ACM exists to equip people with the tools, confidence, and experience necessary for success outside of Academia.
I'm open to suggestions on how we can improve this mission statement and whether you think this is even the mission of our club.
My thoughts after last night's discussion is that we might want to have an easy option to get members started. I do think doing this will help this goal "Equip people with the tools, confidence, and experience necessary for success outside of Academia"
With a common dev environment that all ACM members can access. This may not be through something like cloud nine but having new students sshed into some remote box running linux. Either way having a comman suite of tools we use would be handy, kinda like having a woodshop with all of the tools neatly arranged in bins and on the walls.
One of the aspect that Jordan, Fisher, and my brother brought up last night was how intimidating joining in can be. I do think we should provide all members with a choice when they join. We'll have all projects available fo them to join, but I propose that we also give them the choice of an easier project. This would give those who don't know where all of the tools in the proverbale shop are time to find them. It would get rid of the insurmountable cliff that some see when they try join some of our more ambitious projects. Overall if we don't scare them off we'll have a positive boost to their confidence on nonacademic software engineering.
I actually think we're doing well on this catagory once the initial learning curve is over. I would also like to look at the chalk talk topic that Paul suggested last night. I like the thought of a short tidbit before starting projects.