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John Haskins Honored with CENIC’s 2015 Innovations In Networking Award for Outstanding Individual Contribution

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UC Santa Cruz Network Operations Manager John Haskins is being honored by the Corporation for Education Network Initiatives in California (CENIC) with the 2015 Innovations in Networking Award for Outstanding Individual Contribution.

John Haskins has been a member of the CENIC networking community for many years and was involved with the original 4CNet, the precursor for CENIC’s California Research & Education Network (CalREN), when he was at Santa Barbara City College. He then transitioned to UC Santa Barbara in 1998 and became engaged with CENIC during its very early history. He was a significant contributor to the original backbone design for CalREN and was asked to serve on the committee that oversaw the redesign of the high-performance and experimental/developmental tiers of CalREN, CalREN-HPR and CalREN-XD.

John Haskins’ many contributions also include leadership roles as the chair of CENIC’s High-Performance Research (HPR) Technical Advisory Council in 2006 and again in 2014. CENIC’s Technical Advisory Councils are composed of volunteers from member institutions, and the Councils are the means by which the infrastructure expertise, wisdom, and knowledge of California’s research and education communities are aggregated and used to design, implement, and evolve the 3,800-mile, fiber-optic-based CalREN. Thanks to CalREN’s High-Performance Research tier (CalREN-HPR), which links the state’s top research universities to one another and to institutions around the world, researchers at these institutions can collaborate on some of the most urgent data-intensive challenges confronting humanity today, including climate research, biomedical “omics” research (genomics, proteomics, and metabolomics), astronomy, and high-energy physics.

“One of the things I appreciate about John is his desire to mentor younger network engineers as he recognizes the importance this new talent will have on the continued success of CENIC. We are already starting to see the benefit of this in the composition of the Technical Advisory Council,” states Doug Hartline, director of core technologies, at UC Santa Cruz and Chair of the CENIC Business Advisory Committee.

During the recent process of upgrading the backbone of CalREN-HPR to 100 Gigabits per second (Gbps), Haskins’ leadership and expertise was again invaluable. CENIC’s approach to the integration of Software-Defined Networking with the CalREN infrastructure is another area where he is active, and the community is certain to benefit from his participation.

“John’s thoughtful, gentle, and wise presence is deeply appreciated by his colleagues, and by CENIC staff and leadership,” stated Louis Fox, President & CEO of CENIC. “The time, effort, and expertise he’s shared with California’s advanced networking community are directly benefiting millions of people who use CalREN every day to carry out the kind of 21st century research that’s made California a world leader. Solutions to some of today’s most pressing problems will come as a result of advances guided by his leadership.”

Mary Doyle, CIO at UC Santa Cruz, stated that, “UC Santa Cruz, the UC system, CENIC, and the state of California are indeed fortunate to have the benefit of John’s contributions to our networking communities. We thank and congratulate John on this well-deserved recognition.”

Innovations in Networking Awards are presented each year by CENIC to highlight the exemplary innovations that leverage ultra high-bandwidth networking, particularly where those innovations have the potential to revolutionize the ways in which instruction and research are conducted or where they further the deployment in underserved areas.

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