Resume

Wayne McKnight #

Senior Systems & Infrastructure Engineer // U.S. Navy Veteran

Columbus, TX · 979.661.9362 · wayne.mcknight@gmail.com · Remote-Only

Professional Summary #

Senior systems and infrastructure engineer with 40+ years working with computer systems and 30+ years of professional IT experience across K–12 education, county government, healthcare, and law enforcement environments. Currently architect, operator, and on-call escalation point for a multi-campus district running Proxmox/Ceph hyper-converged virtualization, VMware ESXi, Active Directory, Cisco Meraki networking, and Cisco Unified Communications, with Python and shell automation across the operational tooling. Proven under pressure: led a full VMware-to-Proxmox migration, recovered a production cluster from a critical ZFS outage, and delivered a multi-million-dollar financial system migration on schedule. U.S. Navy veteran. Disciplined, self-directed, and built for a fully remote role.

Core Competencies #

Virtualization & HCI: Proxmox VE, Ceph (hyper-converged), VMware ESXi & vCenter, Proxmox Backup Server, ZFS

Identity & Platforms: Active Directory, Group Policy, DNS/DHCP, Google Workspace for Education, Microsoft 365, Windows Server, Debian/Ubuntu Linux

Networking: Cisco Meraki (full stack), VLAN segmentation, routing & switching, jumbo-frame storage networks, firewalls, VPN, Palo Alto, TCP/IP

Unified Communications: Cisco CUCM (Pub/Sub), Cisco Unity Connection, Singlewire InformaCast, VoIP

Endpoint & MDM: Scalefusion EMM, Radix Viso MDM, SCCM, Windows imaging, Microsoft / Apple / Google ecosystems

Operations & Automation: Incident response, capacity planning, backup/DR design, Python (operational tooling, automation, API integration), shell/bash, systemd, change control

Professional Experience #

Network / Systems Administrator #

Brenham Independent School District — Brenham, TX | Feb 2023 – Present

Architect and operator of the district’s core infrastructure across multiple campuses: AD, Google Workspace for Education, Cisco Meraki, virtualization, MDM, backup, monitoring, and end-user escalations.
Led full VMware-to-Proxmox migration: designed and procured an EPYC cluster backed by Ceph hyper-converged storage; retained dedicated VMware ESXi for Cisco UC (CUCM Pub/Sub, Unity, InformaCast) to preserve voice failover.
Recovered a production Proxmox cluster from a full ZFS pool outage; restored services and Ceph quorum, then engineered post-incident hardening (ZFS reservations, fleecing redirection, Postfix MTAs, ZED/SMTP alerting) to eliminate the failure mode.
Administer the district’s IP-based video surveillance under FBI CJIS Security Policy: access controls, retention, and law enforcement coordination.
Leading cloud storage migration from iLand to S3 object storage on 11:11 Systems, including lifecycle policy design, S3 API integration, and cutover planning.
Led the district’s MUNIS-to-ASCENDER financial system migration end-to-end, coordinating finance, HR, and vendors without loss of fiscal-year continuity.

IT Support Specialist (Contract) #

QA Systems — Austin, TX | Aug 2022 – Sep 2022

Short-term enterprise K–12 contract supporting one of the largest school systems in Texas: hardware, imaging, computer-lab builds, and printer/network configuration across Microsoft, Apple, and Google ecosystems, working alongside Data Center, NOC, and Tech Design teams.

Project Coordinator / Assistant PM / Estimator #

Jim Hoffman Tile / D9 Tile — Columbus, TX | Jan 2016 – Aug 2022

Commercial construction project management. Read and interpreted architectural plans, prepared estimates and submittals, and managed RFIs/ASIs and vendor coordination.

IT Administrator (Department Head) #

Colorado County, Texas — Columbus, TX | Apr 2010 – Dec 2015

Department head for the county’s IT function across every county department on a public-sector budget.
Project-managed upgrades of the County Data Center and the 911 Data Center serving law enforcement across every city in the county, plus the technology buildout of the Colorado County Courthouse historical renovation including a new courthouse data center with redundant fiber to the County Annex.
Issued public RFPs for major purchases, presented technology projects to the Commissioner’s Court in open public session, and provided direct technology guidance to the courts, County Attorney, and Sheriff’s Office.

IT Field Technician #

Tekcom Technologies — Brenham, TX | Jan 2008 – Apr 2010

Pre-sales scoping, sales, and service of high-end computers, servers, and networking. Led Saturn of Houston’s transition from legacy ISDN dealer-network interconnects to site-to-site VPN.

IT Field Engineer #

Med-Net Solutions — Beaumont, TX | Aug 2004 – Dec 2007

Deployed medical software, server hardware, and networking infrastructure for hospitals across the Beaumont region. Built redundant server arrays handling HIPAA-regulated patient data including systems supporting Nuclear Heart Imaging, CT, MRI, and other clinical imaging modalities. HP-authorized for server hardware and peripherals.

Early IT Career — Field Tech, Service & QA #

Advanced Digital Technologies · Integrated Office Systems · Inacom Corporation · Intuit (QA, contract) Texas, California & Ohio | Apr 1996 – Jun 2004

Progressive HP-authorized field-tech and service roles. Data center server hardware, networking, and printing equipment for SMB, enterprise, and healthcare-adjacent customers. Earned HP Tech ID SC5065.

Military Service #

Personnel Administration, U.S. Navy — Honorable Discharge #

USS Kitty Hawk (CV-63) | Sep 1993 – Mar 1996

Managed enlisted personnel records aboard a forward-deployed supercarrier. Awarded the Navy Achievement Medal during WestPac 1994 deployment for designing and building a dBASE III application that automated personnel record tracking, replacing manual processes shipboard.

Certifications & Education #

FBI CJIS Security Awareness — Active certification, Criminal Justice Information Services Security Policy
HP Authorized Technician — Servers (entry through Blade), Networking, Routing & Switching, LaserJet (Tech ID SC5065)
Personnelman “A” School, U.S. Navy — Nov 1993 – Feb 1994
High School Diploma, Columbus Grove High School, OH — 1993