Going miles beyond book information:
Huntington grad is youngest analyst in company history
 

Marc Skinner, a 1995 Huntington computer-science graduate and self-proclaimed "terrible test-taker," says his Scholastic Aptitude Test scores were so low that he was precluded from even trying out for basketball as a college freshman. 

Marc, however, has passed every test put to him over the last five years at American Express Financial Services in Minneapolis. After "starting out as a grunt," as he puts it, Marc, 27, has become the youngest person ever to become lead business-systems analyst for American Express Tax and Business Services. His 15-member group supports 3,000 users in 60 offices across the country.

Minneapolis provides a sharp contrast to the steamy Ecuadorian port city of Guayaquil, where Marc was born. Marc’s father, Roger (Huntington ’65), served as a missionary in Ecuador for nearly 25 years. Marc’s sister Andrea is the only child of the Rev. Roger and Mary Lou (Bickel, ’66) Skinner to be born in the United States; brother Steve and sister Laura were also born in Ecuador. Because the mission stints were long, Marc was in the states for only the third and eighth grades, when the family returned to Huntington for year-long furloughs.

When Marc was in the eighth grade, his father bought a computer, and Marc was soon writing small programs to help his father stay organized—in English and Spanish. "I was fascinated with computers," Marc says. "I was one of those kids who’s always taking something apart to see if I could put it back together again."

Marc wanted to play basketball, so he was enrolled in a high school in Quito, the capital of Ecuador and a plane ride across the Andes from Guayaquil. 

During high school, Marc saved up to buy a used Commodore 64 and began tinkering with it. He also took the SAT. "My scores were terrible," Marc says. "At the time, I didn’t realize the importance of the SAT, or I would have taken it again."

Regardless of his test scores, Marc obviously was adroit at numbers and had a natural instinct for computer science, both of which served him well at Huntington, which he entered in 1991. A quick-study self-starter, Marc credits much of his success to two of his mentors at Huntington: Kerry Arnold (’84), now director of campus computing services, and Rick Miller (’89), now network administrator at Parkview Health Systems in Fort Wayne and a member of Huntington’s adjunct faculty.

"I learned a lot from Kerry and Rick," Marc says. "Rick started teaching when I was a sophomore, and he saw to it that I didn’t just settle for the easy assignment. He pushed me to continue to learn on my own and at my own rapid pace. I purchased as many computer books as I could afford and checked many a book out of the library."

Marc also left a lasting impression on Rick, although it was dubious at first. "Marc was one of my students when I first started teaching at Huntington," Rick recalls. "It was a class in PASCAL, a programming language. As I recall, he failed the first exam. I wasn’t sure if he was going to make it. I try to teach students to teach themselves, and I think that concept really clicked for him. He went miles beyond where I could take him."

Marc’s first job after graduation was as a programmer with Brotherhood Mutual Insurance in Fort Wayne. He soon learned that computer networks were his forte, and he began looking for a bigger challenge with another company. American Express provided that opportunity, Marc says.

The high-pressure workaday world can be a test of anyone’s patience and values, but Marc says his Christian background and education keep him centered.

"I think you can integrate your faith into your job by not, for example, exploding because someone does something wrong. And when someone does that to you, take it at its face value and don’t overreact," Marc says. "Another example would be business trips, when you have X-amount to spend. Some people abuse that and always spend the maximum. I try to live within my own guidelines and not abuse the system."

"I feel lucky that Huntington University took a chance on me and looked at my potential as opposed to a score on a single test," says Marc. "There are a lot of other colleges out there that would not have given me the opportunity to grow as an individual, a student, a computer-science major, and as a Christian."