Georgia Southern University Named World’s First VMware IT Academy Center

March 22, 2010

Georgia Southern University’s College of Information Technology will house the world’s first International VMware IT Academy Center where professors from around the world will learn, and learn how to teach, cutting-edge virtualization technology that is poised to become a mainstay of the computer industry.

Georgia Southern University is an established leader in virtualization education. The University’s College of Information Technology was the first four-year higher education institution to teach VMware by becoming a VMware IT Academy in 2008. Now, the University is breaking new ground again by being chosen by VMware as the first International VMware IT Academy Center . The Center is designed to offer training to college professors that desire to create a VMware-certified VMware IT Academy and teach virtualization to students. VMware is the one of the world’s leading providers of virtualization software, which is expected to be used by 90 percent of businesses in less than five years.

“The demand for professionals with VMware Certified Professional certification (VCP) will grow significantly in the next few years as virtualization becomes standard for government and business computer systems,” said Timur Mirzoev, Ph.D. who heads the International VMware IT Academy Center at Georgia Southern University. “In addition to our students who are graduating with VCP certification, Georgia Southern will help other college and university professors around the world to offer the same training to their students.”

College of Information Technology Dean Ronald Shiffler expects the Center to begin certifying academic instructors in a year. Shiffler notes that in the meantime, Georgia Southern’s College of Information Technology students will benefit from the investment in new computer hardware and faculty training needed to support the International VMware IT Academy Center.

“Because of our association with EMC, VMware and Georgia Southern University support, we have top-quality, commercial-grade computing systems and hardware that are used in our classrooms,” said Mirzoev. “Additionally, faculty who teach this technology must be continuously trained to keep up with the latest trends in the industry; our students are learning about advancements as they happen and often before they reach the markets. This fall, we will start teaching cloud computing using VMware’s vSphere 4. In cloud computing environments it is possible to interconnect islands of physical computing resources and “rent” or “lease” computing power without purchasing new hardware. What Georgia Southern University students learn in the classroom today is invaluable experience to the IT companies around the world. Our students graduate with commercial-grade training worth thousands of dollars.”