| | November 20158CIOReviewBuilding a University's Technology Infrastructure from the Ground UpBy Tom Hull, VP and CIO, Florida Polytechnic UniversityAs Vice President and Chief Information Officer at Florida's newest state university, I have had the opportunity to build a technology infrastructure from the ground up. Florida Polytechnic University opened in August 2014 as Florida's only university wholly dedicated to science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM). More than 550 students were part of the inaugural class, and that population has nearly doubled in our second year. Strategically located between Tampa and Orlando at the heart of Florida's High Tech Corridor, Florida Poly is dedicated to the principle that innovation occurs when research and creativity are applied to real-world challenges. The University offers six undergraduate degrees, two master's degrees and 19 cutting-edge concentrations in emerging fields like Big Data Analytics, Nanotechnology, Cyber Security, Cloud Virtualization and Machine Intelligence. The curriculum is market-inspired and problem-based. Students and faculty work together in a hands-on learning environment to solve real-world challenges. The goal is to graduate students who enter the workforce job ready and go on to become leaders and entrepreneurs in high tech industries. To facilitate this advanced learning model and to remain at the cutting edge, it is essential for Florida Poly to not only have today's most advanced technology, but also an infrastructure designed to scale and adapt as rapidly as technology changes in the 21st Century. Florida Poly's campus includes all-new systems for administration and academics. The university embraces a bring-your-own-device (BYOD) philosophy, and an advanced data network converges wireless, wired and personal mobile devices through a unique Cisco networking configuration. Classrooms are all equipped with cloud-based workstations, and the university's library is 100 percent digital, providing more than 135,000 titles electronically to students, faculty and staff on any device of their choosing. In addition to full-room instructional computer labs, the university has 11 innovation labs that provide a market-driven niche set of high-tech capabilities. These labs are designed to be responsive and interconnected while supporting the work and research of students, faculty and industry partners. They include a: · Rapid Application Development (RAD) Makerspace Lab: The RAD Makerspace Lab is an interdisciplinary environment with 3D printing hardware, digital object scanners, AutoCAD software and RAD technology. This lab is a resource for students pursuing core engineering degrees, computer engineering degrees, and computer science and information technology degrees and also allows for advanced prototyping and adaptive manufacturing. The space is a multi-vendor lab that has enough capacity for an entire class of students to engage in engineering design projects simultaneously. This is especially helping in Tom HullOpinionIn My
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