{"id":138,"date":"2015-10-19T12:28:41","date_gmt":"2015-10-19T10:28:41","guid":{"rendered":"\/\/www.viadata.co.za\/blog\/?p=138"},"modified":"2015-10-19T12:40:24","modified_gmt":"2015-10-19T10:40:24","slug":"uct-information-systems-expo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/viadata.co.za\/blog\/uct-information-systems-expo\/","title":{"rendered":"UCT Information Systems Expo"},"content":{"rendered":"

Every year, the Department of Information Systems at the University of Cape Town holds a Systems Project Expo to showcase their third year and fourth year Systems Development group projects. This varied selection of advanced systems is designed to industry conditions and tackle actual business issues.<\/p>\n

ViaData\u2019s Involvement:<\/strong><\/p>\n

The 3rd year shield and top group has been proudly sponsored by\u00a0ViaData for the last 23 years. ViaData is involved with the UCT Information Systems Expo because it re-establishes our connection with some of the very bright minds being developed at UCT.\u00a0We also want to recognise the effort put in by the students and we get to see some of the great concepts being prototyped and developed by students.<\/p>\n

The Presentation Evening:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Mark Fairweather, CEO of Open Box Software<\/strong> www.openboxsoftware.com<\/a> gave the keynote address.\u00a0 He focussed on the achievements of previous graduates of UCT\u2019s IS Program (he being one) and some key guidelines for students, including find your passion, put in your time (remember the 10,000 hours \u2018rule\u2019 of Malcolm Gladwell) and go out and make a difference.<\/p>\n

Craig Byren, MD at ViaData<\/strong> www.viadata.co.za<\/a> (also a past IS Department Graduate) presented the 3rd<\/sup>\u00a0year certificates and awards \u2013 saying a few words and focussing on lessons learned from an Interview with President Barrack Obama (by American comedian Mark Maron) \u2013 this can be found at: \/\/tinyurl.com\/qevgy2f<\/a><\/p>\n

Here are two extracts from Maron\u2019s interview:<\/p>\n

When asked what he believes in, President Obama\u2019s answer was \u2018I believe in fact, and I believe in reason\u2019 – a sound basis for decision-making going forward.<\/p>\n

When asked how he changes the world \u2013 Obama\u2019s (paraphrased) response was \u201csocieties (and the world) cannot be turned 90 degrees, the course needs to be changed one degree at a time. So to change the world all I do is to set out every day to make small changes that will leave society (and the world) better than before the change\u201d.<\/p>\n

This is exactly in line with ViaData\u2019s mantra \u2018Improving Every Day\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n

\"IMG_0779\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Above: ViaData MD Craig Byren with the winning 3rd<\/sup> year team.<\/p>\n

Finally, Head of Department, Associate Professor Kevin Johnston<\/strong>, closed the evening with some final words of insight for the students in\u00a0an ardent speech \u2013 focussing on two fundamental thoughts and how these relate to the year that passed at UCT and the choices that face students going forward. He highlighted that we all have the right to know AND the power to choose.<\/p>\n

In summary:<\/strong><\/p>\n

The common themes of the evening were: Information is critical to making any decisions (personal, business and political);\u00a0There is no substitute for hard work;\u00a0We ALL have the power to make a difference, but we have to choose to make that difference.<\/p>\n

During the course of the evening, the students were also given time to share their views on the past year, and their comments reminded everyone how great student life is.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Every year, the Department of Information Systems at the University of Cape Town holds a Systems Project Expo to showcase their third year and fourth year Systems Development group projects. This varied selection of advanced systems is designed to industry conditions and tackle actual business issues. ViaData\u2019s Involvement: The 3rd year shield and top group […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37,5,36],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-138","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-improvement","category-systems-development","category-vision"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/viadata.co.za\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/viadata.co.za\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/viadata.co.za\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/viadata.co.za\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/viadata.co.za\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=138"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/viadata.co.za\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":142,"href":"https:\/\/viadata.co.za\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138\/revisions\/142"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/viadata.co.za\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=138"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/viadata.co.za\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=138"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/viadata.co.za\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=138"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}