Essential Functions

The purpose of the essential functions list is to allow prospective students who are considering a career to be informed of the physical, emotional, and psychological demands related to training and employment in a field of study. These lists are provided to allow prospective students to make informed career choices by providing them with a summary of the physical abilities and personality traits that are generally required for the successful completion of a curriculum and result in employment in a field of study after graduation. Students entering the Computer Support Specialist programs must be able to perform the following essential tasks:

• Provide technical hardware and software support to end users.
• Diagnose hardware and software problems to troubleshoot and resolve problems and to replace defective components.
• Use various communication and connectivity methods.
• Provide solutions to end-user questions on the usage of hardware and software applications.
• Perform testing and evaluations of various technologies.
• Provide patches and temporary fix support.
• Provide administrative services for various software platforms.
• Install and configure computer software and configure peripheral devices.
• Modify and customize commercial programs for internal needs.
• Prepare evaluations of software or hardware and recommend improvements or upgrades.
• Confer with staff, users, and management to establish requirements for new systems or modifications.
• Develop training materials and procedures.
• Train users in the proper use of hardware or software.
• Oversee the daily performance of computer systems.
• Enter commands and observe system functioning to verify correct operations and detect errors.
• Conduct office automation feasibility studies, including workflow analysis or cost comparison analysis.
• Have manual dexterity sufficient to work with the fingers.
• Have normal vision with or without corrective lenses.
• Read, analyze, and interpret general business periodicals, professional journals, technical procedures, or governmental regulations.
• Interpret a variety of instructions furnished in written, oral, diagram, or schedule form.
• Add, subtract, multiply, and divide in all units of measure, using whole numbers, common fractions, and decimals.
• Compute rates, ratios, and percents and draw and interpret bar graphs.