TAG Meeting Notes – 2013-09-04

5 09 2013

TAG Meeting September 4, 2013 2:00pm-2:50pm

Attendees:

Jeremy Brees, Tim Cannon, Paul Cutrufello, Kim Daniloski, Dave Dzurec, Tara Fay, Jim Franceschelli, Eugeniu Grigorescu, Andrew LaZella, Sandy Pesavento, Kristen Yarmey

1. Introductions

We introduced two new TAG members for this year: Dr. Andrew LaZella (Philosophy, CAS) and Jeremy Brees (Management and Marketing, KSOM). We’re still hoping to recruit an additional faculty representative from PCPS – please let us know if you have any suggestions!

2. Brief Reports

LMS Group (Tara)

The Learning Management System Working Group recommended at the end of Spring 2013 that we switch from Angel to Desire2Learn (see full report for details). TAG members Tara Fay (Biology), Sandy Pesavento (Education), and Teresa Conte (Nursing) all served on the LMS Group, along with fellow faculty members Maureen Carroll (Math) and Julie Nastasi (OT).

The University has since signed on with Desire2Learn. As VP for Planning and CIO Jerry DeSanto announced in July, Desire2Learn will be available for use in Spring 2014, and Angel will be available until June 1, 2014 (so D2L and Angel will run in parallel in Spring 2014).

Staff members in CTLE and ITDA have been working on an implementation plan. We’ve been asked not to share details yet, since the plan hasn’t been finalized, but the LMS Group will be presenting their plans to the Faculty Senate and Deans Conference in the very near future. We’ll post a conversion schedule here when there’s more information available.

Eugeniu noted that CTLE plans to do some pilot course conversions with several faculty members early on in the process – particularly faculty members whose Angel courses have a lot of specialized content.  (Tara has already volunteered to be one of the pilot participants.) There will be trainings and demonstrations available for faculty.  Let TAG know if you have questions or requests related to the LMS transition and we’ll pass them along to CTLE and ITDA.

Website Proposal Group (Dave)

Dave, Jeremy S., Kristen, and Katie met with Hal Baillie, Jerry DeSanto, Gerry Zaboski, and Vince Carilli in May to discuss the Website Maintenance Proposal that members of TAG drafted last year as a solution for the complex issue of maintaining and updating departmental websites. All parties generally agreed that maintaining departmental websites is a serious issue affecting recruitment of students and faculty, but unfortunately a new position (full time or part time) is not an option. TAG will table this issue unless we come up with other options to explore.

On a related note, during the switch to the new responsive design for the University website this summer, some departments were prepared for the conversion and had sized images uploaded in time, but others did not.

Acceptable Use Policy (Dave)

The Acceptable Use Policy drafts are moving forward and will go to the University Governance Council and the Faculty and Staff Senates this semester.

Identity Finder (Kristen)

At our April 2013 meeting, IT Services Director Jim Franceschelli and Information Security Director Adam Edwards brought a proposal for Identity Finder Automated Scans to TAG for faculty feedback. TAG shared two main concerns from faculty:

1) Decreased performance of computers during Identity Finder Scans — Adam had explained that the automated scans would be implemented with IT staff members first, so that he’d be able to smooth out the process before implementing with faculty. Jim noted that the staff rollout had gone smoothly and IT Services had not received any complaints about decreased performance. The *first* Identity Finder scan tends to take the longest, but subsequent scans are quick.

2) IRB data – concerns that Identity Finder scans of machines storing human research subject data or client files would breach subject confidentiality. We were working over the summer on preparing recommendations for faculty members who store IRB data on how to encrypt and password protect their data folders, such that the data would be protected from Identity Finder scans but (perhaps more importantly) also from external malicious attacks. Kristen will check in with Adam to find out the status of the recommendations.

All TAG members in attendance volunteered to serve as pilot participants for faculty implementation of Identity Finder prior to full rollout.

Jim recommended that faculty members run their own Identity Finders scans ASAP due to the increase in malicious attacks on campus computers — IT Services can clean and return faculty desktops much more quickly if a recent Identity Finder scan has confirmed the absence of confidential or sensitive data.

Information Resources Advisory Council (Kristen)

IRAC will meet twice this academic year, in October and March. TAG normally sends two faculty representatives to IRAC meetings. Paul Cutrufello volunteered to continue serving on IRAC this year. Andrew LaZella volunteered to serve as the second representative depending on the schedule for IRAC meetings. Kristen will contact Robyn Dickinson for IRAC meeting dates.

3. Items for Discussion

University Website Changes (Kristen)

During the summer, there were several major changes to the University’s web presence. Kristen opened the floor for feedback or comments on these transitions:

  • Academic server (academic.scranton.edu) decommissioning — Kristen worked with Adam Edwards in Information Security to reach out to faculty members who still had content on academic. CTLE offered support for faculty who needed help moving their content, generally recommending that faculty members use existing templates in the University’s content management system (CMS). While the transition seemed to go smoothly, there is still a need for a place or host for faculty and student web development. At least one faculty member had needs that could not be fulfilled in the CMS.
  • Responsive redesign of www.scranton.edu — There are several reports of templates not quite making a smooth transition – e.g., Faculty/Staff pages like the History Department’s, dropdown links on the Provost’s website, etc.
  • m.scranton.edu takedown — The Library had issues with this, but TAG members hadn’t heard any other concerns. [Update 2014-02-12: Lori Nidoh in PR clarified that m.scranton.edu had not been taken down. Instead, automatic redirects had been implemented.]
  • my.scranton.edu (Luminis) upgrade — TAG members reported several ways in which the new interface unintuitive. Student schedules are difficult (for students) to find, as are the Faculty/Staff directory, class rosters, and course evaluations. However, TAG members agreed that by now most people have figured out where links are, so we don’t want to request changes to the Faculty Tab at this point.

WordPress (Kristen)

The University set up a local WordPress network in late 2011. It now hosts admissions blogs, the Library blog, and the History Department blog. IR staff members had indicated that they were working on developing guidelines for how the WordPress network could be used and creating a process through which sites on the network could be requested.

In the meantime, several faculty members have requested WordPress sites for other uses – internal collaboration, classroom use, etc.  To date, while internal collaboration requests have been accommodated, IR has denied requests for classroom use. Jim explained that IR is working on determining what level of support they can provide. For example, while supporting one faculty member’s WordPress site would not be time intensive, supporting 30-40 classroom sites would be an issue — whose job does this become? There are also other issues IR wants to consider before providing class-based WordPress support – e.g., archiving student work, providing access and security, etc.  IR’s preference would be to provide support for classroom blogs via Desire2Learn once we convert over from Angel. Kristen asked Eugeniu if one of the D2L faculty pilots could include a blogging feature so that faculty members can see what blogging features are or aren’t available in D2L.

IR staff members are meeting to discuss the WordPress service in a few weeks. Kristen asked if faculty members can participate in this conversation, and Jim said that he will let TAG know when faculty input is needed. TAG will expect to see drafted language on service levels for WordPress at our November meeting, in the hopes that the service may be available for use in Spring 2014.

TAG Senate Status (Dave)

Dave (as TAG’s Faculty Senate liaison) reported that Senate president Rebecca Mikesell would like to propose that TAG become a full Senate Committee, (possibly called the Technology Advisory Committee). The membership criteria would be the same as we discussed last year for TAG as a subcommittee of the Academic Support committee — that is, flexible membership aiming for representation from CAS, PCPS, KSOM, and the Library, with at least one faculty Senator, who will serve as TAG’s liaison to the Senate. Dave noted that if TAG is a full Senate committee, TAG’s Senate liaison will serve on the Senate Executive committee.

TAG members had no objections to the proposal, which will likely be brought up for a vote at the September 13 Senate meeting.

4. New Business

Jim gave us some quick updates on changes that will affect or interest faculty:

  • Desktop computer logins — by the end of 2013, logins for desktop computers will change to the user’s R number and my.scranton password – so users will not have to remember a separate desktop password. This is part of the continued implementation of Active Directory authentication.
  • Google Chrome browser — IR will begin providing Google Chrome to University computers via KBOX. There are still some details to be worked out on this – Jim will let us know when it will happen and what will happen for users who already have Chrome installed.
  • Office 365 — We converted to Office 365 from Live@Edu over the summer. We’ve already benefited from increased email storage space and access to “lite” cloud versions of Office software. We will see a few new features later this fall, including Lync instant messaging and SharePoint collaboration software.

Kristen and Dave will meet with Jerry DeSanto, Robyn Dickinson, Lorraine Mancuso, and Jim on September 25 for a full “road map” discussion of what’s coming this year from IR for faculty.

The meeting adjourned at 2:50pm – TAG will reconvene on Wednesday, October 2 at 2:00pm in LSC591 (CTLE Conference Room).


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Categories : Angel and Desire2Learn, Announcements, CMS and University Website, Minutes, Website Proposal

TAG Meeting 9/12/12

12 09 2012

TAG held its first Fall 2012 meeting today.

1. Membership

We welcomed three new faculty members to TAG!

  • Tara Fay , Biology (CAS)
  • Kim Daniloski, Management/Marketing (KSOM)
  • Katie Iacocca, Operations and Information Management (KSOM)

We did a quick review of what related committees and projects TAG members are serving on this year:

  • Kristen: Mobile Apps, Luminis
  • Jeremy: lecture capture, pedagogy group
  • Dave: Code of Responsible Computing committee
  • Jim: Code of Responsible Computing committee, IRAC, among many other IR teams and projects
  • Eugeniu: IRAC, IMAC, among many other CTLE teams and projects
  • Teresa: LMS Work Group
  • Tara: LMS Work Group, pedagogy group (and testing clickers)
  • Paul (in absentia): IRAC

2. A few miscellaneous announcements

  • Katie mentioned that Brennan Hall is working well this year. Thanks so much to all of the IT Services staff who worked on Brennan’s classrooms this summer!
  • Kristen is working on moving the TAG website to the University’s local WordPress instance. That will make it easier for TAG members to log in and add information.
  • TAG meetings are in a 50 minute time slot this semester, so we’ll try to keep meetings snappy and do more of our announcements and information sharing via email.

3. Information Resources Advisory Council (IRAC) representative

Last year, Dave and Paul served on IRAC as faculty/TAG representatives. This year, Dave has agreed to co-chair (with Jim) a committee tasked with reviewing and updating the Code of Responsible Computing. Since that will be a significant project, Dave is stepping down from IRAC. Kevin volunteered to join Paul as a second faculty representative.

IRAC’s agenda this year will include the service catalog – a list of what services IR provides, where/how those services can be provided, what the expected turnaround time is, what IR’s responsibility is for each service, etc.

4. Departmental websites and the CMS

At the end of last year, we started discussing the issue of departmental websites. [See the follow-up post for more details on this discussion.]

The big question: Who has responsibility for creating and updating content on academic department websites? After a discussion of faculty concerns, we came to a consensus that the faculty would likely be willing to contribute content, but the CMS interface wasn’t user-friendly enough for faculty to be able to use it easily, especially if they weren’t using it on a consistent and regular basis. Katie suggested a model from Rutgers – faculty were responsible for updating content, but they did not have to post directly to the CMS. At regular intervals, a window would open for faculty to submit changes to certain types of information – e.g., each July, departments could add new faculty info and images. Each September/January, course information was updated. The centralized system seemed more efficient and got rid of inconsistencies.

Next steps: Our PR representative (Lori) was unable to make it to today’s meeting, so Kristen will get in touch with her to see if that kind of system might be possible for PR. Jeremy will get in touch with Anne Marie in Academic Affairs to find out if there’s a possibility for staff support with the CMS and to get an update on the status of the web profile project from last year. Katie will look for some of her records from Rutgers that might help us. The rest of the faculty were asked to compile a list of what kinds of departmental information are needed and how often each type would need to be updated. We can share this information via TAG-Discussion or TAG-Members. Kristen will post a compiled list to the TAG website.

5. FERPA considerations for cloud computing

We didn’t get to fully discuss this, but Kristen asked that everyone take a look at the FERPA post and think about how to share/clarify this information for faculty.


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Categories : Announcements, CMS and University Website, TAG Administrative

TAG Meeting Notes 4/12/2012

16 04 2012

TAG met on Thursday, April 12 for our final meeting of the 2011-2012 academic year.

Standing Committees:

IRAC

  • IRAC (the Information Resources Advisory Council) will be meeting this week.

Learning Management System (LMS) Work Group

  • Blackboard recently announced that 1) they are purchasing MoodleRooms and 2) they will be extending support for Angel indefinitely.  (See this post for more information)
  • The LMS Work Group will still be reviewing the three original options (Blackboard, Desire 2 Learn, and MoodleRooms), but will now also consider the option of staying with Angel for the future.
  • Mobile support for the LMS is still a primary concern for faculty and students.

Information Management Advisory Committee (IMAC)

  • The Incidental Use policy has been approved by the Cabinet. The final draft of the policy has been posted on the web.
  • There is still some concern among faculty about the governance process the Incidental Use policy went through. Anne Marie noted that there are some issues (e.g., privacy and confidentiality) for which compliance with federal regulations, rather than consensus from faculty and other campus users, must be the goal.
  • TAG was able to provide feedback on the policy language at an early stage, and we hope to continue to work with IR in that capacity on future policies.
  • A privacy and employee confidentiality policy is still in the works.

Previous Action Items

Incidental Use Policy

  • See IMAC discussion above.

Academic Technology Plan

  • The Academic Technology Plan has been backburnered. Anne Marie said that it’s unlikely any progress will be made on the Plan any time soon, since there are too many other things going on on campus that are a higher priority.
  • At some point, the next step will be for Anne Marie to meet with Jeremy and Kristen to identify a path forward.

Faculty Directory

  • HR and the Provost’s Office are continuing to explore options for storing in Banner such faculty-related information as chair or program director status and departmental affiliation.
  • Currently, Banner identifies a faculty member as a Chair, but does not specify of what department or departments.
  • The Provost’s Office has volunteered to maintain this kind of data once a location in Banner is identified. This information changes from term to term, so frequent maintenance is important.
  • The Provost’s Office would like to know what *other* information about faculty status or affiliation should be recorded that isn’t currently documented somewhere.
  • In a related project, Anne Marie and Maria Landis are working to create web profiles for faculty members – similar to those done in the past few years for new faculty, which are highlighted from the Provost’s web site. This set of data will include faculty photos, and will be compiled and maintained manually in flat HTML rather than in a relational database. We discussed that this seems like a very ineffective way to gather, publish, and maintain information about faculty members. However, this was the only solution presented to the Provost’s Office by PR.  Eugeniu suggested that the web pages could be hosted somewhere else so that information could be pulled from Banner.

Networking Computers Follow-up and Resolution

  • A faculty member contacted TAG with a concern about networking computers. The issue is now resolved, but it served to highlight some ways in which communication between faculty and the Technology Support Center and IT Services staff members could be improved.
  • Jeremy met with Jim and Robyn to discuss the faculty member’s request and the TSC’s service response. On the IR side, the communication issues inspired some changes in the Support Center workflow.
  • On the faculty side, TAG will work on encouraging faculty members to 1) report issues to the TSC either via phone (941-HELP), email (techsupport@scranton.edu), or Footprints, 2) if reporting by phone or email, to request a ticket number to be able to follow the TSC’s progress, and 3) provide as much information as possible to the TSC staff member (e.g., classroom number, symptoms, any attempted troubleshooting, etc) to speed service response time.
  • Kristen asked if there could be an “other” category in Footprints for requests that don’t seem to fit under any other category. Anne Marie warned that then every request would be submitted as “other.” Jim recommended that faculty who aren’t sure what Footprints category to use should call or email the TSC, who will route the ticket to the proper category.

Leahy Hall and Classroom Technology

  • Teresa C. and Sandy met with Dean Pellegrino to request that a TAG representative be involved in classroom mediation discussions regarding the new PCPS building. Dean Pellegrino agreed with this request.
  • TAG and IT Services will work to keep each other informed on classroom mediation in the new building.

St. Thomas Hall and Classroom Technology

  • The plans for the St. Thomas renovation have changed, so there are no longer plans to remodel classrooms in that part of the building, only faculty offices.

Lecture Capture

  • The lecture capture end point devices are already installed in the Science Center. IT Services is currently working on configuring the back end MediaSite server.
  • Testing will continue through the spring, with a goal of implementation over the summer for use by faculty in Fall 2012.

New Incidents/New Business

Faculty/TSC communication

  • A faculty member contacted TAG about a ticket that she put in to the TSC. The TSC staff member who responded hadn’t read her initial request, so while the issue was eventually resolved, it took a few more emails back and forth than it should have. This seems to have been a one-time mistake on the part of the TSC staff member rather than a systematic error, but it renewed our discussion of how faculty can best communicate with and report problems to the TSC, and how TAG can relay that information out to faculty.
  • We discussed the possibility of tutorials or screenshots on Footprints being made available, though faculty don’t necessarily have time to view tutorials.
  • When Luminis (the my.scranton interface) is upgraded, Kristen will request that the faculty tab have TSC contact information clearly highlighted so that it’s easier to find.
  • Jeremy suggested that TAG work with IR staff to incorporate that information into New Faculty Orientation.
  • Other possibilities included communicating with faculty administrative assistants or emailing faculty at the beginning of the semester to ask if they need help adapting to a new classroom.
  • The best way for the TSC to get information is to have a conversation directly with the faculty member experiencing the problem, whether via phone call to the TSC, email, or Footprints request.

Thin client computing

  • IR is currently experimenting with thin client computers in the Library. The experiment has hit some road blocks, so the original computers were replaced, and the pilot is now continuing.
  • Once the thin client model is proved successful, the next step would be to replace the lab computers in the Library and in Brennan, and then additional computer labs on campus.
  • Faculty and staff computers are farther away on the timeline.
  • One of the major benefits but also difficulties of thin client computing is software licensing – e.g., faculty would be able to log on to a virtualized environment from anywhere and have access to the software they need (SPSS, etc). But this is a very expensive process.

Faculty development specialist in CTLE

  • CTLE is hiring a new staff member to work with faculty on pedagogical techniques. This position is not specifically targeted at teaching with technology, and in the job description, the requirements focus on curriculum development.

TAG Membership for 2012-2013

  • TAG members should let Kristen know if they do not plan to continue serving on TAG in 2012-2013. She will send out an email reminder to all members.
  • We plan to follow the same model of meeting as a group once a month, with different TAG members tasked out to serve as TAG representatives on various related committees or projects.

2011-2012 Recap and 2012-2013 Planning

  • We talked about potential technology-related issues that faculty might face in 2012-2013 that TAG should monitor or be actively involved in.
  • Dave mentioned that there may be some technology issues over the summer as faculty move offices, but to date everything has gone smoothly.
  • One of the major concerns for next year may be the maintenance of departmental web pages in the University’s content management system (CMS). Maria Landis has reached out to each academic department to try to identify a point person for web page development and maintenance. There may be significant faculty concerns about the time commitment involved in departmental pages. Lori said that PR doesn’t feel comfortable creating content for academic pages, but at the same time, the pages need to be up-to-date and complete since they’re such an important factor in recruitment. We ended the meeting without being sure of whether and how TAG should play a role in these discussions, but it will likely be an issue that we will address in 2012-2013.

We adjourned for 2011-2012. TAG’s next full meeting will be scheduled for September 2012.


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Categories : Announcements, Minutes

TAG Meeting Notes 3/6/12

8 03 2012

TAG held its second Spring 2012 meeting on Tuesday.

Online Course Evaluations:

  • We started the meeting with a discussion about online course evaluations.  Jerry Muir, as a representative from the Course Evaluation Committee, led the discussion.
  • The Course Evaluation Committee is concerned about decreasing response rates for the evaluations. In the last two semesters, the overall response rate was below 60%.
  • Response rates were higher (~80%) when students had to complete evaluations in order to see their final grades. But this policy had some serious problems – e.g., students were sometimes completing the evaluations after taking their final exam, or they would rush through the evaluations just to see their grades.
  • The Course Evaluation Committee is looking for ideas to improve response rates for online evaluations. One idea under discussion is to ask faculty to grant students 15 minutes of class time during the last week of class to complete the online evaluations in class. Students could use mobile devices like laptops, tablets, or smartphones – although smartphones wouldn’t really facilitate comments, which many faculty find to be the most valuable part of the evaluation.
  • S.P. suggested that course evaluations could be tied into the Passport system for KSOM students. Sandy and Teresa agreed that the Passport system under development in PCPS might be useful in the same way.
  • Dave pointed out that the current structure of the online evaluations doesn’t necessarily fit for online courses (e.g., there are questions about “classroom management”).  There should either be separate evaluation forms for online vs. traditional classes, or the questions should be standardized to meet both situations.

Standing Committees:

IRAC

  • IRAC (the Information Resources Advisory Council) met on February 16 and discussed the idea of a service catalog that would outline what services IR provides and set expectations for both the providers and the recipients of those services.  This is still under development and will be brought back to IRAC in the fall.

Learning Management System (LMS) Work Group

  • The LMS Work Group brought three vendors (Desire2Learn, MoodleRooms, and Blackboard) to campus for demonstrations. The demos were open to the University community.
  • Attendees at the demonstrations were invited to complete evaluation forms. The average evaluation scores for Blackboard and Desire2Learn were relatively close, while MoodleRooms’ score was further behind.
  • The next step is to obtain sandbox versions of each system for demonstration and experimentation.  CTLE has asked some of the faculty participants in the LMS Work Group for sample course content to use for the sandboxes.
  • S.P. mentioned that DelTech, the vendor that hosts the KSOM and PCPS online-only programs, is moving from Angel to Moodle (that is, their own customized version of Moodle, not MoodleRooms). Instructors who teach both online and in-person versions of a course would have to navigate two different LMSes.

Information Management Advisory Committee (IMAC)

  • TAG does not have a sitting representative on IMAC, but Jeremy and Kristen have been invited to recent meetings since there are new policies under development that would affect faculty.
  • At a February 13 meeting, IR introduced two new policies under development: a Privacy & Confidentiality Statement and the Employee Separation Procedures document.
  • The “Privacy & Confidentiality Statement” is still in rough draft form. It is intended to describe how staff members in the Planning & Information Resources division will handle electronic information, in compliance with the Information Classification Policy and other information management standards. IR asked for feedback from IMAC members and will release the next draft of the Statement for wider review.
  • The “Employee Separation Procedures: Information Resources” document outlines the divisional procedures that IR staff will follow when an employee (faculty or staff) member separates from the University.  The procedures address the departing employee’s access to information resources, including hardware, email, Royal Drive data storage, etc.   TAG briefly discussed the idea of having a checklist of technology items (for example, data transfer, email forwarding) that faculty should prepare for or be aware of prior to a separation. Sandy and Kristen will ask Anne Marie if and how a technology checklist could be incorporated into the Academic Affairs separation procedures.

Previous Action Items

Incidental Use Policy

  • Jeremy and Kristen presented a draft of the Incidental Use Policy to Faculty Senate on February 10, with Robyn Dickinson and Tony Maszeroski representing IR.  Robyn and Tony will take the input from the Faculty Senate discussion (mostly clarifications in the policy language) into consideration for the next draft of the policy.

Academic Technology Plan

  • At the February 10 Faculty Senate meeting, Hal reported that the Academic Technology Plan was essentially dead in the water since there is no budget to support it.
  • TAG members agreed that the Plan should drive a technology budget, rather than the reverse. [The same conclusion was agreed upon at the Deans’ Group half-day retreat last spring.] A plan is needed to establish goals and vision, which in turn are needed in order for progress to be assessed.
  • Jeremy and Kristen will work with Anne Marie to figure out next steps for writing and implementing a Plan.

New Business

Leahy Hall and classroom technology

  • Our discussion of the Academic Technology Plan led into a discussion about the new PCPS building to be constructed on the Leahy Hall site.
  • TAG would like there to be a consistent faculty voice on classroom technology issues during new construction or renovation. TAG had some input into classroom mediation decisions in the Loyola Science Center, but not on a consistent, continued basis.
  • Sandy and Teresa will explore this idea with Deb Pellegrino as planning for the new building begins.  Dave has been already providing classroom technology input on the St. Thomas renovations.

Networking computers and desktop sharing

  • TAG received a complaint from a faculty member about the difficulties involved in setting up desktop sharing between a faculty computer (on the faculty virtual network) and lab classroom computers (on the student network).  IR had suggested that RoyalDrive be used instead, but that solution did not meet the faculty member’s needs.  A temporary solution has been worked out by placing the lab computers on the faculty network.  The faculty member initially requested the service in September 2011, and the temporary solution is being put in place this week.
  • We did not arrive at an action step on this complaint during the TAG meeting.

Having run out of time (as usual!), we adjourned. The next TAG meeting is scheduled for Thursday, April 12, from 10:00am-11:15am in WML305.


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Categories : Angel and Desire2Learn, Announcements, Classroom Mediation, Network and Infrastructure, Online courses, TAG Administrative

TAG Meeting Notes 2/9/12

13 02 2012

TAG held its first Spring 2012 meeting last Thursday.

Standing Committees:

IRAC

  • IRAC (the Information Resources Advisory Council) is meeting this Thursday and will be discussing the service catalog.

Learning Management System (LMS) Work Group

  • The LMS Work Group has chosen three vendors – Blackboard, MoodleRooms, and Desire2Learn – to bring to campus for demonstrations.
  • The three candidates have been asked to focus their demonstrations based on the Work Group’s list of top desired features, which included feedback from the faculty survey distributed by CTLE in December and January.  The faculty’s top desired features were mobile access and grading.
  • All faculty are invited and encouraged to attend the demonstrations. If you attend, you’ll receive a list of the top desired features so that you can mark it with your comments and concerns.
  • The group aims to choose a vendor by the end of the semester. Next fall, faculty will be able to choose whether they’d like to try the new LMS or stick with Angel – the two systems will be run in parallel for the 2012-2013 academic year.

Mobile Apps Work Group

  • The Mobile Apps work group met on Wednesday, February 8.
  • New mobile development will be in the form of mobile web pages – accessible either via the University’s mobile app or directly through a user’s mobile browser.
  • The February 8 meeting focused on identifying the top priorities for mobile development.  Mobile access to the Learning Management System (LMS) and Banner data were ranked highly by most of the work group.
  • Public Relations will be sending out a survey to users and non-users of the University app to get feedback on what users want to see in the app.
  • Full minutes will be posted when they’re are available: 2012-02-08-Mobile Apps Working Group Minutes

Luminis Work Group

  • This spring, an upgrade is planned for Luminis, the software behind the my.scranton portal.
  • Kristen and Anne Marie met with Joe Casabona from IR to provide faculty/staff feedback on the my.scranton portal.

Previous Action Items

Incidental Use Policy

  • TAG continues to work with IR to provide faculty feedback on new drafts of the Incidental Use Policy.
  • Jeremy explained that the policy clarifies the responsibilities of faculty, staff, and students when it comes to technology use. It does not add new restrictions to faculty technology use.
  • Jeremy and Kristen will bring this draft of the policy to Faculty Senate on 2/10/12 for discussion and further faculty input.
  • This policy is one part of a multiple-policy Information Security compliance program.   The Code of Responsible Computing will essentially be broken up into smaller, more adaptable policies.
  • The next part of the compliance program will be the Privacy & Confidentiality Statement, to be discussed at the February 13 IMAC meeting. IR has invited TAG to provide feedback on this proposed policy as well.

Academic Technology Plan

  • Anne Marie reported that other priorities have prevented progress on the Academic Technology Plan.
  • She will work with Hal on identifying the direction and goals of the plan, which are amorphous at this point.

Faculty Directory

  • We revisited the question of listing more than one department for a single faculty member in Banner.  This problem is not going away, since new faculty in Women’s Studies will be joint appointments.
  • Anne Marie reported that this issue seems to be dead in the water – there doesn’t seem to be a viable solution for adding another field to Banner.  It’s surprisingly difficult to create a new field in Banner, and when Banner is upgraded to a new version, custom fields aren’t carried through.  The field also would need to be maintained.
  •  We will revisit this conversation with HR in the future.
  • A short term solution may be a faculty photo directory that Anne Marie is working on with Maria Landis.  The directory will include portraits of all faculty members as well as their department listings, etc.

Computerized Testing

  • The new Learning Management System (LMS) may be able to provide a secure testing environment for computerized testing.  Eugeniu is looking at this.

Email Transition

  • January’s email transition seemed to go smoothly for most faculty members.  Most of the faculty have successfully migrated – only a few outliers (who requested later migration dates) remain.  Many thanks to the IT Services staff for quickly answering lots of questions from Kristen and other faculty members.
  • Training courses are still available for faculty who want assistance getting used to the new Live@Edu environment.  Next Thursday’s IT Forum will include tips and training for Office web apps and SkyDrive.
  • Eugeniu recommended using OneNote, synced to SkyDrive, for notetaking.
  • SkyDrive storage space can be used for pretty much anything, but any institutional documents that contain Personally Identifiable Information (PII) must be stored on Royal Drive.

Social Media Guidelines

  • At a recent meeting of the Committee on University Image and Promotion (CUIP), Public Relations distributed a new draft of the Social Media Guidelines, now integrated into the University Web Guidelines.   TAG gave feedback on an earlier draft of the Social Media Guidelines, much of which is incorporated into the new version.
  • Kristen will post the new guidelines for review by TAG members and other faculty.

New Incidents

  • Faculty should be careful to log out of Live@Edu and close their browser at the end of a session. Dave pointed out that if you don’t log out of Live@Edu on a shared computer, another user can access your account simply by going to Hotmail (also owned by Microsoft).

New Business

TAG policy workflow

  • The Incidental Use policy so far has been a good case study for how IR and TAG can work together on policy issues to address faculty needs and concerns.  We got to give feedback on the policy language and will present the draft language to Faculty Senate before the policy starts to go through the full governance process.
  • We’re working on solidifying this process with IR and the Faculty Senate Academic Support committee.

Content Management System

  • The transition from Tiger to the CMS server went smoothly.
  • So far about ten faculty members have approached the CTLE and developed a CMS website.  The process isn’t ideal – e.g., instead of creating a new page a user had to copy an existing page, etc.

Outage Notifications

  • Jeremy suggested that there should be a feed or web page detailing for each enterprise service 1) when the next scheduled downtime is and 2) what the status is of any unplanned outages.
  • Jim said there used to be a page like this, but it was hard to maintain.  It can be done, but where should it rank on the priority list?
  • We will keep this in mind and try to figure out how high a priority it would be for faculty.

Footprints

  • Footprints is working well as an internal tool for IR. Not many users are creating their own tickets, but it helps to track issues internally.
  • The knowledge base hasn’t been used much yet, and it’s somewhat hard to find.  We discussed the idea of posting a direct link to the knowledge base from the portal, after the Luminis upgrade.

Having run out of time, we adjourned. The next TAG meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, March 6, from 10:00am-11:15am in WML305.

————

Updated 4/24/2012 with a link to the 02/08/2012 Mobile Apps Group meeting minutes


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Categories : Announcements, TAG Administrative

TAG Meeting Notes 12/1/11

2 12 2011

[Updated 12/08/11 with links to additional information]

TAG met yesterday to catch up on all our initiatives. Here’s the latest:

  • The Learning Management System (LMS) Work Group has formed and will begin meetings this week.
  • The Mobile Apps work group met at the beginning of November. Meeting minutes are available (PDF). The meeting was mostly dedicated to getting everyone caught up on the existing mobile app and mobile website.  The minutes indicate that any new mobile development will occur within the existing University app (made by Straxis), but this point seemed undecided during the meeting itself. Kristen is seeking clarification from group leader Connie Wisdo on this question.

Sandy Pesavento (education) has withdrawn from the group due to time conflicts, but Andy Berger (physics) has volunteered to serve as a faculty representative along with Ben Bishop and Kristen Yarmey.

  • The Novel Pedagogy Group has received funding from the College of Arts and Sciences to design a mediated classroom that will accommodate the new pedagogies they are exploring. The group is working with Jim and OIT to mediate the room, which is intended to be a model of what the University could do should it prove effective.
  • Members of TAG met with IR in early November to discuss the results of last summer’s TechQual survey. Kristen will post the results and highlights of the discussion on this site under a separate title.  We’ve been asked not to share the results, but we did post a summary of the discussion.
  • IR invited TAG to provide feedback on a rough draft of a new Incidental Use Policy during last month’s IMAC meeting. Jeremy will post specifics about the policy on the TAG site under a separate title.
  • IR is in the process of hiring a new manager to coordinate the work of the Office of Instructional Technology.
  • Progress is being made on the Academic Technology Plan. Anne Marie interviewed several faculty members and administrators to get a sense of what the Plan should include.
  • Faculty directory. At our last meeting TAG discussed the faculty directory’s inability to list more than one department affiliation for a single faculty member. Anne Marie discussed this concern in a Banner meeting earlier this week.  There are several similar issues with Banner not being able to describe employee designations (e.g., emeritus, program director, department chair…).  It seems like the University needs to have a larger conversation about data storage and sharing – Banner wasn’t really designed to handle all of these designations. Anne Marie will look into how other universities handle data sharing.
  • Computerized testing. Teresa spoke with colleagues at Villanova University and found out that they use Par software to conduct secure, controlled online testing.  The downside to Par is that it doesn’t integrate with Villanova’s LMS (Blackboard). Jim will look into Par to see what options we might be able to provide for computerized testing on campus.
  • Security Awareness Training. The email announcement for IR’s security awareness training program went out early by accident. All faculty are encouraged to complete the training program – it’s  a series of short videos, totaling around 60 minutes.  The idea is to expand a general user’s knowledge and understanding of security issues.  See Jeremy’s post from 11/14/11 for details.
  • We talked briefly about the Oracle outage on 11/10 and the wireless outage on 11/16. IR has an incident policy now that indicates how and what information about outages should be disseminated.  During the Oracle outage, information was displayed on my.scranton showing alternate ways for users to access Angel and email. RoyalDrive was not included, but this has been fixed.  Jim is meeting with the rest of the IR team this week to figure out what happened during the 11/16 outage. His goal is for IR to be able to send out early notifications when something is happening.
  • The email transition is a go! The email team itself transitioned this week. Students will be transitioned at the end of December after exams. We discussed the best time to convert faculty, and the best option seems to be January.  We’ll transition in batches, by department. Notifications with more details will be sent out on paper and via email, but here’s essentially what will happen:
    1. You will get email notification in advance, and a final email notice the day of the transition. If your department’s migration is happening at a time that will not work for you, you should contact IR right away to reschedule.2. Your email account will move to Live @ EDU during the night.  Server email will be migrated automatically.

    3. When you log in to my.scranton the next day, you’ll see a new tab with instructions for accessing your new account through the web portal, and instructions for migrating local mail [with Transend Migrator].  You will also need to update your mobile devices and any other email clients (Gmail, MacMail) with new POP3 information.

    4. Your email address will be firstname.lastname@scranton.edu. You will still receive email sent to your existing email (lastnamef2@scranton.edu), but you can’t send out email from that address, so you will need to update it in email listservs, etc.

    5. Training will be available that week to help you get started.  We asked Jim if short screencapture tutorials could be made available as well.

    6. Calendars won’t be migrated until later in the spring.

    7. Office 2010 will be pushed out around the same time.


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Categories : Email, TAG Administrative

TAG Meeting Notes 10/27/11

27 10 2011

TAG met this morning to catch up on our projects. Here’s the latest:

  • A Learning Management System (LMS) Work Group is forming to review and evaluate alternatives to Angel. Connie Wisdo in ITDA will lead the group. There are six spots available for faculty participants, and (as of a few minutes after our meeting!) we now have a full slate of volunteers:

Tara Fay, Biology
Julie Nastasi, Occupational Therapy
Keith Yurgosky, Communications (part time)
Maureen Carroll, Math
Teresa Conte, Nursing
Wesley Wang, Economics/Finance

The group will also include 3 representatives from CTLE (including Eugeniu), 5 representatives from IR, and 4 students (graduate, undergraduate, and adult).  CTLE and IR will begin drafting evaluation criteria this month in preparation for the first full group meeting in December. The goal is to make a decision by May so that we can run both Angel and the new LMS in parallel in 2012-2013.

  • The Mobile Apps work group is forming to guide the design and development of mobile applications for teaching and learning. This group will begin meeting in November. Connie will lead this group as well, and it will include representatives from Alumni and PR. Faculty member participants are:

Ben Bishop, Computing Sciences
Sandy Pesavento, Education
Kristen Yarmey, Library

  • The University now has an in-house WordPress Network (http://sites.scranton.edu), available to be used for University blogs. Currently the only users are the Admissions office, though the Library will be migrating its blogs to the local server during Intersession. Anyone interested in migrating or starting a University blog should put a request in Project Tracking under “Systems.”
  • Continuing education opportunities. Wilkes University is hosting an Apple Education Seminar on November 17. Villanova University is hosting a Technology Expo on April 26, 2012.
  • IT Roadmap. Jeremy and Kristen met with IR to discuss their project list for 2011-12. The email conversion timeline is still uncertain, but IR expects that the first test conversions will begin in November and that student conversions may be done after final exams end. Faculty and staff conversions will likely be in January. IR will continue to communicate with TAG about the most optimal time for faculty conversions. Questions about the conversion came up during the last Faculty Senate meeting.
  • Faculty directory. TAG shared concerns with IR about the faculty directory’s inability to list more than one department affiliation for a single faculty member. The fix for this problem is more complex than we anticipated and will involve working with several University departments.
  • TAG will meet with IR on November 10 to discuss results from the summer TechQual survey.
  • CTLE has two upcoming events for faculty. On November 9, Margarete Zalon will lead a faculty-to-faculty exchange on management of bibliographic resources. On November 17, there will be a Faculty Advancement Series event on peer review and writing for journals. CTLE also has hired a new associate director, Brian Snapp.
  • CTLE is exploring options for classroom response systems (also known as clickers).  They have a demo scheduled with Top Hat Monocle, and a TechCon is researching other options. Sandy mentioned that there are tools like PollEverywhere available that utilize text messaging rather than clickers.
  • Jeremy, Sandy, Anne Marie, and Jim all attended the recent EDUCAUSE conference. Items of interest included Penn State’s open source WebLion application for program assessment, Pearson/Google’s new OpenClass learning management system, QR codes, mobile education, Google+, and Google Hangouts.
  • At the last Faculty Senate meeting, a motion passed that asks the Provost to provide updates on various academic initiatives.  The motion included the Academic Technology Plan that TAG members have contributed to.
  • The newly reconstituted IRAC group met, with two TAG members (Dave and Paul) serving as faculty representatives. Their recent meeting focused on the TechQual survey results, which will be discussed with TAG on November 10.
  • Teresa provided further insight on the Nursing department’s need for computerized testing. We discussed several options, including the purchase of Chromebooks or the use of specialized, restrictive software. OIT’s budget cannot maintain any new mediation, so the construction of a full computer lab would mean that other mediation could not be maintained. Jim would like to know if any other departments have this kind of need. TAG will continue to explore possible solutions to this issue.
  • This week’s IT Forum was on Data Security and Classification. (Kristen will post specific notes.) We discussed how faculty might be exposed to and educated about different data types and security procedures.
  • Jeremy reported on a classroom mediation issue in the Loyola Science Center. He asked if OIT could provide email updates to faculty to let them know if/when a computer or projector is not functional in one of the classrooms where they teach. Jim is exploring this idea with OIT.

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Categories : TAG Administrative

TAG Meeting Notes 9/29/11

29 09 2011

We had our first TAG meeting of 2011-2012 this morning.  We had a lot to catch up on from the summer, so apologies for the long notes! As always, post a comment if there are any questions or concerns.

  • New members. Teresa Conte joined us from Nursing as a replacement for Cathy Lovecchio. Ben Bishop (Computing Sciences) joined us late last spring, as did Lori Nidoh (representing Public Relations). S.P. Chattopadhyay is currently on sabbatical, and Kevin Wilkerson has returned from his.
  • Novel Pedagogy Cohort. Jeremy and a few other CAS faculty members have formed a small group to explore and implement new pedagogy techniques in their classes – some of which involve technology while others don’t.  Tools to be explored include lecture capture and clicker systems. If any other faculty are interested in innovative pedagogy, let Jeremy know.
  • Lecture capture.  A team of stakeholders (including TAG members Jeremy, Kristen, Sandy, and Eugeniu) met several times in the spring and summer to review possible products for lecture capture.  The final recommendation was a hybrid solution of Media Site (as a back end) and Crestron HD appliances for the actual capture. Implementation will start in the Science Center and then spread to other departments. Right now, IR is working on setting up the back end servers while VistaComm is implementing the front end capture devices. The goal is to have LSC lecture capture ready to go by Spring 2011, and then expand to other departments next year as funding allows. Sandy and Teresa noted that Education and Nursing would be very interested in implementing lecture capture in their classrooms. Thanks to Jason Oakey over in Instructional Technology for taking the lead on this project!
  • Office 2010.  The upgrade to Office 2010 for faculty and staff is tied to the email conversion (see below) due to the incorporation of Outlook.
  • Windows 7. The upgrade to Windows 7 for faculty and staff machines currently running Windows XP is held up due to a security issue. XP users are currently admin users on their computers. While this gives us a lot of flexibility and control over our own machines, it also introduces security risks – users can accidentally install malicious code.  When we move to Windows 7, IR will change XP users’ roles from admin to standard user accounts. By default, standard users wouldn’t be able to install or delete applications, but ideally there will be a way for users to obtain temporary admin status when they need to install programs. IR is currently working out these privilege management issues, so Windows 7 deployment is pushed back to (tentatively) Spring 2011.   Wesley asked about 64 bit vs 32 bit machines – Jim said that by default new machines will be 32 bit, but faculty who need 64 bit should let him know.
  • Email conversion. The Microsoft Live @ Edu email transition has been delayed by issues with identity management (e.g., automatically assigning set permissions to new hires, and removing permissions from retirees, departing employees, etc). IR is working on a workaround plan that would let us go forward with the email conversion while temporarily skipping over identity management. IR is aware of “crunch times” in faculty schedules, so faculty email conversion will probably wait until intersession or beyond.
  • Personally identifiable information.  Ben asked about security concerns for faculty members who don’t use University email.  Jim recommends that any University business, and especially any University business that involves confidential information, be done using University services (like Angel and Royal Drive). The Identity Finder tool is available to help faculty and staff find any PII that might be on their machines. IR also has security training videos that faculty can watch to get an entry-level awareness of PII.
  • Information Resources Advisory Committee.  IRAC had been inactive for a year but is now reconstituted. IRAC members will be providing input on IR’s service portfolio. TAG members Dave, Paul, Eugeniu, and Lori will be on it as CAS faculty, PCPS faculty, CTLE, and PR representatives, respectively.
  • TechQual. IR ran this customer service survey over the summer. Preliminary results just came in, but IR is still processing them and will present them to IRAC next month.
  • Loyola Science Center. Most of the IT work in LSC is done, but there are still a few equipment issues popping up in classrooms. IR will continue working on this. Remaining projects include lecture capture, the auditorium, and RoomView, a tool that will allow Instructional Technology to monitor and maintain classroom equipment (e.g., whether or not a projector has been left on).
  • Wireless. The wireless upgrade project was approved.  Phase I (freshmen residences, the new Mulberry Street residences, and the LSC) is complete and adds 350 new WiFi points to the campus. Phase II is currently underway and will add 252 WiFi points in 21 buildings (residences, St. Thomas, and the Long Center). Phase III is scheduled for summer 2012 and will include the remaining academic and administrative buildings as well as outdoor coverage.  This is a big improvement – many thanks to the Network Infrastructure staff!
  • CTLE liaison. CTLE used to have two faculty liaisons who focused teaching and pedagogy. They have now added a third faculty liaison, TAG member Sandy Pesavento, to provide input on faculty interests and needs regarding pedagogical uses of technology.
  • Mobile access to Angel. CTLE and IR experimented with Blackboard’s iOS app for Angel, but found it to be a very limited tool, particularly for teachers (e.g., faculty can’t enter grades or interact with Angel dropboxes).  So mobile access to Angel still isn’t conveniently available at this time.
  • LMS review. Our contract with Angel expires in 2013, so a review committee will begin exploring other learning management system (LMS) options in January. Connie Wisdo in ITDA will lead the group. Eugeniu said that we might have an opportunity to use a “free” installation of Blackboard temporarily (on top of our existing Angel installation) so that faculty could try it out. Dave asked whether or not we would be able to migrate courses from Angel into a new LMS. Eugeniu said that from our current version of Angel (7.4), we could export/import single courses into Blackboard, with some imperfections. If we upgraded to v8 of Angel, we’d be able to batch migrate courses. Blackboard would also complement our Royal Card and emergency notification systems, since they’re Blackboard products (Transact and Connect), but it might not be easily tied into Banner.
  • Academic Technology Plan. The Provost’s office has no updates on the Academic Technology Plan.
  • Mobile website and app. Lori shared some analytics to give us an idea of how the mobile website and mobile app are being used. The app has been downloaded 7,604 times (mostly by iOS rather than Android devices). An in-app poll asked about the user’s identity, and 57% of the poll-takers were current students, 28% were alumni, 10% were prospective students, with faculty, staff, and other community members making up only 6%.  New app modules include Admissions and the Library (live but still being tweaked), with an Alumni module on the way. An iPad version is also on the timeline for this year, and hopefully mobile authentication is on the horizon.  The m.scranton mobile site is getting plenty of traffic. The most commonly viewed mobile pages are the home page and the admissions and academics home pages. [Note: Stats on the mobile app are here (in PDF). Stats on the mobile site are here (also in PDF).] PR is also setting up automatic redirects from the full site to the mobile site for recognized mobile devices – right now, the only active redirect is from the full site home page to the m.scranton home page.
  • Faculty websites. We’ve figured out a good workflow for faculty websites with CTLE. Any faculty member who wants to create a new website in the CMS should contact Aileen McHale in the CTLE. The CTLE TechCons will set up the faculty member’s web space, and then can help him or her as needed with templates or other support.  Sandy and Anne Marie would like to encourage faculty members (and any other page admins) to keep their websites current.
  • Continuing education. TAG members interested in learning more about academic uses of technology should keep an eye out for continuing education opportunities, since funding may be available. Jeremy and Sandy will each attend a day of the EDUCAUSE conference, courtesy of the Provost’s office.  Anne Marie and a few representatives from IR will also attend. TAG members who do participate in continuing education are asked to report back and share conference highlights.
  • Computerized testing. Teresa reported on concerns from the Nursing department. Nursing licensing exams are all online, so the department uses computerized testing to help their students prepare for the licensing environment.  Nursing faculty have run into trouble finding places to conduct their computer tests – there isn’t enough space to accommodate large classes, and classrooms that do accommodate that many students have been booked for other courses.  An ideal solution would be a large “shared resource” lab (possibly run by CTLE/Library) that faculty could schedule for tests, with computers set up to restrict access to the testing environment. Anne Marie suggested that we look at how other schools have solved this problem. Teresa will get more details on Nursing needs. Jim asked if other departments have this need, and for what class sizes. Once we have more information, we can agree on a good solution and then seek funding.
  • Our next meeting will be October 27. TAG members are asked to keep collecting (specific!) feedback from other faculty members on technology concerns or issues, and we’ll keep sharing information here as projects continue.

——

Note: Updated 10/24/11 with PDF docs of mobile app and website statistics shared during the meeting.


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Categories : Angel and Desire2Learn, Email, Minutes, Mobile, Network and Infrastructure, Security, TAG Administrative, Upgrades

IRAC on Hiatus

1 09 2010

TAG just got word that the Information Resources Advisory Committee (IRAC) will be on hiatus this semester, as IR evaluates feedback from committee members and other campus leaders about the best way to engage with the campus as a whole.

From a TAG perspective, this looks like an opportunity for the faculty to think about how technology decisions should be made at the University – that is, how faculty, staff, and students can all work with IR to get the support we need for teaching, learning, and other our University activities.  If you have thoughts on this, please feel free to post below.


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