{"id":2976,"date":"2018-05-23T09:41:38","date_gmt":"2018-05-23T09:41:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/?p=2976"},"modified":"2018-05-23T14:20:47","modified_gmt":"2018-05-23T14:20:47","slug":"recent-tstc-graduate-returns-to-hometown-to-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/?p=2976","title":{"rendered":"Recent TSTC Graduate Returns to Hometown to Work"},"content":{"rendered":"

(ABILENE) \u2013 Stephen Heckler is glad to be home.<\/span><\/p>\n

Heckler, 20, began work earlier this month in the network operations center at Acumera, a network-managed service provider in his hometown of Austin. He earned an Associate of Applied Science degree in Computer Networking and Systems Administration from Texas State Technical College in late April.<\/span><\/p>\n

Heckler\u2019s job as a technician involves fulfilling client tickets and answering telephone calls at the Northland Drive company.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s going to be a great opportunity and a lot to learn,\u201d he said. \u201cIt seems like a really good fit for what I want to be doing.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Phil Stolle, director of Acumera\u2019s network operations center, said it is a challenge finding qualified applicants with customer service skills and technical training who can work nontraditional yet flexible hours.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cCandidates who have real-world experience along with a course of study in networking\/IT from TSTC are great candidates,\u201d Stolle said. \u201cIn the specific role as a network operations center technician, it is a great opportunity for those looking to put their degree to use. One thing that I think candidates are really attracted to is that interviewing with Acumera is the opportunity to go deep in the field of network management.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Heckler was home-schooled and attended private schools while growing up in Austin. When he was 8, he crashed his father\u2019s computer. When Heckler was middle school-age, he searched online for a computer he could afford with his allowance.<\/span><\/p>\n

He said college was not an option at first because he wanted to be a mechanic or work on computers because of his interest. He said TSTC exceeded his expectations.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI have relatively good time-management skills already,\u201d Heckler said. \u201cIt was not a big deal to go to class once or twice a week with a lab section and make sure the homework got done.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

He went to TSTC\u2019s Abilene campus because his fiance is attending Abilene Christian University.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI did not want to do theory and programming,\u201d Heckler said. \u201cTSTC was a good fit. I feel like I am prepared for work. I pushed and worked on the assignments, so if you put in the effort, you do learn a lot.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Leo Chavez, an instructor in TSTC\u2019s Computer Networking and Systems Administration program, said Heckler showed a lot of passion with his learning and spent a lot of time in the program\u2019s combined classroom and lab.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt is validation for the program since we certainly teach toward the smaller areas, like Abilene and Sweetwater,\u201d Chavez said. \u201cIt says a whole lot about the things we teach in that you can take that and pivot to an Austin, and make it work well.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Heckler said Chavez was an integral part of his success at TSTC and in finding a job so quickly after graduation.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cHe has a way of communicating his passion for the material and getting the students excited about that,\u201d said Heckler.<\/span><\/p>\n

For more information on Texas State Technical College, go to tstc.edu.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(ABILENE) \u2013 Stephen Heckler is glad to be home. Heckler, 20, began work earlier this month in the network operations center at Acumera, a network-managed service provider in his hometown of Austin. He earned an Associate of Applied Science degree in Computer Networking and Systems Administration from Texas State Technical College in late April. Heckler\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2976","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-abilene"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2976","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2976"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2976\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2978,"href":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2976\/revisions\/2978"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2976"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2976"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.tstc.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2976"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}