Introducing WPCampus Speaker: Mike Richwalsky

Mike Richwalsky will be joining us at WPCampus 2017 to share Managing a gigantic Multisite installation and surviving to tell the tale. You can see him in action on Saturday, July 15 at 1:30 p.m.

Tell us about your first website or digital project. What was the spark for you?

I caught the spark in 1996, the early days of the web. In those days, only select few people had web pages where I went to school. I wasn’t a computer science major, but I asked nicely and got an account on a math/computer science server and went out that weekend and picked up an HTML for Dummies for book. The rest is history.

Why higher education? 

I love higher ed because we’re working for something more than profits. I’ve worked in agencies and struggled with time sheets and always looking for new business. I never ran out of work to do in higher ed.

Tell us about the topic of your session. Why is it important to you?

I’m excited to share my experience with managing a giant WP multisite installation because when I set out on this journey, no one really had any experience or data points around how to best work with WordPress on this large a scale. If there’s a nugget that someone can walk away from and implement on their campus, I’ll be pretty pumped.

Why do you ♥️ WPCampus?

I love WPCampus because of its laser focus. Don’t get me wrong, I love other groups like HighEdWeb, but they must support such a varied group of platforms. At WPCampus, you know the friends and colleagues you talk and share with all are working on the same platform and therefore having similar successes and challenges.

If someone designed a wapuu for you, what would it look like?

That’s a great question. Is there an older wapuu who looks and feels perpetually tired because he was up too late coding? That’d be me.

What WordPress, or other, tool can you not live without?

Slack, my Macbook Pro, ServerPilot.