James Watson

Santa Barbara, CA 93110 · james@coachwatson.net

As a leader in education and technology, I have spent the past 20 years empowering faculty and students to make the best use of technology in the classroom and in numerous performances and events. I have a unique perspective as a teacher, student, leader, and technology specialist, and can help any educational organization achieve its technical goals.

Education

Pepperdine University

M.A. in Educational Technology

2009

San Francisco State University

B.A. in Music, Electronic Music Emphasis

2007

Experience

Music Lab Supervisor, Tech Support, Faculty, and Performer

Technical support for all music department students and faculty

Led the technology evaluation, setup, and distribution for 2020-2021 remote instruction, including developing methods and systems to use Jamulus low-latency audio software and hardware setups, enabling live concerts to be performed from multiple remote locations, such as this world’s first real-time international remote music concert.
Wrote online sections of many music courses from scratch for other faculty and myself, using Moodle, and then later, Canvas Learning Management Systems
Lead the move out and return of our entire department to and from temporary buildings while our main location was completely remodelled
Expanded the audio labs from 3 ProTools-only stations to 11 general music stations with ProTools, iZotope RX, Logic Pro, Melodyne, Finale, Practica Musica, and many other department specific software packages.
Wrote a completely custom FileMaker database app to keep track of our equipment.
Designed, budgeted, purchased, and built a $40,000+ portable professional recording rig.
Responsible for hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of instruments and computers.
Responsible for approximately $15,000 of computer / tech purchases per year, and an additional $10,000 - $15,000 instructional supplies per year, and have assisted the department chair and the dean in developing our budget for the past 10 years.
Setup and run the Ubuntu linux host for sbccmusic.com and quireofvoyces.org
Work closely with our central IT department to take care of technology issues in our area before they get escalated to others.

August 2007 - Present

Creative Arts Technical Services

San Francisco State University, San Francisco, CA

Supported students and faculty with technological issues, maintained the music department library and instrument collection, supervised student workers.

2004-2007

Programmer

MegaVision, Inc.

Documented code, implemented simple features, designed UI elements with WX Widgets (a C++ library meant to help create cross-platform user interfaces).

2002-2004

Intern Programmer

Cisco Systems, Inc

Unix scripting, C-based code optimizations, debugging, testing of hardware and software, version control, data analysis and presentation.

1999-2002

Aviation Ordnance Technician

United States Marine Corps, Reserve

As a certified Team Leader, I led groups of Marines in loading, unloading, arming, de-arming AH-1W and UH-1N helicopters. I also was able to diagnose faulty ordnance related avionics and repair or replace as needed.

1996-2002

Skills

Mission driven, transparent, self-aware, authentic leadership.
Works well with students and faculty of all ages and backgrounds.
Able to work under constraint of a deadline and intense pressure.
Excellent at empowering others to find and master the best tools for their needs, while also being mindful of the biases in the tools we use.
Understanding and working with diverse use-cases, and testing with real world user testing to evaluate and debug software and hardware.
Completed classes in Python, C, C++, Data Structures, Java, Pascal, UNIX, x86 Assembly Language, and other computer science areas of interest.

Other

Maintained a 4.0 in a Master’s degree program from Pepperdine while leading the move of the entire department out of its current home into temporary buildings for renovations. I lead the faculty and student workers in planning, packing, moving, setup, room modifications, and everything else involved in the move, including computer setup and technology upgrades along the way.
Have managed and supported approximately 40+ events per year for the past 15 years, ranging from small songwriter shows to big fundraisers featuring Michael McDonald, classroom interview sessions with David Crosby, and everything in between.
Was elected President of the Santa Barbara Flying Club for 2019-2020, and Vice-President the year before. The SBFC is a group of about 60 members who share in the use and ownership of 4 small planes. I did the vast majority of the work modernizing our online tools and infrastructure (document sharing, online scheduling, and the like).
While in the USMC Reserve on deployment, I was also the only person on the flight line to be able to figure out and use an avionics diagnostic tool for our helicopters. It was intended for contractor use only and did not have an instruction manual.