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Technology Committee ReportThis report highlights the progress Information Technology Services has achieved during the 2017-2018 Academic year, outlines a plan for the FY 18-19 year in progress and a longer-range outlook into the strategic and long-range needs ahead. Over the summer we completed and made significant progress on several key institutional and technology initiatives. Our work was focused in the following areas: improvements of living and learning and environments; enrichment of the technological environment that facilitates communication, research, and effective and efficient services across the university; and supporting enrollment, retention and fundraising. Our accomplishments, updates and plans are included in the body of the report.A few of the more noteworthy projects were:Crete Phone System: Installation of a new IP based phone system for the Crete campus to replace the existing 20+ year old system that had reached the manufacturer’s end of life. There were 30 new network switches installed in buildings around campus and over 300 phones. Some additional benefits include added contact center functionality available for Admissions and to support the upcoming Advancement phonathon. Colleague Upgrade: Over the last several weeks we completed an upgrade to Ellucian Colleague servers. This upgrade was a predecessor to the self-service upgrades we are planning for this fall as well as security and continuity enhancements. One of the additional benefits included the upgrade of Microsoft Reporting Services (Web reports) which included several usability improvements.Recruit Consulting and Training: Over the last several weeks members of IT and our admission and enrollment teams have been working with consultants from Ellucian to identify opportunities to improve the utilization of Recruit CRM, our enrollment customer relationship management system. This engagement has included a combination of process review, configuration changes, implementation of new and updated workflows, report modifications, bug fixes and training and development for the staff. We are also using this engagement to inform us on the next upgrade of Recruit to version 5, which we are considering for the spring of 2019. Computer Lab Upgrades: Several computer labs were upgraded this summer including:College of Arts and Sciences: Journalism Lab, Environmental Sciences (GIS) Lab, Physics Lab, Math LabCollege of Professional Studies: Virtual Lab for Information Systems and Technology Fall is a time of assessment and planning for the IT office at Doane. We are now in the process of collecting requirements for the FY 19-20 year from our colleagues in administration and the academic units. We will use this information to draft our operational and capital budgets and project plans as well as inform us of common themes to consider in strategic planning in the spring.Many of the changes occurring at Doane are driven by trends in higher education and the technology industry. Some of the most influential trends identified by Educause for 2018-2019 are: Complexity of security threats Implementing a risk- based security strategy that keeps pace with security threats and challenges Institution-wideStudent success focus/imperatives Understanding and advancing technology’s role in defining the student experience on campus (from applicants to alumni)Higher education affordabilityBalancing and rightsizing IT priorities and budget to support IT-enabled institutional efficiencies and innovations in the context of institutional funding realitiesData-driven decision-makingUsing BI and analytics to inform the broad conversation and answer big questionsChange leadershipReinforcing the role of IT leadership as an integral strategic partner of institutional leadership in achieving institutional missions Helping institutional constituents (including the IT staff) adapt to the increasing demands and pace of technology changeIncreasing complexity of technology, architecture, and dataManaging the system implementations and integrations that support multiple student success initiatives and ensuring system interoperability, scalability, and extensibility, as well as data integrity, standards, and governance, across multiple applications and platforms.These change drivers will help guide the specific IT driven initiatives that we build into our plan and budget request. Our goal is to have this work completed by the middle of December. Below are some of the highlights of work completed and in progress since our last report.Goal 1. Learning through EngagementObjectiveStrategyStatusObjective E: Prepare students to use technology effectively for communication and for research in preparation for their future careers.Strategy 2: Evaluate the potential educational impact as well as costs of the support, infrastructure, and training requirements for a Mobile Learning program as one option to facilitate the effective use of technology in academic programs and to enhance student learning on the effective uses of technology.We have submitted a project request for a virtual application and desktop initiative. The project is currently on the capital improvements project list with a requested implementation date of FY 2019-2020.Goal 2: Expanding Resources through Enrollment Growth.ObjectiveStrategyStatusObjective B: Grow enrollment for non-traditional and graduate students..Strategy 2: Establish blended or on-line programs on the undergraduate level and identify high-demand areas for new on-line graduate programs. The web and marketing team collaborated over the spring and summer to update the program page template and develop program pages for the new Agribusiness Undergraduate program and Instructional Design graduate program. Goal 4: Exceptional Educational Environment.ObjectiveStrategyStatusObjective A: Provide an enriched technological environment that facilitates communication, research, and effective service across all campuses.Objective C: Develop a master plan to improve academic facilities and plan for future growth.Strategy 1: Create a new Information Technology Strategic Plan to support the institution’s strategic initiatives and plans for future growth. ITS Strategic Plan: Learning and Teaching Spaces Strategy 1: Improve the experience of student learning at Doane by developing more flexible classroom designs that accommodate a variety of teaching and learning styles.The institution will engage in strategic planning this coming spring. Major IT initiatives will be outlined in this plan and the IT plan will be subsequently updated to reflect the new institutional priorities. This fall, operational and capital improvement plans will be drafted for FY 19-20.Ryan Dorshorst and Mike Carpenter attended the University Business and Technology conference this summer. One of the keynote presentations was provided by a Professor from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. He has designed a scalable next generation classroom that he is using to engage students face to face and online. We now have the designs for the classroom and will price and review it with Doane faculty to determine the feasibility of using some, none or all of the technology at Doane.Goal 5: Supportive and Inclusive Community.ObjectiveStrategyStatusObjective C: Restructure the University to promote growth, effective planning and enhanced communication across all colleges, expanding awareness of the common mission. Strategy 5: Improve the University website for marketing and enrollment services and move to develop a University-wide portal that delivers user-specific information to increase communication of timely information and to provide easier access to University-related announcements, news, documents, policies, pertinent websites, events, etc.In collaboration with Marketing, this fall we will engage members of the Doane community to determine the feasibility of a new faculty and student portal for the university. IT Plan: Teaching and Learning InitiativeTargetOutcomesLiving, Learning and Performance SpacesContinue to improve students’ living and learning experience through technology.Upgrades were made to wireless infrastructure this summer to increase the throughput of access points. As previously mentioned in the highlights, several computer labs were upgraded this summer.IT Plan: Administrative ComputingInitiativeTargetOutcomesEllucian RecruitEnhance utilization of Recruit CRMUpgrade Recruit CRM to ver 5.xWe are currently working with the admissions and enrollment teams as well as Ellucian consultants to improve data management, communication workflow and reporting.We are targeting this upgrade for Spring 2019.IT Plan: Technology Infrastructure and SupportInitiativeTargetOutcomesUpgrade IT InfrastructureVirtual Server Environment UpgradeUpgrade Storage \ back-up system.Doane’s virtual server environment was upgraded this summer. We have added significant capacity and with the exception of one server we have virtualized all mission critical servers in the data center. We will redeploy our old virtual environment to our disaster recovery site.We are in the process of upgrading our back-up storage solution and plan to have this completed this fall.IT Plan: Technology Infrastructure and SupportInitiativeTargetOutcomesTelecommunicationsClassroom, Faculty and Staff RefreshInformation Security Install new data circuits in Crete, Lincoln and OmahaUpgrade phone systemComplete classroom, lab, faculty, and staff refresh plete Department of Homeland Security Cyber-Resilience Assessment.Host Department of Homeland Security Cyber Resiliency Workshop.Conduct a year-long awareness campaign and have Doane recognized a champion by the National Cyber Security Alliance for our internal and community efforts toward improving cyber security awareness. To reduce the cost of operations, we negotiated new contracts with new carriers to transport Doane wide-area network and Internet traffic to Network Nebraska. New circuits are all up and running.We upgraded the Crete phone system this summer and we are planning to upgrade Omaha in a few weeks.Four labs were updated on the Crete campus and one on the Lincoln Campus. Over 100 new machines were deployed this summer across the university.Successfully completed the assessment and met federal compliance requirements.On September 28th Doane hosted a DHS Cyber resiliency workshop where 50 IT leaders and IT security professionals from Nebraska K-20 education completed a half day of training and practical exercises.Doane has been identified as a champion institution. ................
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