Texas State ITSA wins big at USITCC national conference

PLANO, Texas — Texas State University’s Information Technology Students of American (ITSA) organization sent 26 students to the U.S. Information Technology Collegiate Conference (USITCC), March 30-April 1, where they won awards in five of the eight competition events.

In the Network Design category, Andrew Ly and Jose Lopez III won first place. Shahmeen Razzak and Nicholas Robertson won second place in Business Analytics. Sam Serio earned an honorable mention in Security, while teams comprised of Joseph Maynard / Marcus Block and Harsh Parmar / Sebastian Osuke each earned an honorable mention in Network Design.

Additionally, the Texas State ITSA student organization was recognized as a Model Student Organization for 2022 by the Foundation for Information Technology Education.

Kevin Jetton, Texas State ITSA faculty advisor and senior lecturer in the Department of Information Systems and Analytics (ISA), said that he was very proud of the team’s focus and effort.

“I’m proud of them for stepping up and taking competition seriously and preparing and giving it their all,” Jetton said. “They didn’t give up.”

A total of 225 IT students, faculty, and others from 20 schools attended the 3-day conference. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, this was the first USITCC national event since 2019, when it was hosted in Galveston.

“On the trip itself, I’m proud of [our team] for being sociable, inclusive, and courteous,” Jetton said.

Jetton organized and planned the national USITCC event, while also serving as Microsoft Office contest problem statement developer / judge. Additional Texas State ISA faculty and staff who assisted with the conference included Dr. Garry White, Information Systems Education Conference (ISECON) 2023 paper presentation and USITCC Network Design and Security Contest teams mentor; Dr. Tahir Ekin, USITCC 2023 conference session speaker on data analytics; Brad Hamman, USITCC Office contest judge; Zach Kelley, USITCC Office contest and judge; and Christy Etter-Esse, travel accounting and transportation shuttle service. ✯

For more information, email Twister Marquiss, manager of marketing and communications for the McCoy College of Business, at twister@txstate.edu.

About the McCoy College of Business
Established in 1970, Texas State’s business school officially became the McCoy College of Business in 2004 following a donation of $20 million by Emmett and Miriam McCoy. The college, which offers classes in both San Marcos and Round Rock, is accredited by AACSB in both business and accounting, and has graduated more than 42,000 alumni.