MIS Laboratory Imagine Cup Web Page
This section of MIS Laboratory is a resource for student and mentor Imagine Cup participants
US Imagine Cup Competition Resources
Books on Giving Great Presentations
Questions the Judges Asked at the US Finals During Q&A
Mentor's Guide to the Imagine Cup
A Student's PR Guide to the Imagine Cup
Imagine Cup Competitor's Overview
How to Create a Great Tech Project
Imagine Cup World Wide Finals Resources Index
The United States 2011 Imagine Cup Team
Competitors
Software Design - Team Note-Taker
-David Hayden - Arizona State University
-Michael Astrauskas - Arizona State University
-Shashank Srinivas - Arizona State University
-Qian Yan - Arizona State University
Game Design - Web - ICsquared
-Marc Howard - Ithica College
-Ashley Alicea - Ithica College
-Corey Jeffers - Ithica College
Game Design - Mobile - Team Dragon
-Chase Sandman - Rice University
-Pierre Elias - Rice University
-Veronica Burkel - Rice University
-Ungwoo Lee - Rice University
Embedded Development - Syntax Errors
-Bill Veter - Santiago Canyon College
-Gary Kelly - Santiago Canyon College
-Hayden Donze - Santiago Canyon College
-Ron Kessler [Mentor] - Santiago Canyon College
Windows Phone 7 - The Life Lens Project
-Cy - Arizona State University
-Michael Astrauskas - Arizona State University
-Shashank Srinivas - Arizona State University
-Qian Yan - Arizona State University
Microsoft USA Chaperones
Jodi Elias - Director, US Business/Marketing
Jessica Anderson - Marketing Manager, Student Platform
Martin Schray
Bob Familiar
Edwin
Lindsay
Tara
Ed Donovan
Sam Stokes - Academic Developer Evangelist, Southern California
Kenny Spade - Academic Developer Evangelist, Northern California
Krishna Kumar - Academic Developer Evangelist, Central North
Brad Jensen - Academic Developer Evangelist, Central South
Randy Guthrie - Academic Developer Evangelist, Desert Mountain West
Hotel Address & Contact Info
Hotel Novotel Warszawa Centrum
Event Agenda and Schedule
July 2-3 Travel to Poland
July 3rd Opening Ceremony (approx 6pm)
July 4 - 5 Competitions
July 6 Cultural Day (tours) and finalist rehearsals
July 7 Finalist Competitions
July 8 Competitors' Showcase (Expo) 11am, Awards Ceremony
7pm-ish,
Post-awards party/dance 10pm-ish to 1am
July 9 Travel home
Passport and Visa Information
US Department of State Passport Web Page
US
Department of State Poland Travel Page
Travel Arrangements
Students and
Mentors
Friends,
Family & PR
Health, Medications and Vaccinations
Summary health advisory info for Poland
Travel and Health
Insurance Coverage
Keeping in Touch in Poland
Using a cell phone in Warsaw
Keeping in touch with US-based family
& friends
Internet, Power & AV Equipment in Poland
Electric Voltage and Power Conversion
Equipment in the Showcase
Equipment in
the Competition Judging Rooms
Weather and Clothing Considerations
Competition/Judging Clothing
Showcase Clothing
Cultural Event Clothing
Closing Ceremony Clothing
Post Award Ceremony Party Clothing
Packing
How to pack
Checklist
Competition Format, Rules & Venues
Software Design
Embedded Design
Touch / Tablet Accessibility
Personal Finances and Shopping in Poland
Language and Communications in Poland
Imagine Cup World Wide Finals Resources Details
Travel and
Health Insurance
Many insurance plans have some form of coverage for subscribers who are
travelling to international destinations. Please call your insurance
company and know what is covered and what you need to do in the event of an
injury or illness. In the event you feel your regular coverage is inadequate,
you may want to purchase travel / medical insurance. For US students
travelling to Poland insurance packages can typically run from $75 - $200
depending on the carrier, cost of tickets, and type of coverage. One "platinum"
plan I've looked at covers $50K medical, hotel if flight gets delayed, lost
baggage up to $2,500, emergency dental, etc. Some plans required a
two-week waiting period so if you think you'd like some addtional peace of mind,
don't delay. Microsoft does not recommend any insurance carrier, but an
Internet seach will turn up lots of different companies that are associated with
names/brands that you recognize.
Keeping in Touch in Poland
Using a cell phone in
Warsaw
At the Imagine Cup World Wide finals, it is extremely important to be able to
communicate at a moment's notice between student participants, the US ADE team
and the World Wide Imagine Cup event organizers. There are LOTS of moving
parts in the event, and making sure everyone is where they need to be, at the
time they need to be there, dressed appropriately, with the proper gear,
equipment, etc. is a major undertaking. This can be complicated by last
minute changes to schedules due to an infinite number of possible reasons.
It is highly recommended that each team have a GSM 900/1800 mobile phone that
will work in Poland. Many US mobile phone providers have "international"
calling plans, but the cost ranges between $1.75 and $3.00 per minute. A
much less expensive alternative is to purchase a pre-paid SIM card from a local
provider. The pre-paid card will give you a local Warsaw phone number and some
increment of 100 minutes of calling time. Prepaid SIM cards that will
provide a local phone number with 100 minutes or so will be adequate and
provided to each team. These cards are to be used only for official
communications between the student teams and Microsoft US ADE/BMO hosts. The
phones should be kept charged and left on when students are in the hotel room.
Note: unless you bring your own phone don't count on using your phone as a
watch/alarm clock!
Most phones that use SIM cards purchased from a US cell phone providers such as
Sprint, ATT, T-Mobile are "locked" so that they will only work with that
company's SIM cards. There are special codes that the company has that can
unlock a phone so it will accept a SIM card from any provider. If you want
to get your phone unlocked, the easiest way is to call your service provider and
asked to get the phone unlocked. I did this successfully last year with
ATT and my Samsung i617 BlackJack II phone. When I arrived in Cairo, Egypt
for the 2009 Imagine Cup finals, I went to a local Vodafone store and bought a
pre-paid 100 minute SIM card for $18 that gave me a local Egyptian phone number.
It took about 10 minutes at the store and I was all set up. When I got
home I put my ATT SIM card back in and it worked fine. If your service
provider won't unlock your phone for you, you can have it done for a fee from a
variety of places including
http://www.unlockingcodesforphones.com You can also buy "disposable" phones
in Warsaw that will take a pre-paid SIM card.
Keeping in touch with US-based family
& friends
Within the Imagine Cup venue there will be reliable high-speed wireless
Internet. Guest rooms will also have free wired internet access, but
in-room wireless costs $$$. Be careful that you don't "accidently" sign up
for in-room wireless charged to your room because Microsoft will not reimburse
you for Internet charges.
Since students will be sharing a room, you might want to bring a small
switch/router and a few cables to facilitate connection sharing in the room. The
best / least expensive way to stay in touch with US-based family and friends is via Skype. Skype is "voice over
IP" calling plan that for about $4/month will give you unlimited calling to
other Skype members. You can also call non-Skype users for about $.02 (two
cents) per minute anywhere in the world, plus send SMS text messages and video calls. For small
extra fees you can get a phone number that people can call you on, a voice mail
box, and even call forwarding to your cell phone. Considering that a ten-minute
long distance call from the hotel or your cell phone will cost between $20 - $50
, You could talk for hours on Skype for less than that.
To use Skype you will need speakers, ear buds or headphones and a microphone connected to your computer.
Most people purchase inexpensive "headsets" such as the
Microsoft Lifechat LX-3000, which is a very high quality digital headset
with boom microphone that retails on Amazon.com for about $21 plus shipping. Not
only is this headset great for voice conversation, you'll be amazed at how good
music and video sounds.
Internet, Power & AV Equipment in Poland
Electric Voltage and Power Conversion
Poland uses 230 volt and 50 Hz (cycles per second). The United States uses
110 volts at 60 HZ. Fortunately most electronic equipment, particularly
computer equipment is dual voltage. If you look at the power brick on your
notebook power supply, if it says something like " INPUT: 100-240V ~
50/60HZ then you have a dual voltage power supply and you won't need a voltage
converter for that device. My cell phone charger is also dual voltage, but
you have to check. What isn't dual voltage is the plug at the end
of the cord. Poland uses a round, two-pin plus ground type system rather
than the two parallel blade-type plug that we use in the US. My suggestion
is for each member of your team to go to
Radio Shack or Amazon.com and buy a single plug converter and bring a US
power strip and voila! you can now plug five US appliances into your single
European plug. The price of one of these should be between $8 - $10.
If someone is trying to sell you something that costs $50 or more, run away!
They are trying to sell you a voltage converter that you don't need.
Caution! Some common travel items that
may not be dual voltage include blow dryers, curling irons, electric tooth
brushes, etc. Don't assume with these items; check the tag or labels!
Don't bring them if they won't run on 220v 50hz unless you (1) want to ruin the
device and (2) want a really spectacular electrical fire in your room complete
with sprinklers, foreign firefighters and hotel staff screaming at you in
Polish.
In order to guard the fairness and integrity of the
competitions at the Worldwide Finals in Warsaw, Microsoft will offer the same
set of benefits, services, and rules for each team within each competition and
in the Showcase. More specifically: One physical work station area will be
provided for each Software Design, Game Design, Embedded Development and Digital
Media team in the Showcase to set up their equipment (dimensions of this space
are approximately 150x50cm). One VGA monitor per team will be provided in the
showcase. Note that Digital Media will also have a separate assigned room with
additional workspace outside of the Showcase. Game teams and Digital Media
teams should bring
their own sound amplifiers and speakers with appropriate Xbox and/or PC
adapters. Make sure the speaker power adapter is dual
voltage!
Power adaptors will be provided based on previous requests made in the
competitor surveys. Note that power in Poland is 230V/50Hz and uses a “type-c”
connector. It is highly suggested that each team bring several of their own
adapters and power strips as explained in the "Electric
Voltage and Power Conversion" section above.
Audio, Video and Network configuration services will be provided to help each
team configure their presentation equipment both for the Showcase and in the
Judging Rooms.
Equipment in the Competition Presentation Judging Rooms
Each team in Software Design will be responsible for providing
its own computer(s) for the competition, but one back-up desktop machine can be
provided if the team can prove that their own machine has failed and they need a
temporary replacement.
Each team in Embedded Development, Game Design and Digital Media will have some
computers and necessary auxiliary equipment provided (e.g.: for Digital Media
this will include (1) Flip video camera with a desktop computer to act as a
video editing workstation).
Judging Rooms for Software Design, Embedded Development and Game Design
presentations will be equipped with:
(1) 180cm x 70cm table
(2) 42” flat screen monitors, each with a 4-input KVM switch for accommodating
multiple sources
(3) Network connections as necessary (wired and wireless)
Note: these judging rooms are built within a
large hotel exhibit hall especially for this event, and there are about eight
identical rooms to provide absolute equality in presenting environment.
Teams will have about 20 minutes to set up before their presentation, and will
not have access to these rooms in any way prior to their competition time slot.
Be prepared! Have a back up plan and back up equipment and lots of
different cables and adapters.
A Survey will be sent to Finalist teams shortly after 1 June
in order to assess the equipment the teams will be bringing to the finals.
Requests for power adapters will be part of this survey.
The basic rule of thumb for bringing competition equipment into and out of
Poland is that students should consider the equipment as “personally owned” and
that it will not be given or sold while in Poland – the items that they bring
into the country will also be with them when they leave the country. Therefore
there is no need for them to declare customs on this and they can proceed
through the green line. For any equipment or valuables above that of a laptop,
we recommend that they carry original receipts if available, but not necessary.
Any equipment outside of these baseline provisions will be up to the competitors to procure, deliver to Warsaw, etc. We do have some contacts that could help them with that process but the responsibility is completely up to the teams.
Weather and Clothing Considerations
The daytime weather in Warsaw during the time the Imagine Cup competition will be held averages in the mid 70s to low 80s. Rain showers are possibility, but during the event we will be inside almost the entire time. The dress code at the Imagine Cup tends towards the casual. For the Microsoft Corp team running the event, denim jeans and polo shirts or event tee-shirts with comfortable shoes will predominate. The US team will be given several event tee-shirts that will be appropriate for use anytime / place during the Imagine Cup finals. From team to team and country to country, dress will be all over the place, from extremely casual to very formal. Teams are to dress according to their country's standards and do not have to worry about adhering to Polish or foreign expectations.
All students on a team should have a similar appearance. You do not need to match exactly, but extreme deviations between team members should be avoided. Teams may wear the Imagine Cup shirts that will be provided by the US ADE/BMO team, matching school shirts with tan slacks, or more formal dark slacks/skirts with collared shirts & ties, jackets, or any other conservative clothing the team deems appropriate. Comfort and avoiding an appearance the distracts the judges attention away from your technology presentation are the priority.
The Showcase is an exhibit hall type venue similar to a Science Fair with each team having a booth. Dignitaries, media and event guests will wander the Showcase to view the different projects. Members of the Microsoft PR team and other media outlets such as television and Internet news outlets may have cameras and sound equipment and want to talk to students about their projects. That being said, student clothing should be clean, neat (not wrinkled!) and similar, but can be comfortably casual.
Cultural Event Clothing
On Tuesday, July 6th there will be a variety of off-venue cultural tours for
attendees visiting places of historical or cultural interest. These tours
will consist of bus rides and lots of walking. There is also the potential for a
river or lake-type excursion. Attendees should dress comfortably, but with
particular attention to comfortable shoes. A hat to keep the sun off is a
good idea, as is a windbreaker in case of rain. A small backpack to keep
personal items together and to carry water is a great idea. A small collapsible
umbrella is also a good idea.
Closing Ceremony Clothing
The Closing/Awards ceremony is the highlight of the Imagine Cup, and lasts
between two and three hours (think Academy Awards night). There will be
several speeches, some kind of cultural show, and a video summary of the event.
Winners will be invited on stage to receive trophies and giant prize money
"checks", and have pictures taken. That being said, students will either
wear their country's team shirts or something a bit dressier. Unlike the
closing ceremony in Cairo that was held outdoors in the desert, Imagine Cup 2010
closing ceremony will be in the State Opera House, which suggests a slightly
more formal appearance might be in order for finalists. Students that know
they are not winning awards can dress a little less casually but since there
will be lots of PR and pictures, why not dress it up a bit as well?
Post Award Ceremony Party
After the awards ceremony there will be party back at the hotel that will last
until about 1am. This is very casual and there is some food, drink and
music. Last year there was a DJ playing electronic/club music and the US
team got the party started with some dancing that eventually got everyone out
there having a good time. Wear whatever you like!
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/video/video.php?v=563705752124
Only pack items into your checked-bag that are non-essential to your competition. Baggage does get lost, and one Embedded team last year was unable to compete because their project hardware was lost by the airline. Clothing, toiletries and other generic/easily-replaceable items are the rule. Computers, project hardware and essential software (and backups) should be carried on board the plane with you.
Checked Baggage: Unless you are a frequent flier, for International Travel you will be restricted to one piece of checked luggage that cannot exceed fifty pounds in weight. This is easy to exceed if you over-plan for contingencies. Overweight or excess baggage charges are very high $100 - $200 (United Airlines example used). Even within the 50lb weight restriction, fitting all your stuff into your bag can also be a challenge. Here are some tips:
Tightly roll your shirts and pants individually. Rubber bands can help keep rolled items tight. Start at the bottom wedging them in between the internal metal bars into which the extension handle retracts. Hard soled shoes can go in here too if they fit but keep them near the bottom with the soles against the side of the suitcase (to keep the bottoms of the shoes from getting your clothes dirty)
Put any hard items in next i.e.: toiletries, routers, power bricks, power strips, etc. Orient heaviest items so they are at the "bottom" of the suitcase when it is in the "rolled" upright position.
Stuff your socks into your shoes. This keeps the toes of the shoes from being smashed and fills up an otherwise unused void.
The top-most layer can be unrolled items you don't want to get wrinkled i.e.: suit jacket and trousers, but put a soft top layer on top of those like a sweatshirt to protect against a dirt and tearing if the zipper fails on your suitcase or the suitcase fabric gets punctured.
Carry-on Luggage: Put at least one change of clothes and two changes of underwear in your carry-on bag. Also a small zip-lock bag with your essential toiletries (keep sizes under the 3oz limit). If you miss a connection and get delayed for any extended period of time, or the airline loses your luggage, you'll be glad you've got something to change into. A comfortable hoodie sweatshirt would be nice too. I would put any essential project hardware (like Xbox controllers, your ebox, and your 220v power adapter and power strip in there as well. Then fill it with some of the loose stuff from your other suitcase to reduce its weight if necessary.
Carry-on Backpack: Here is my list:
Notebook computer
Spare computer battery (nobody make a battery that lasts 12+ hours!)
Computer Power brick
Essential tech accessories: cell phone charger, USB cable, 7ft Ethernet cable
Pack of baby wipes
toothbrush (no paste; don't want security to have an issue)
Black pens (necessary for filling out customs forms on the plane both upon arrival in Poland and upon returning to the US)
Passport and Passport card
One or two paper-back books (1 book = 6-8 hours of reading). I tend to sleep more on the way back due to being exhausted from the event. So I bring a third in my carry-on bag.
Headphones/Headset: now is when you want to rock those sweet noise-cancelling ones (don't forget the spare batteries for them!)
Bring a back-packing pillow (Slumberjack is a personal preference). It is more versatile than a "neck donut" and compresses really small to fit in your backpack. I actually bring both for International travel
Soft foam earplugs: Get from Wal-Mart for a couple of bucks (get the super soft ones). Great for blocking out airplane noise, crying babies, the guy snoring next to you, awful in-flight movie, etc. especially when you are trying to get a couple hours sleep (but not too much if you are planning a rapid adjustment to the Central Europe Summer time zone (UTC +2)).
Personal Finances and Shopping in Poland
We do not recommend that you carry a lot of cash with you during your Imagine Cup stay. US currency will only be accepted at airports. Once you are in Poland you will need to use local currency. The good news is that your credit cards and ATM cards will be acceptable and the foreign exchange rate is calculated for you. Right now the dollar is very strong against European currencies which will make your dollar go much further than it would have a year or two ago. A couple of guidelines to make sure you don't run into financial trouble:
Visa and MasterCard are accepted most places in the city. But Visa gift cards probably will not work. Visa debit cards also will work, as long as they are tied to a checking account. ATM cards will also work as long as they are tied to a major ATM network, and are linked to a checking account (not a savings account). If you are worried about identity theft, then open a separate checking account, and only put a limited amount of cash in it (say $300). that way even if the card gets lost / stolen, you're liability is limited.
When you check into the hotel you will need to use a major credit card to use for security. A Visa debit card may be accepted, but they will put a hold on $300 that you won't have access to. If your balance isn't that high, then the card will be declined. Gift cards will also not be accepted. If you don't want to bring a major credit card, then contact the hotel directly and give them the card number over the phone a day or two before you arrive.
While the Imagine Cup venue is very safe, we recommend that you use a travel wallet or keep your wallet in a zipped inside pocket if you are carrying valuables. Keep your passport in your room during the event.