Day 4: ODU- Norfolk and Cape Charles

ODU Campus Intro Visit

Fabian Binde - March 24, 2016 

Welcome to our fourth blog post. Pictures are more worth than a thousand words, I’ll try to give you an understanding of what our trip was like by showing some pictures As always  we had a tight schedule, which didn’t allow short rests after some short nights. Our group usually gets to bed pretty late, is probably caused by a 6-hour time difference.

After breakfast we had the opportunity to inspect the ODU (Old Dominion University). The ODU is a public university in Norfolk, Virginia, 20,802 students are currently enrolled at. The US tuition fees for one semester can barely be compared to those of German universities. To register for the ODU, $ 19,831 have to be paid per year. The university Magdeburg-Stendal tuition in Magdeburg are about 100 € per semester (i.e. € 200 per year).

Before the tour at ODU campus started, an introductory lecture at ODU was held.

The ODU offers many sports facilities, that vary from baseball, basketball to wrestling. Officially 28 teams represent their university athletically. The highest success was achieved by ODU Monarchs sailing team.
 

Sport	Men	Woman
Baseball	X
Basketball	X	X
Cheer/ Dance	X	X
Diving	X	X
Field Hockey		X
Football	X
Golf	X	X
Lacrosse		X
Rowing		X
Sailing	X	X
Soccer	X	X
Swimming	X	X
Tennis	X	X
Wrestling	X

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For whom the leisure facilities are not enough, they can still go in a large sports hall, where a variety of options are available (right picture: Exterior view).

The entire campus is about 102 hectares big and there are more than 14 "houses",so each student can choose his "house" and his own room. Every room is limited about 10 square meters and the students will share their apartment with another student.

  

Subsequently , Prof. Dr. Hantscher, who joined the trip from Germany , held a lecture on the radars. Radar technology deals generally with the detecting of objects. This technique is primarily for aviation, for example, used for contactless measurement of objects under special conditions. Because of the unique characteristics of radars, such as independence from weather and sunlight, the long range, the high sensitivity to changes in distance and the production of high resolution images, has become the radar to an indispensable tool for military and civilian applications.

Dunkin Donuts and coffee were provided by the ODU, which we enjoyed heartwarming.

In between, we had a group meeting in the inner sanctum of the CS Department. The well-equipped conference room is usually accessible for faculty only. During the meeting we went over our plans for the next day and the division of the blog posts was discussed. Furthermore, our group that takes care of the finances, received further instructions.

In the afternoon, a job lecture by Michael L. Nelson was held as Department Chair. He reported on his interesting career as NASA scientist and university professor and since 2002 he worked at the computer science department of ODU. He is particularly active in the development of open-source archiving programs such as OAI-PMH, the OAI-ORE, Memento, and ResourceSync.

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Memento is an add-on that you can download to your browser. With this tool it is possible to archive websites. For today's information systems new sites are created and deleted constantly. Even literary quality sites are no exception. Memento helps to secure and archive websites at any given time. This makes it possible to open old sources again, although it’s not existing anymore.  

 

In the evening we drove to Cape Charles. On our way we stopped by the Chesapeake BayBridge-Tunnel (CBBT). The CBBT is 37 km long and is one of the largest bridge-tunnel constructions in the world. It connects Hampton Roads, Virginia and the Delmarva Peninsula (also called Eastern Shore). Formerly a drive from the Delmarva Peninsula to Hampton Roads only with a considerable detour of several hundred kilometers to the Chesapeake Bay was connected, first a ferry for more direct about 30 km long crossing was established. However, the traffic became more and more very soon, so that in 1954 it was decided to build a construction of a fixed route. Due to the excessive load of the bridge, it was built in 1999, with twice as much lanes as originally planned.

http://www.cbbt.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/rotator-img12.jpg

When we finally arrived at Cape Charles, we could still enjoy the last rays of sunshine and took some great group photos, which of course took it’s time.

Eventually we went to a very popular fish restaurant at Cape Charles.

“Shantyseafood” offers a great selection of different specialties. Although the food was not as cheap as in various fast food places, but it was definitely worth it.

Greetings from the USA, Fabian B.