TH OWL students enrolled in Prof. Dr. Jürgen Jasperneite's elective bachelor's module “Wide Area Networks” recently visited the company OWL-IT in Lemgo. The municipal service provider supports cities and municipalities in East Westphalia-Lippe, providing them with powerful and secure IT infrastructures. Despite the rather gloomy weather forecast, many students did not want to miss out on the excursion.
BSI-certified data centers and real-world operating procedures
Among other things, OWL-IT operates two BSI-certified data centers in Lemgo. On site, the students gained exclusive insights into the technology and processes used daily in professional IT environments: from structured network design and redundant connections to security and availability concepts.
From VLANs to VPN: Theory meets practice
Particularly exciting for electrical engineering and computer science students: many of the technologies used are a central component of the course. These include Ethernet switching, VLANs, IP routing with OSPF, wide area networks (WANs), and VPN solutions.
The excursion provided a very concrete illustration of how the knowledge imparted in the course is applied in practice—for example, in the planning and configuration of networks, troubleshooting, or securing critical infrastructures in municipal data centers, at IT service providers, or in industrial companies.
Practical formats as an integral part of the program
Such excursions and practical formats are firmly anchored in the curriculum of the Department of Computer Science and Automation. They give students early insights into real working environments, enable them to exchange ideas with practitioners, and establish initial contacts with potential employers – helping them to explore career prospects in IT and network technology.
We would like to express our sincere thanks to OWL-IT for the open insights, the exciting discussions, and the very friendly hospitality.
Further information on the Department of Computer Science and Automation at TH OWL:https://www.th-owl.de/iat/