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arrow1.gif (140 bytes)Academic Computing Committee

arrow1.gif (140 bytes)Technical Literacy Working Group

arrow1.gif (140 bytes)Administrative Computing Committee

arrow1.gif (140 bytes)Info Tech Services

arrow1.gif (140 bytes)Curricular Design

arrow1.gif (140 bytes)Web Resources

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 vert_line.gif (131 bytes) Academic Computing Steering Committee
(AcCSC)

Minutes of Meetings:
October 8, 2004; Reamer Campus Center

Present: Batson, Cossey, Davis, Feck, Klein, McFadden, Sener

Review of last meeting's minutes

1. ConnectNY.  New library service.  Click on the ConnectNY icon from the catalog web site to search 8 upstate libraries.

2. Laptop insurance.  Our current written laptop policy is incorrect.  Basically the college does not insure laptops ($10K deductible).  Faculty and staff are responsible for loss or damage off campus; they may be covered by individual homeowners, renters, auto policies, but that is up to the individual.

We will contact the Bookstore and John Skumurski to see whether there is a cost-effective way for faculty to buy separate laptop policies.

3. Content Management System (CMS).  The web office is studying CMS as a way to keep all web sites current.  Academic departments, among others, continue to suffer from "content rot," as pages become stale and obsolete without constant attention. A CMS might make it easier for one person to (a) know about and (b) fix stale content without a lot of expertise in web programming.  Content would be served into fixed templates via a database.  The system would not be cheap -- up to $100K.  Of course getting some one person to take responsibility for the content of each site is key.

4. House seminar rooms.  With the opening of the Minerva House system, there have been some early issues with scheduling rooms, training faculty, and maintaining the seminar rooms.  The Houses, plus College Park Hall, have stretched ITS and Media Services by adding eight new, geographically scattered buildings to cover.

5. ITS report.  D. Cossey supplied the attached report of ITS activities.
The Fall ITS newsletter is posted at:
http://its.union.edu/ACAD/ACADNEWS/update0904/index.html

6. Future agenda items.

  • Software for faculty home computers [probably cannot be done because of our licenses, unless faculty get a laptop]

  • Spam filtering [DK recommends MailShell Anti-SPAM for Eudora; ITS is doing some filtering for Outlook]

  • Online student and administrative services, including advising, registration, transcript viewing, faculty evaluations, electronic portfolios, budgeting and purchasing (provide an overview of planned administrative computing upgrade)

  • Online survey tools, specifically Zarca (available through the Web office)

  • Deliniating responsibilities of AcCSC and the Web Advisory Board

  • IP-Video support for IVDS and other projects - e.g. R. Balmer’s experiment with Macromedia Breeze and Election 2004

  • Status of new Blog software

  • Subscribing to ARTStor

  • Upgrading faculty and staff computers – is there a stock of 2-yr-old lab computers? Where do they go? - Is there new  or used equipment for women’s studies?

  • Computers for disabled students

  • Most Wired article for Forbes magazine

  • Making the online schedule and calendar system work

  • Maya computers in the Graphics Lab -- there is a class needing these computers, which were unfortunately damaged at the start of the term, but still not replaced.

Next meeting: October 29, 2004; Reamer Campus Center, 2nd floor.  Lunch will be provided.

© 2003  Union College, Schenectady, New York
Page maintained by J. Douglass Klein, Associate Dean for Information Technology.
Last updated 10/27/2004