Skyline High School students tour the MACC Data Center on November 9. (Joel Iverson, ITS Communications)
On November 9, computer science students from Skyline High School were treated to a special tour of the Michigan Academic Computing Center (MACC). Seventy-one students were split into shifts to walk through the data center, talk about what makes it work, and see some of its key components. Brock Palen, director of Advanced Research Computing-Technology Services (ARC-TS), arranged the tour after speaking to the class at Skyline High on October 30. He gave a similar tour for Pinckney High School last year and talks to the students about anything their teacher likes—topics ranging from data and supercomputers to STEM skills, Linux, large-scale administration, and more. Tours were led by Palaen as well as Matt McLean, HPC systems administrator at ARC-TS, and Mark Linsenman, computer operations manager for ITS Infrastructure. Zhen Qian, application developer manager, ITS Teaching & Learning and parent of a Skyline student, helped to coordinate the tour with the high school.
