CSE develops new missions program

Local Hunduran resident located within a few miles of Escuela El Sembrador, where five CSE students participated in a technology based Lighthouse missions trip to Honduras in January, 2005.

Taylor's Computer Science and Engineering (CSE) Department is making its involvement in missions work official with the development of a Missions Computing Initiative.

According to Bill Toll, chair of the CSE Department, the new initiative would benefit mission organizations and students through the development of new computer software they could use.

"We are working on a way to make this [missions initiative] academically valid, because we know students can produce commercial-quality software if they're in the right environment with enough resources," Toll said. "This would give Taylor exposure in new communities and possibly serve as a recruiting tool to encourage our students to work in missions."

In the past, CSE students and faculty have worked with mission organizations such as Wycliffe, HCJB and Operation Mobilization on a number of software packages, including WordSurv, a linguistics program designed to aid Bible translators in the collection and analysis of word lists.

The initiative would enable the CSE Department to dedicate more time and resources to developing software for missions organizations while simultaneously enabling students to receive more practice with long-term projects. CSE has even considered adding a new major track that would focus on that type of software development.

"[The initiative] will provide good experience for students," Stefan Brandle, CSE faculty member, said. "Students will get a real-world chance to see their projects being used."

Toll said the CSE Department would need to raise over $5 million - seeking different donors than normally contacted by Taylor - for a long-term endowment that eventually be used to start the Center for Missions Computing.

"We're looking at people who have contacts with the mission community and would be interested in helping," Toll said.

Brandle said the goal for the initiative is to involve other colleges and universities in the process of software development, thus increasing the number of projects that can be completed.

"Mission organizations don't always have the time...to coordinate volunteers who want to help in the area of technology," Brandle said. "If we had one or two people on staff dedicated to the missions initiative, they could help organize volunteer efforts."