Chemeketa Community College

Biography:

I have been a faculty member of Chemeketa Community College since September, 1983.  In those days, I was hired because of my experience with personal computers.  The computer lab consisted of Franklin computers which were clones of the Apple II.  Although the primary  computer curriculum was oriented around training "COBOL" programmers on a mainframe computer,  my job was to develop classes around the personal computer.  I also had experience with mainframes from the engineering and mathematical perspective where the primary language was Fortran. I did teach some Fortran based classes for Chemeketa engineering students as well as introducing Basic programming, but my colleague Larry Wintermeyer, now retired, had the primary responsibility for teaching BASIC.

The current "Introduction to Microcomputers" course (CS101) evolved from an introductory course I developed that used programs such as WordStar, Multiplan, VisiCalc, and Ashton Tate's Dbase II.  Subsequently, I developed several application courses that used spreadsheet and database programs which have evolved into the current Excel Workbooks (CS125e) and Access Database (CS125a) classes for students interested in application support for information systems.

The microcomputer technology brought-on a complete new area called computer networking.  The early microcomputer networks were designed for sharing files and printers.  Chemeketa's student lab evolved from a technology called "Corvus" to ArcNet, and now Ethernet.  The network services offered have also evolved from printing and file services to e-mail and groupware products. Because of this new demand for network training, I worked with an Electronics Faculty member, Roger White, to develop courses that our respective students could share. I developed a Data Communication Fundamentals (CS278) class, and worked with Roger to develop the Network Management class (CS279) which currently uses Novell Netware. Other networking operating systems have been added to our curriculum. This collaboration eventually resulted in developing the Network Technology Program in partnership with the Cisco Academy  using their online curriculum developed by Cisco Systems.

Because of the ubiquitous technology field, many Chemeketa programs have morphed into new structures which look different from their origin but retain their fundamental basis.  Computer Programming and Support are no different.  Today we are the Computer Information Systems program with a core of class work supported by several curriculum threads for specialization. Specialization includes programming, support, system administration, web development, security, and database.

Education/Training: