What happened when Kenneth Lindbloom and Ryan Murphy combined their interests in film, music and computers? The Lone Star College students won first place in a national Cisco Networking Academy Video Contest.
“We knew we would win,” said Lindbloom.
The winning video, available for viewing at Youtube.com/watch?v=t5OhUUn138w, is a short film starring Lindbloom, Murphy and friends that was shot on the Barker Cypress campus with editing assistance from students of LSC-CyFair’s David Potts, professor of television and motion graphics. The film short promotes Information Technology (IT) and in particular, the value of skills mastered in the Cisco Network Academy courses taken at LSC-Tomball and LSC-CyFair.
In one excerpt, Murphy said “When large companies have IT problems, it can cost them millions of dollars.” Lindbloom adds: “They depend on highly trained individuals to keep them up and running. If you want to make your interest in IT more than a hobby and step up your game, you could become one of those individuals.”
In another excerpt, they admit while they knew a lot about computers, the academy gave them a good foundation in basic concepts, like networking, which they’d been lacking. They also learned new skills that will make them valuable in the job market.
“The Cisco instructors are excellent, particularly Mr. Kenneth Martin, who cared about teaching and took the abstract and technical and put it into plain English,” said Lindbloom.
Among the skills acquired through Cisco courses are teamwork, logic and troubleshooting said Murphy, who has earned the Network Administrator Certificate and is ready to sit for the industry exam.
The academy program also provides real world training and internship opportunities. Lindbloom said he once came face-to-face with how important security is in the real world and saw the consequences. Now with his Cisco training, he streamlines and secures the network infrastructure of a small construction company as a network administrator. Murphy is a self-taught musician, recording engineer and producer, has played piano for 10 years and overdubs audio and foley for short films. He put his Cisco training to work in the spring maintaining IT services depended upon by large corporations and providing tech support to employees. Now he plans to integrate his passion for media and IT at 104.1 KRBE where he is working as an intern.
Both Lindbloom and Murphy hope to tie their passions to IT careers. Pursuing a computer information degree toward a career goal as an information security specialist in government, Lindbloom plans to use his film acting and writing skills as a creative outlet. He will continue making film shorts like he’s done for LSC-CyFair’s Quack Attack Film Festival and plans to do for the Sundance Film Festival one day. Pursuing a computer engineering degree and possibly double majoring in music, Murphy said he plans to become an electrical engineer at a recording company or from the business side, oversee servers and such. Ultimately, he wants a career that provides an opportunity to be creative. In the meantime, he will continue making music with his band “One Day at a Time.”
For information on the Cisco Network Academy at LSC-Tomball, contact Willie May at 281.401.1844 or via e-mail at Willie.May@LoneStar.edu and at LSC-CyFair, contact Kim Hubbard at 281.290.3920 or Kimberly.D.Hubbard@LoneStar.edu.