Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1493016
REAL TIME WITH... IPC APEX EXPO 2023 SHOW & TELL MAGAZINE I I-CONNECT007 127 I must confess that I went to IPC APEX EXPO this year with a particular mission. Since tak- ing on the duties of a professor at Palomar College, where I teach basic and advanced PCB design courses, and knowing that IPC drives the standards of the PCB industry, I was curious about how we get critical stan- dards into the hands of new PCB design- ers—specifically, my students. As we all know, companies, either on the design level or the fab/assembly process, are required to follow specific IPC standards. I decided to ask IPC representatives some questions about how new designers can become acquainted with those standards, and they introduced me to a team from the IPC Education Foundation. This was just the resource I was looking for. IPC's new focus on students and educators is exactly what our industry needs to mentor the next generation of PCB designers. As a college professor, I was inspired to discover that educators have the ability to create an IPC Student Chapter within their university or community college. After my great conversation with the IPC Education Foundation, I am now looking at possibly creating the first IPC Student Chapter at Palo- mar College in San Marcos for both basic and advanced PCB design classes. My final thoughts are on the show's atten- dance, which I felt was down compared to previous years. When I spoke with one of the IPC organizers about this, they confirmed that attendance was still down from before the pandemic, but they also mentioned that many have already committed to attending next year. Be sure to put it in your calendar: April 6–11, 2024, in the beautiful Anaheim Convention Center. Hope to see you there. S&T John Watson is a regular columnist for I-Connect007. To read past columns, click here. Dan Hogan: First Impressions Dan Hogan of Right-Minded Teamwork, takes a minute to share his thoughts on standards committee work with Nolan Johnson. Dan Hogan, you've introduced yourself as being from outside our industry. You and I are talking on a Saturday outside a committee meeting that you've been observing. What are your impressions about how the committees work? First, there is a lot of detail and they seem to be managing the detail very well. As you know, you can get buried in the detail and create tangents that waste time and energy. Then, eventually, people's feelings get hurt and so forth. But that's not happening here, from what I've seen in the balance. What do you see as some of the most effective techniques the committee mem- bers are using to manage that detail and keep 168 people moving forward? The facilitation team—if I could call them that—is taking the lead from Malia. She's got her supporters, and Simon has others. And just right now, she's call- ing the committee par- ticipants back in. It's a team effort to steer everything.