High school students from Del Valle High School’s computer science and IT programs visited our data center campus in southeast Austin on Friday to tour the facilities and get an idea of what it would be like to work in a data center.
Del Valle ISD has an excellent program that prepares students for a future in IT and networking that can begin right after high school. Data Foundry engineers were excited to show them around and open their eyes to the potential careers a data center can offer.
Students got to view all the data center’s electrical and mechanical infrastructure, including the floor-to-ceiling generators, massive chillers, computer room air handlers and biometric security scanners. They also toured the network operations center, also known as the NOC, where technicians and network engineers monitor Internet traffic and important infrastructure 24 hours a day.
After the tour, students were served lunch in the Texas 2 briefing center where they listened to a career path presentation by Data Foundry’s HR and IT leadership. They learned about the different career possibilities a data center company can offer, from product management to network and systems engineering and software development. They also had time to ask questions and socialize with the company’s leadership, including Data Foundry’s co-founder and CEO, Ron Yokubaitis.
“It’s important to show the next generation where the Internet lives,” says Yokubaitis. “Making kids passionate about STEM education is important to us, and there’s nothing that sparks interest like giving students a firsthand look at how a data center works.”
Students asked many questions and connected their experience to things they learned in class. We hope to continue this tour program for IT and engineering students on a semi-annual basis to open students’ eyes to interesting and rewarding jobs that exist in a place most people never see – the data center.