantage of these programs? Here is a weekly preview of upcoming events gathered from the centralized BDPA calendar :
BDPA supports your efforts for career advancement in the IT industry. Our hope is that you find reasons to provide tax-deductible support to our Causes, our HSCC Scholarship Funds or Your Causes!
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