We are engaged in many new projects, but I want to talk about a few here to illustrate the variety of ways we are beginning to engage in supporting the Pace Community. Before I begin, I am sure that many of you are following the discussions around how Microsoft and Google are going at each other as well as some of the worst restrictive practices that Apple seems to follow in managing the iPhone Applications. Microsoft is apparently paying Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation money to prevent Google from indexing stories in his vast empire of publication as a way to direct those interested in such stories to go to Microsoft’s bing. And, of course, Google is expected to release Chrome OS during the second half of 2010 as a direct competition to Microsoft Windows. The difference is that Chrome will be free! Apple has very strict policies about letting the application and their upgrades get on their App Store, which many feel is so restrictive that many are predicting that developers will migrate to Android phones. So, it appears that while Microsoft and Apple are practicing a more controlled system to ensure that they make money, Google is taking a completely different approach of offering the core services free and relying on people clicking on the ads and search results as a way to monetize. This is a very interesting battle to watch from outside, but has real implications for us…
Now, on to projects…
E-Portfolio
As you have heard from me many a times, we are working with a group of faculty and staff in developing an Electronic Portfolio for students at Pace. Rather than go into lengthy details of what this is, I will leave it up to those interested in the subject to go to the link and read at length. In simple terms, it is a space that allows students to collect their academic, co- and extra-curricular works, reflect on them as well as package them in many different ways to share with others such as prospective employers or parents and relatives. From the institutional perspective, this is being used to track learning outcomes as well as for assessment. We have recommended the use of an open source software called Mahara for this purpose.
In the interest of time, we also installed this on the Amazon Elastic Computing Cloud. Since we were not sure if this is going to do the job, we didn’t necessarily want to do all the ground work on our servers. It too literally 5 minutes to provision a Linux machine on Amazon and another 2 hours to fully set up Mahara for configuration and testing. How cool is that? We then did a test drive and showed it to the Pace E-portfolio group who deemed this as a workable solution, so we will install it locally and proceed. This will become the way we will test new systems going forward, without the elaborate set up that we need internally. Almost a full month of usage on Amazon cost us $48.50!
Winter Orientation
The Application developers and Administrative Computing Services staff have been working feverishly with the Office of Student Success as well as Enrollment Management to get an application that was developed earlier for students to register for Winter Orientation from various schools in the different campuses. As always, revamping an application is never as straightforward as one assumes at the beginning. So, we had the usual scope creep, last minute adjustments, lack of data definitions in the beginning and most importantly lack of clear understanding of the source of data. However, everyone working on it came together nicely and the product is being reviewed for going full production today.
As I watched the progress of this, I began to understand more of the “Pace culture” and how it plays into these types of applications. I learned a lot and have made some suggestions on how to improve the application development itself (such as separation of content from the code) and have spoken to the functional offices about a few tweaks that we need to make to the process as we move along.
Wireless in the Dorms
We have done the site surveys for providing wireless in the dormitories and are in the process of evaluating whether to stick with Bluesocket like we have for the classrooms or look at other vendors. This is obviously not an easy decision, but, as I have mentioned numerous times, our obligation to the institution is that we do due diligence everytime we make a major technology commitment. When I was at EDUCAUSE, I heard Quinnipiac University (I have strong connections to the IT folks there) and MIT rave about the transformation that 3Com has gone through in the networking space and how happy that these institutions have been for implementing the 3Com solutions. So, I have asked our staff to seriously evaluate 3Com as an option. I fully understand the dangers of mixed environments which should be taken into consideration in evaluating 3Com. But, regardless of which direction that we go, the good news is that the dorms will have wireless – the extent of coverage and where we will be able to provide this will all depend on what we can afford!
Classroom Technology
It is very exciting that we are planning to install classroom technologies along the lines of what we did on the 20th floor of 163 William Street in 13 more classrooms before the Spring semester starts. 7 Classrooms in NY City and 6 in PLV are scheduled for this upgrade. As you know, we need to do this strategically in that only classrooms that are in decent physical shape with appropriate lighting etc. that we want to do this. Otherwise, we may have to go back in and rip everything apart yet again! In addition, we are looking to vastly improve our videoconferencing facilities by installing state of the art hardware in two locations. With the increased strategic focus on online courses, these types of enhancements will add enormous values.
I had suggested that we look at 4.5″ touch panels in these newer classrooms as a way to save money, without necessarily reducing functionality. However, thanks to the focus group and consultation with the faculty that we have in place, we reversed this decision and are sticking with 17″ touch panel. The faculty made sound arguments as to why this is a wise choice in the long run. After all, these decisions are less about technology than functions and the users! User Services, specifically the Educational Media folks did a terrific job in moving this forward.
While at it, I am excited to let you know that I have asked User Services to look at increasing the Helpdesk hours as well as look at ways to move the Helpdesk to more visible location where the users can interact directly with them!
We are also planning the move of students to Google Apps for Education as well as Emergency Communication using Connect Ed. Both of these topics require more detailed posts on their own!