There are many ways to train student employees, but hands-on experience is invaluable. To provide our Resident Computer Consultants (RCCs) with the experience they need to solve technical problems before our ResNet Installation Fair begins, we have a ResNet Obstacle Course through which we run the RCCs. In the Obstacle Course, the RCCs are faced with networking, OS, software, and hardware problems in a controlled environment with staff supervision. In addition, the machines, once fixed by one team of RCCs, can be “re-broken” for the next team. Acknowledgements I would like to thank several people who helped make the ResNet Obstacle Course possible: Brian Burchett, who helped me throughout the planning and implementation of the 1997 ResNet Obstacle Course; Steve Hideg and Ed Dickison, for creating the necessary “re-breaking” scripts for the 1997 and 1998 ResNet Obstacle Courses; Jamus Jegier, Travis Korth, Chris Miller, Tim Malin, and Scott Siler, who helped to prepare and test...
Kathleen A. Hausmann