Introduction

Having been in the workplace for quite a few years, I decided to return to school and pursue a career change. I began taking Computer Science courses in the Fall of 2001 with the intent of acquiring a master's degree. When my application fell short, my contingency plan was to enter into the Engineering Co-op Program and finish my B.S. studies. It seemed reasonable to expect that applying my new found skill set for an employer, while gaining some valuable workplace experience, was the right way to go. I began my first rotation with General Electric in the Spring of 2003. I completed final two rotations with American Bridge Company in 2004.

General Electric Corporation, Bridgeville, Pennsylvania - Spring 2003

Imagine how thrilled I was to have an opportunity to work for the most successful company in American history. And the plant was only 10 minutes from my home! The Bridgeville Glass Plant, as it is more commonly referred to, has been in business since 1901. It is a major producer of glass tubing and specialty bulbs. As GE was endeavoring to obtain their ISO-9001 quality system certification, I created an Access database to maintain employee training records. In addition, I designed MS-DOS batch files for monitoring network activity and performance as a service to the IT Group located in Kentucky. Probably the most interesting project was the refinement of a BASICA program used by a chemical engineer to calculate the batch formulations for a particular glass run. Man, it was like going back in time to my humble origins when, as a young engineering student at Penn State (boo!), we had to write our programs on PC's running DOS and BASIC, that's it.

American Bridge Company, Coraopolis, Pennsylvania - Fall 2004

American Bridge is a vertically integrated construction, engineering, and manufacturing firm with operations throughout the USA and abroad. The company specializes in the manufacture, erection, and rehabilitation of complex bridges and other structures. I was involved in a variety of projects within the IT Department. For starters, I developed a web-based application for tracking non-steel expenditures for AB Manufacturing here in Coraopolis. The program allows users to input and query purchasing information into and from a database. In addition, users can add new vendors and classification codes as needed. Along the programming front, I recoded the AB and ABM expense e-forms to properly calculate and display an individual’s T&L information.

I managed the process of acquiring, troubleshooting and testing a multi-function printer/copier from IBM. The ability to scan-to-email and properly format reports from the JD Edwards package were among the primary reasons for evaluating the equipment. However, the unit fell short in several key areas, so we then brought in a Canon Image Runner similar to the model currently in use by the Structures group and voila - it met all of our expectations. Finally, I helped to install various updates, security fixes and service packs on all computer workstations within the Structures and Manufacturing buildings. The entire operation was designed to provide fixes to security vulnerabilities identified within Windows and MS Office.

American Bridge Company, Coraopolis, Pennsylvania - Summer 2004

My final rotation proved to be a geared mostly toward technical support for clients, both locally in Coraopolis and remotely for the eight divisions scattered throughout the United States. My supervising manager had taken nearly three weeks of vacation during this term and suddenly I found myself in charge of the entire IT Department for American Bridge. Yikes! Talk about a leap in responsibility! I was tasked with keeping the network up and all of the users happy and productive. Specifically, ensuring that clients could access the AS400 system, the cornerstone of the company's financial metrics. Luckily, there were no major events during this time that had an adverse effect on the communication infrastructure.

I then shifted my focus on revamping some of the web-based, data access scripts that were either inefficient or inoperative. We also invested in a program that continually monitors CPU usage of the server pool. If any process happened to "take over" a server's CPU, I devised a batch file to kill the wayward process and alert the IT staff via email. Using the same software, my supervisor and I developed a program that would continually monitor the status of the servers. If any of them were down, the program would send a text message to my bosses cell phone so that he could take the appropriate measures, whether during or after work hours. I as my time was coming to an end, I had the great privilege of imparting all of the knowledge I had gained at AB to the incoming co-op student.

Conclusion

As the emphasis of the Computer Science program at Pitt is on programming and problem solving, I was extremely fortunate to gain exposure to the intricacies of data communication and networking. As every company has an IT Department, so do they have a need for knowledgeable people to maintain and troubleshoot their networks. For me, this is a fascinating field, and my experience in this area now presents a whole new realm of desirable employment choices that I might not have previously considered. From a programming perspective, I have learned a very practical and flexible language that has a wide scope of appeal: PHP. Coupled with JavaScript and SQL, it makes for some very powerful applications, as I have seen first hand. The ability to develop programs that combine web-based forms, scripting, and data manipulation is a skill that will certainly make me marketable in a variety of business settings. In summary, I believe I have fulfilled the mission I embarked on when I decided to become a Pitt co-op student: I am much better prepared to meet the challenges of a transient world of technology.