Marywood recently hired Thomas Steffes as the new director of information technology (IT).

Steffes is in charge of overseeing all operations within the IT department, which consists of many tasks including maintaining the network, making sure servers are working properly and providing desktop support.

“Right now, my goal is to assess where things are and try to improve them and make them better,” said Steffes. “There’s a number of areas that need to improve.”

Steffes graduated from a small Christian college in central Indiana called Taylor University and earned a master‘s degree in information and communication sciences from Ball State University.

Originally planning on becoming a school teacher, Steffes’ career plans changed drastically when there weren’t any teaching jobs available. His experience in managing the freshman writing lab at Taylor University led him to be recommended for a desktop support position, despite not having the required degree.

Prior to Marywood, he worked at Earlham College in Richmond, Indiana as the director of IT and was the Chief Information Officer (CIO) for nearly 17 years. Steffes said he sees a lot of similarities between Marywood and Earlham.

“There’s a lot of focus on helping those who are underprivileged. Earlham is very focused on peace and justice… I see a lot of similarities in the core values of Marywood,” said Steffes.

Feeling that it was time for something new, Steffes made the decision with his family to leave Earlham and apply at Marywood. The familiarity of the area and the Catholic identity of Marywood made coming here feel comfortable, but still different and refreshing, he said.

“Coming here felt like, in a sense, coming home,” said Steffes.

Although he is many miles from where he spent nearly the last 20 years of his life, Steffes is ready for what his new position has to offer.

“I like a good challenge,” said Steffes.

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Twitter: @JKucharskiTWW