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Volunteers make the events of the CSSA possible. This pages describes the different opportunities for volunteering. If you are interested in volunteering, email cssa@cs.unc.edu.

Currrently volunteers are desired to be:

• Department committee members
• Experienced QUAL takers
• Foosball meister
• CSSA webmaster

The Tea-Czar organizes the Graduate Tea time. The Tea-Czar:
• Arranges for volunteers to bring goodies each week.
• Weekly on Wednesday emails the student newsgroup and gradtea mailing list to remind students of the afternoon gathering.


The current Tea-Czar is Leo.

Rewarding reasons to volunteer:

• Fame and recognition of fellow students
• Meet students throughout the department (to get them to volunteer).
• A good reason to be at every Grad-tea

The foosball Meister would arrange a foosball tournament each semester. Arranging a tournament involves arranging the two member teams, maintain the game schedule and results and find the winner prizes. The meister would also maintain the foosball table.

This prestigious job is available to anyone; first year grad students are also encouraged to volunteer.

Rewarding reasons to volunteer

• Fame and admiration from fellow students.
• Become an expert about the Tornado table
• Meet more foosball players

The CSSA webmaster helps maintain these great web-pages. Any creative ideas to improve the wed-page are welcome. Once a semester the pages for the department review have to be setup.

Rewarding reasons to volunteer:

• Learn about maintaining web-pages.
• Implement your own ideas

Committee members participate in department committees that make decisions effecting the department. The committees vary from “Building and Grounds” to “Curriculum and Planning”. Link to a description of all department committees.

In general anyone (first year students too) can participate in the committees. Some committees, however, might require being a senior student. The time commitment varies from meeting once a month to once or twice a semester. Check the committee web-page or with the committee faculty chair of the committee for more details.

Rewarding reasons to volunteer:

• Influence issues that are important to students.
• Learn more about how the department works.
• Meet other students and faculty interested in the same issues.

As part of the QUAL preparations, experienced QUAL takers are wanted to share their QUAL experiences with students taking the QUAL this September. It would be helpful to share strategies for preparation and answer questions during the exam. There will be a QUAL preparation session in the 2nd or 3rd week of the semester.

A separate request would be for an experienced QUAL taker to take the hot seat and participate in the mock QUAL with one or two professors – relive the QUALs all over again.

Rewarding reasons to volunteer:

• Admiration from those who have to take the QUAL
• Pass on advice that you would have wanted to know about the QUALs
• Relive the experience :)

Mentors would have email contact with the students before they arrive in Chapel Hill and help them with questions about housing and location of shopping and entertainment. When the students start in August, the mentors can meet once a week for the first few weeks and help them feel at home in Sitterson.

It is a small time commitment to exchange a few emails with two or three new students. Sharing your experience, even if only a semester at UNC, will be a tremendous help for the new students. There is no need to know all the answers, as the question can be passed on to other mentors as necessary. You do not need to be in Chapel Hill this summer to volunteer as the contact is through email.

Rewarding reasons to volunteer:

• You can mentor someone who you met during candidates’ day.
• You can mentor someone from your alma mater or the state/country you come from.
• You can mentor someone who might be in your research group.
• You might learn something new about Chapel Hill.
• You can make new friends.

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Computer Science, Sitterson Hall Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3175 USA

Server Manager: webmaster@cs.unc.edu Content Manager: cssa@cs.unc.edu Last modified: .