ASME Early Career Technical Conference (ECTC) - District E
March 29 - 31, 2012 - Baton Rouge, LA

Hosted by Louisiana State University in conjunction with Student Professional Development Conference
A FORUM FOR THE PRESENTATION OF IN-PROGRESS OR COMPLETED WORK BY MECHANICAL ENGINEERING GRADUATE STUDENTS AND early career ENGINEERS
Supported by The ASME Old Guard and the Committee on Early Career Development

CONFERENCE PURPOSE
In today's competitive engineering job market, employers and engineering managers are looking for the technical credentials that separate one candidate from another. The District, in keeping with ASME's mission of promoting and enhancing the technical competency and professional well-being of our members, ASME has organized this conference as a forum for ME graduate students and early career engineers (practicing engineers graduating 5 years or less ago) to develop their technical credentials and to establish their professional identity. This program is designed to enhance the ability of graduate students and early career engineers to compete in an ever more demanding and changing global marketplace by providing and developing the skills and the demonstrated technical performance that will make them standout among their peers.

In providing conferences such as this, the District also wants to establish a bond between ASME and the early career engineer that encourages continued participation in ASME activities, increased use of ASME resources and programs, and reinforces the concept of "ASME for a Lifetime."

WHO CAN ATTEND?
Conference participation is open to all graduate mechanical engineering students enrolled in the 2011-12 school year including those graduating in December 2011 and all early career engineers who graduated after May, 2007. Only graduate students and early career engineers will make presentations. Participants must be paid ASME members. (Apply for membership or pay dues at http://www.asme.org/about-asme/professional-membership/).

WHY SHOULD YOU ATTEND?
If you are an undergraduate ME student, attending the ECTC will give you an idea about the type of projects graduate students and early career engineers work on. Moreover, if you have any aspirations to attend graduate school, you will be able to talk to graduate students from other schools in the District and ask them about their experience. If you are a ME graduate student or early career engineer, you can attend the presentations to learn something new and/or present your work in progress or nearly completed work. You will probably receive constructive comments from fellow students, engineers, and faculty on your research results. All presenters gain invaluable experience practicing your presentation skills in front of a small and friendly audience before presenting your work at national or international conferences.

FUNDING
Honoraria will be given to the author/presenters, scaled from $50 to $250 in $50 increments and based on distance traveled to attend the conference. An average of $100 each is expected for up to 20 author/presenters. Honoraria will be granted in the order in which papers are received. In the past, $200 awards for the best paper in each session were given.

PAPER PUBLICATION
Proceedings will be published by ASME.

HOW TO PARTICIPATE
Those planning to participate must send a "Notice of Intent to Participate Form" and a 200 word abstract to Dr. Rick Couvillion (rjc@uark.edu) by January 6, 2012. Include your name, email address, school name, and title of presentation. Abstracts will be reviewed, and invitations to submit full papers will be sent by January 13, 2012. Completed papers are due January 27, 2012. Notification of acceptance will be March 2, 2012. Final manuscripts and authorizations will be due March 16, 2012.

AUTHORSHIP
Authorship can include names of the student(s) and a faculty member(s). However, a student or early career engineer must be the primary author and presenter. It is ASME policy that all those who have participated significantly in the technical aspects of an ASME paper should be recognized as co-authors or cited in the acknowledgments.

INQUIRIES AS THEY RELATE TO THE TECHNICAL CONTENT
Direct all inquiries by e-mail to the Chair of the Conference.

Dr. Rick Couvillion, Chair, ECTC
University of Arkansas
Email: rjc@uark.edu