Campus Champions program reaches 200 members

The Campus Champions program, an outreach and education effort to help spread awareness about XSEDE, has reached a new benchmark.

Alla Kammerdiner (New Mexico State University) has become the 200th Campus Champion. Kammerdiner is a faculty member at NMSU, where she is an active member of the NMSU Teaching Academy, and was awarded the Most Distinguished Member for the 2011-12 academic year.

"I'm really excited and I'm really happy, but it's not as much about me as it is about the needs of New Mexico State University," Kammerdiner said. "I just felt that something I really want to do is help the community more and do more regarding supercomputing resources that XSEDE has to offer. I also benefit more myself and I found a synergy in terms of what I can do and how it can impact my university. In terms of both teaching and research, this will help me do both and bring more attention to supercomputing and XSEDE as a whole."

The Campus Champions program supports campus representatives as a local source of knowledge about XSEDE, as well as other digital services, opportunities and resources. Champions are found in 49 of the 50 United States at nearly 150 institutions.

Champions not only provide researchers with information regarding high-performance computing and cyberinfrastructure specific to that campus, but Champions can also become a source of Start-Up allocations or act as a liaison to interact directly with XSEDE staff.