Punch cards—that is the first technological memory that Ralph Yingling, B.B.A.’87, director of information technology for the Haworth College of Business, can recall. That memory comes from his time in the Air Force. His first job at WMU was running a mainframe computer that supported 20 users plus two classrooms. “Today, my cell phone has much more computing power than that computer,” Ralph notes.
With more than 30 years of service, Ralph’s goal has always been to keep technology relevant and accessible for students in the college—that accessibility was recently put to an extreme test with the move to distance education during COVID-19. He is also the first call that faculty and staff make when their technology isn’t working. His team collaborates with faculty and staff to create the best technology-aided learning environments for the greatest number of students. That involves doing research and balancing budgets.
When Ralph isn’t in the computer lab (or someone’s office helping them with their technology needs!) you may find him supporting the Kalamazoo Blues Festival, camping with the Boy Scouts, enjoying music in the community, embracing the food scene in Kalamazoo, or spending time with family and friends.
What are Ralph’s recollections from his time at WMU? “I was always impressed by the feeling of family we had in the college. My colleagues were there for me in times of devastating personal tragedy and also shared pride in successful outcomes on many projects over the years. I vividly recall the very early days of planning the move-in and initial equipment purchases for our brand new college in the early 1990s—that every college employee would have a computer connected to the network was a novel concept, and, as reality crept in, reactions of pure wonderment, and in some cases, great trepidation were the result! As we added mobile computing and wireless, each of these steps brought huge new capabilities to the classroom and to productivity. Memos and internal paper newsletters are only found in file cabinets and archives these days. Much has changed, but I don’t think that basic human interaction will ever be out of date.”