College and industry leader join forces on green technology education

College and industry leader join forces on green technology education

The Metropolitan Community College (MCC) from Omaha, Nebraska, and IBM are set to collaborate on a program aimed at developing a unique green data center management degree.

The two-year associates degree program would use IBM hardware, software and online skills training resources to help students gain technical and business skills to prepare them for careers in the design and management of energy efficient data centers.

"We're seeing a dramatic increase in demand here in Nebraska for specialists who understand how to help companies reduce the costs associated with running an energy-intensive data center," says Tom Pensabene, Dean of Information Technology of MCC.

"Now, our students are getting exposure to leading edge IBM technologies, increasing their chances of being hired for jobs in this growing area," he adds.

The program will enable students to learn virtualization and server consolidation, energy efficiency, business resiliency as well as security and compliance skills through an enterprise data center on campus built on IBM Power Systems servers running AIX, IBM i and Linux environments.

With the government's new commitment to funding energy-saving projects, and the expected growth in jobs that require green skills, enrolling in an engineering or computer science program may offer a competitive edge when applying for high-paying jobs of the future.

Government data suggest demand for environmental engineers will grow by 25 percent until 2016, while job growth for computer and information systems managers will average 16 percent during that time.