CSUEB virtual computing lab wins innovation award

From left to right, Lee Thompson, Gagan Aneja and Alex Patterson

April 21, 2011 5:10am

CENIC, the Corporation for Education Network Initiatives in California, awarded the Virtual Computing Lab (VCL) Initiative the 2011 "Innovations in Networking" award in the category of Educational Applications. Every year, CENIC selects a project that showcases the ways in which advanced network are and will be changing the world we live in and our way of interacting with it in the arenas of research and education.

At the awards ceremony held in March, Doug Hartline, Chair of the CENIC 2011Conference, explained why the VCL project was selected for an award:

Begun as a pilot program at the Cal State East Bay and Northridge campuses, the Virtual Computing Lab (VCL) Initiative allows students to access the software applications their coursework demands from campus, home, or anywhere they have a browser and Internet connectivity. Furthermore, students have this access seven days a week, 24 hours a day. Complex,expensive software can run on the VCL and be accessed via an older PC or a Macintosh since the hardware in the VCL handles the processing. Thus for all the reasons listed above, the VCL enables significant cost savings and performance increases for the CSU. Software can be used much more efficiently in the VCL and the Lab scaled to make it available to users in many locationswithout duplicating effort. Also, older and legacy equipment can be used to access the Lab. In times when new budget cuts confront California's public education every year, an application that can literally take these crises and turn them into opportunities not only to continue operations in the face of financial tight times but to actually improve and extend an institution's mission certainly deserves applause.

After accepting the award, Lee Thompson, Deputy CIO and Interim ISO at Cal State East Bay, presented an overview of the VCL project. View video. In addition to Thompson, who serves as the project manager, the CSUEB VCL team includes John Charles (sponsor), Setareh Sarrafan, Jesse Norman, Alex Patterson, and Gagan Aneja.

Congrats to the VCL team!