Lecture to first year students

Last week I was given the opportunity to talk to a group of approximately 50 first year students (on a multi-disciplinary module) in the School of Computer Science at the University. The focus of the talk was on Green ICT.

I loved it! It was the first opportunity ive had for a while to share some of my knowledge and more importantly experience with a group of students as most of my talks now are to peers or other IT professionals. This is also a great forum for students to provide feedback direct to me about their perceptions of IT at the University - and often you can get a lot of really innovative suggestions for improvements or new services.

I was able to give the students some insights into what IT looks like in St Andrews, talk about our primary Data Centre - and why it's so important (and explain why it really is Green). It was also important to link this to some of the business drivers for our IT decisions and how these underpin some important aspects of the University's strategy.

In IT Services, we want to provide the best possible environment for our students and staff to learn, teach and carry out research - using technology as an enabler and not an inhibitor.

I'm grateful to Lisa Dow in Computer Science for providing this opportunity and hope further such opportunities arise in the future.