Drarelle Blassingame
This month the spotlight shines on Drarelle Blassingame! Drarelle joining OTDI in July 2024 as a Senior Data Engineer for the Enterprise Applications team. Balancing his technical responsibilities and passion for collaboration, he’s truly grateful for the chance to work with his diverse and talented colleagues. This Buckeye for Life is a proud Ohio State alum and jack of all trades, with past accomplishments ranging from “collegiate rugby player” to “first chair violinist.” When he’s not troubleshooting Raspberry Pi projects or moonlighting as a musician, you can find him exploring state parks, spending time with his wife and their fur babies, or planning his dream trip to New Zealand.
Q: What is your role at the university? I am currently a Senior Data Engineer for Enterprise Data Analytics and Warehouse and have some responsibilities in the Enterprise Integration Platform as well.
Q: How long have you worked at Ohio State? I started in this role in July 2024.
Q: Have you worked on any large projects since you’ve been here? Student Information System Data into the Reporting & Analytics Environment (RAE) and Buckeye360 Salesforce Integration into RAE come to mind; shoutout to Buckeye360 CRMI team, 4 months and counting with no errors.
Q: What are you currently working on? What does a typical day look like for you? As with a lot of folks on the EIP and data warehouse team I wear multiple hats depending on business needs. Usually, a typical day consists of checking monitoring systems, planning development workload, collaborating with other data engineers and enterprise architects and navigating through treacherous git merge conflicts.
Q: What do you like best about your job? The people—I’ve had the opportunity to meet and learn from folks across OTDI with a diverse set of technical backgrounds and experience. It really is a “happy to be in the room” moment for me every day, truly grateful.
Q: How do you create and innovate? I love to investigate and find points of failure, pain points and technical debt and research to uncover solutions to alleviate these issues, especially when the solutions are already present in OTDI’s existing capabilities and technology stacks. Where there is pain, there is opportunity.
Q: Did you always know this is what you wanted to do as a career? I always assumed I would be a musician in some caliber, but orchestrating data is just as fun.
Q: Why did you choose to work at Ohio State? Ohio State has provided me so many opportunities for professional and personal growth as a student and that experience has continued in my tenure here in OTDI. As well, finding good leaders and technical mentors in this industry can prove to be incredibly challenging and OTDI has plenty of both.
Q: Of what are you most proud? I am most proud of the relationships I’ve built with coworkers, friends and people in my community.
Q: What was your very first job? Providing percussion lessons for elementary school students, this was as chaotic as it sounds.
Q: Where did you go to college? Homegrown here at The Ohio State University.
Q: Where are you from originally? Cape Canaveral, Florida.
Q: What is your favorite place to visit? National & State Parks are a staple, but I equally love to travel south to visit my family in South Carolina & Florida.
Q: If you could travel anywhere in the world, where would you go and why? New Zealand, incredible geography and kiwis are some of the most kind-hearted and determinate people on the planet and I’d love to see the New Zealand All-Blacks play in-person.
Q: Can you tell us about your family? I am married to my awesome spouse, Melanie, who currently lives away in Pittsburgh, PA while she pursues her doctorate in occupational therapy. We have two fur babies, 1 cat, 1 dog.
Q: What do you do for fun outside of work? Do you have any hobbies? I spend most of my time outside of work hiking, hanging out with my golden retriever, Lincoln, and moonlighting as a percussionist for a ‘jazz-adjacent’ jam band.
Q: What is something most people might be surprised to know about you? I played rugby for several years and played in national and state championships against both collegiate and club teams. I also first chaired as a violist for a few years.
Q: Favorite place to eat in Columbus? Preston’s: A Burger Joint in Clintonville, ironically, their chicken sandwiches are my favorite and the banana pudding is exquisite.
Q: Best concert you’ve ever been to? Youssef Dayes at the Ludlow Garage in Cincinnati.
Q: Favorite quote? Not a quote, but a poem by Dylan Thomas: Do not go gentle into that good night.
Q: Do you have a favorite book or movie? Jurassic Park, both the books and movies.
Q: It’s 9 p.m. on a Saturday. What are you doing? Troubleshooting boot crash loop errors on my Raspberry Pi projects or headed to bed, former activity pending.