Back to September 2002 CRN Table of Contents

[Published originally in the September 2002 edition of Computing Research News, Vol. 14/No. 4, p. 5.]

Once again, following a long tradition that began in 1974, senior researchers from academia, labs/centers, and government with an interest in computing research wended their way to Snowbird, Utah July 14 to 16 for CRA's biennial conference. Attendance this year was the highest ever with 260 registrants. Attendees managed to keep their cool In spite of unseasonably hot temperatures in the mountains.

The program, organized by committee co-chairs Leah Jamieson, Purdue University, and Phil Bernstein, Microsoft, offered two keynote speeches, three plenary sessions, and four simultaneous workshop sessions.

Dr. Robert Kahn, Internet pioneer and President of the Corporation for National Research Initiatives in Reston, VA, opened the conference with a keynote address on "Key Issues in Information Technology." On the second day, Peter Freeman, Assistant Director for CISE at the National Science Foundation, discussed "Strategic Directions at NSF" in a keynote address.

The always popular workshop for new department chairs, led by Kathleen McKeown, Columbia University, and Randy Bryant, Carnegie Mellon, had a very large turnout.

On the second evening, CRA Service Awards were made. Bryant York presented the Habermann Award to Valerie Taylor, Northwestern University; Guylaine Pollock presented the Distinguished Service Award to Andries van Dam, Brown University. Jim Foley, CRA chair, and Bill Aspray, CRA Executive Director, presented the "State of CRA" after dinner. Gifts were presented to Bill Aspray, who stepped down as CRA's Executive Director on July 31, and the new Executive Director, Andrew Bernat, made some brief remarks.

For the second time at Snowbird, IT Deans met on the final day of the conference. This session, chaired by Bobby Schnabel, University of Colorado at Boulder, attracted more than 40 attendees this year.

In addition to co-chairs Leah Jamieson and Phil Bernstein, members of the program committee for Snowbird 2002 included Ron Brachman (DARPA, formerly AT&T Research); Oscar Garcia (Wright State University); Tom Henderson (University of Utah); Jim Horning (NAI Labs); Jack Stankovic (University of Virginia); Frank Tompa (University of Waterloo); Dick Waters (Mitsubishi Labs); and Roger Webb (Georgia Tech, ECEDHA). The evaluation forms submitted by attendees suggest kudos all around for this hard-working committee. Presentation slides are posted at http://www.cra.org.

The next CRA Conference at Snowbird is scheduled for July 11-13, 2004.