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Syracuse U MOOC To Build Skills in Mainframe-Scale Enterprise Computing

• By Dian Schaffhauser
• 08/27/14

People seeking a better understanding of enterprise computing strategies have the chance to attend a free, self-guided, self-paced open online course hosted by Syracuse University's School of Information Studies (iSchool). And by "enterprise," the school means mainframe-scale — the kinds of systems used to solve large and complex computing problems and that require high availability, high performance, high reliability and high security.

Participants who finish the coursework successfully will receive a certificate of completion from the university's iSchool and IBM.

The goal of this course is to help build up student skills in managing the systems that play a role in supporting big data, cloud, mobile, social business and security initiatives.

There are no prerequisites for the class, which begins on Monday, September 1. It's taught by two faculty members who run the bachelor degree programs in iSchool: Susan Dischiave, director of the Science in Information Management & Technology for iSchool; and Dave Dischiave, director of iSchool's Global Enterprise Technology and Systems & Information Science.

"We believe that by creating these MOOCs, which are a suite of new and relevant technology courses available to the public domain, we help fulfill part of a broader mission of the modern university by providing access to affordable and continuing education,"said David Dischiave in a statement.

According to Dischiave, IBM will be providing fact checking for enterprise security content, which references z/OS and the System z enterprise-class servers as examples of a "security-hardened operating system and computing hardware."

Students who register for the course on this iSchool page will receive information about where to attend via email. It is being hosted on CourseSites, a MOOC platform run by Blackboard.