Dave Zenz’s Journey on the Information Superhighway
In 1992, most people at Hillsdale College had never heard of the Internet, let alone used it. Students did not have e-mail accounts, and they probably never dreamed of using a pocket-sized phone to look up information for a research paper. The advances in technology over the past quarter-century have been nothing short of amazing, transforming the way students, faculty, and staff conduct their work. For 24 years, Executive Director of Information Technology Services Dave Zenz has quietly and steadily overseen this technology transformation, building a busy department that serves every area of campus. This spring, after being the one constant in an area of continuous change, he retired.
Zenz, who previously worked as a technical and proposal writer and managed the Proposals and Publication Department for Sparton Corporation’s ASW Technical Center in nearby Jackson, jumped at the opportunity to be Hillsdale’s first full-time director of Academic Computing. At the time, his responsibilities included running a small Apple resale operation, and managing the Place for Information Technology, better known as the PIT, and the Wiegand Computer Lab, both of which had just opened in the basement of the Knorr Center. He also managed a fledgling AppleTalk computer network, which the faculty had developed with phone wires strung from office to office and classroom to classroom in several campus buildings. With only a small group of student lab monitors assisting him initially, Zenz recalls, “We made it up as we went along. Those students put their liberal arts education to work helping to build the department and its operations.”
In his first month on the job, Zenz attended a conference sponsored by Merit Network Inc., a Michigan-based Internet service provider, to gain the knowledge needed to achieve one of the Academic Dean’s first charges: “Get us on the Internet, whatever that is.” A few months later, Hillsdale jumped on the information superhighway with a 56K connection. “That was the start of a rich and professional relationship with Merit Network,” Zenz recalls.
Hillsdale’s Internet usage quickly outgrew that 56K connection, and Zenz had to purchase increased bandwidth every year. In hopes of eliminating this costly dependency, Zenz, representing the College, along with the city of Hillsdale, the Hillsdale Intermediate School District, and Merit Network began discussions in 2008 about bringing a fiber optic backbone connection to Hillsdale. Not only did Merit build this direct fiber connection to Hillsdale, thereby eliminating the costly carrier circuit and allowing for easier bandwidth upgrades, it also selected the College’s data center as the location for one of its core backbone nodes when it extended its network across southern Michigan. Furthermore, the Ohio Academic Resources Network also installed a second connection to Merit Network in Hillsdale’s data center, offering redundant network paths. “Hillsdale College now has one of the best, redundant fiber optic backbone and bandwidth connections of any small college in Michigan, if not the country,” Zenz states proudly.
In 2000, Zenz oversaw the merger of Academic Computing and Administrative Computing into a new Information Technology Services (ITS) department. He hired several full-time staff members, who in turn helped improve technical support and user services for the College’s rapidly growing computer network. Today, ITS consists of 17 full-time employees, whom Zenz considers “the greatest people in the best department on campus.”
In a field dominated by machines, Zenz has always looked at the personal connection. “The person is the most important part of any process,” he says. “I always ask, ‘What will best meet the needs of the faculty, staff, and students?’ A network is much more than connecting computers; it’s a way to move ideas. We align our work with the College’s mission.”
As Zenz reflects on his 24 years at the College, he is grateful for his talented and knowledgeable staff, for the “good liberal arts students who helped build ITS,” and for the friendships he made. “I’m just an average guy who’s had a fantastic opportunity at just the right time to work here and to be a part of something big and exciting in the Information Age.”
Printed in the Spring 2016 Alumni Magazine