Annual Report Fiscal Year 2010
Table of Contents / PageMission Statement / 3
Web Page Address & Contact Information / 3
NETS Executive Committee / 3
NETS Staff / 4
NETS Budget / 5
NETS Accomplishments Brief / 5
Near Term Improvement Efforts / 7
Far Term Improvement Efforts / 7
NETS Infrastructure / 8
Usage Levels Video Applications / 9
Courses & Webcasting / 9
Usage Character & Traffic Patterns / 11
User Technical Support & Maintenance Record / 12
Cost & Efficiency Measurements / 14
Historic Utilization Measurement & Patterns (Video Applications) / 15
Access History By Campus / 16
Data Tables / 20
Credit Listing / 21
Non-Credit Workshops/Meetings / 24
Web Streamed Events / 29
NETS Mission Statement:
The Northwest Educational Technology System, NETS, is a coalition of northwestern Minnesota institutions of higher education who employ technology to foster cooperation, communication, efficiency & access. Members utilize NETS to meet their own mission objectives & facilitate access between public resources & users. NETS infrastructure & policies are in place to expand opportunities through resource sharing between member institutions, to access distant resources & to form partnerships with other public & private entities.
NETS Executive Committee:
Bemidji State University Dr. Jon Quistgaard, President
Robert Griggs NETS Proxy
Minnesota State Community & Technical College Dr. Barry Lane
NETS Executive Committee Chairman
Minnesota State University Moorhead Dr. Edna Mora Szymanski, President
Brittney Goodman NETS Proxy
Northland Community Technical College Kent Hanson, Provost
University of Minnesota, Crookston Dr. Charles Casey, Chancellor
NETS Coordinator Jeff Sinks
NETS Staff:
NETS Coordinator Jeff Sinks
NETS Technician Mike Hanson
NWLINKS Technician Corky Miller
NETS Site Locations:
Bemidji State University
Leech Lake Tribal College
Minnesota State Community & Technical College
Fergus Falls
Detroit Lakes
Moorhead
Perham Admin Offices
Wadena
Minnesota State University Moorhead
Northland Community & Technical College
East Grand Forks
Thief River Falls
Northwest Technical College Bemidji
Roseau City Center
University of Minnesota, Crookston
Warroad Training Center
NETS Budget:
Costs / Video Only / WAN Only / Support/Administration
193,576 / 507,450 / 262,753
Total Cost / 963,779.17
Income / % of Total
Grant / (781,170) / 81%
NWLINKS Contract / (55,462) / 6%
Other Income / (30,768.80) / 3%
NETS Member Fees / (96,377.92) / 10%
Total Income / (963,778.72)
Of the $701,026 spent on the infrastructure core, 72.4% provides the WAN access for all digital networking applications for member campuses. 27.6% are video conferencing & web streaming related.
3 full time staff members & several part time students provide NETS technical support & administrative support. A contractual arrangement with NWLINKS, the northwestern Minnesota K12 & regional library networking entity, pays for 1 of the 3 full time staff positions. In exchange, NETS provides technical support to them.
NETS Accomplishments Brief:
Applications & Services:
NETS provides the regional component for all digital access for member institutions. In addition, NETS provides technical support for video applications & webcast video streaming & coordinates telco contracts & line maintenance. Data for this report was run in early April. Numbers are expected to grow to approximately last years levels when the fiscal year ends.
§ Circuit contracts were signed for Detroit Lakes, Perham & Wadena. This is to increase bandwidth & provide redundancy for these campuses.
§ The NETS WAN was a reliable platform with no failures in FY10.
§ Leech Lake Tribal College was added to the network.
§ NETS members reported 12,654 hours of video use last year. (Data Run Date: 4/6/10)
§ Credit applications utilized 7,084 hours of credit activity. This is 56% of total activity & down 13% from last year.
§ Meetings utilized 4,906 hours & make up 39% of total activity. There is a growing number of users self connecting for meetings. Hourly & event count usage data for these self connected events is not fully available.
§ 113 college courses were offered at NETS sites. 334 college credits were offered. 65% of course activity originates from NETS members. 35% comes from higher educational institutions out side of NETS. The U of M, St.Cloud State U, NDSU & UND were the out of net course providers. There was a 6% decline in courses exported from non NETS institutions & a .5% increase in courses hosted by a NETS member.
§ A pilot project providing a centralized & shared facility for media storage encoding & web video server was implemented. This is provided at the U of M in Minneapolis & jointly funded by the U of M, MnSCU & the 6 higher ed regional networks.
§ Webcasting of video accounts for 5% of total video activity. 122 events & 664 hours of encoding for web streaming occurred this year so far, an increase of 49%. 19 traditional classes, (non distance learning), utilized NETS to post streaming video for their courses.
§ 6 NETS campuses had codec upgrades. 10 codecs were upgraded & 2 codecs were added.
§ New hardware was added to integrate telephone calls into video conferencing & streaming.
§ Video is being posted on the pilot project streaming server. Access for posting will be extended to tech staff at all NETS sites in late spring.
§ Wadena, Detroit Lakes & Moorhead campuses had classroom upgrades to improve resolution.
Collaboration & Communication:
§ MnSCU & NETS collaborated to share the cost to increase the bandwidth & add redundancy to the Perham, Detroit Lakes & Wadena locations.
§ A shared facility for storing, encoding & serving up web streamed video was initiated. This is a partnership between the U of M, MnSCU & the higher ed regional networks. The U of M houses & manages the hardware & software. It is running in a pilot mode. Access for posting will be extended to tech staff at all NETS sites in late spring.
NETS meets formally, informally & frequently with the following entities:
§ NETS Executive Committee
§ MnSCU & U of M directors of telecommunications/technology
§ The Learning Network of Minnesota Board
§ Minnesota higher education regional network coordinators & UM OIT.
§ NWLINKS Joint Powers Board (K12 & regional libraries technology consortium). NETS is a member of the NWLINKS Joint Powers Board. NWLINKS is the regional consortium for networking between school districts & libraries in northwestern Minnesota. NWLINKS funds one full time technician position at NETS. NETS continues to provide site technical support to NETS & NWLINKS users & site technicians.
§ OET (Office of Enterprise Technologies-MN Dept. of Administration)
NETS meets frequently with the following groups & individuals:
§ Site facilitators
§ Faculty
§ Technology support staff & directors including MnSCU & OET CIO’s, OET
§ Superintendents & principals
§ Telcos
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Near Term Improvement Efforts:
Areas of Focus:
§ Moving the streaming project from pilot to full operational status.
§ Change over circuits to MSCTC highway 10 campuses (July 1, 2010).
§ Continue progress to upgrade codecs at several campuses.
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Far Term Improvement Issues:
Technical:
§ Improve bandwidth at the Roseau hub.
§ Improving redundancy for East Grand Forks & Perham.
§ Upgrades at Fergus Falls classroom for high resolution.
§ Planning for a shared TMS server platform with the other higher ed regions to improve redundancy & reduce costs.
§ Explore high definition applications, costs & options for members.
Funding & Collaboration:
§ Retaining sustainable funding levels is a key issue.
§ Significant bandwidth upgrade needs are anticipated. Funding this is a challenge.
§ Lifecycle replacement needs to be developed as a core element in the budget.
§ Expanding new applications in a statewide collaborative model to achieve scales of economy & standardization. Web conferencing & streaming are key areas of opportunity here.
§ Funding for K12/library network access continues to be severely limited. School districts & libraries are important vehicles for community access to higher ed.
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NETS Infrastructure:
NETS members’ digital access is provided through a regional ring with 2 access paths to St. Paul. This provides a level of redundancy that helps keep service up in the event of line failures. NETS funds the regional circuits that to connect to the state hubs.
The Office of Enterprise Technologies, OET, is the primary provider of bandwidth for NETS members with regional telco’s providing smaller links. OET is a state agency.
MnSCU & the U of M play a critical role in funding & supporting hub hardware & core access to the regional & state Learning Network of Minnesota WAN.
Traffic levels are monitored to insure that capacity is sufficient to keep up with demand.
Usage Levels:
Video Conferencing & Streaming
NETS recorded 12,654 site hours of reported video conferencing use last year. (Data run as of 4/6/09).
Credit course offerings account for 56% of total NETS activity.
Meetings are 39% of total video activity, 1,609 reported meetings were held, as of April 2010.
Web casting is 5% of total activity
§ NETS Host Courses: 73
§ NETS Host Credits: 212
§ Non NETS Host Courses: 40
§ Non NETS Host Credits: 122
§ Total Courses: 113
§ Total Credits: 334
Non NETS courses are those courses coming to NETS sites from institutions that are not in the NETS regional infrastructure.
Usage Levels:
Video Conferencing
NETS member institutions receive a significant number of college courses from outside northwestern Minnesota. The U of M, St. Cloud State University, NDSU & UND are the major out-of-region course providers. Almost all of NDSU & UND courses are taken by NETS member faculty & staff.
113 college courses were offered via video at NETS member campuses via video conferencing. 65% of these courses were hosted by NETS member colleges.
Webcasting
5% of NETS video activity involved webcasting.
122 events were webcast via NETS. Almost all activity was an element in credit courses.
FY10 / Credits Hosted / Courses Hosted / Course Stream SupplementBSU / 14 / 5 / 0
NTC / 0 / 0 / 2
DL MSCTC / 16 / 6 / 1
EGF NCTC / 38 / 14 / 0
FF MSCTC / 17 / 5 / 5
MSUM / 43 / 15 / 1
MHD MSCTC / 26 / 9 / 0
Leech Lake / 0 / 0 / 0
TRF NCTC / 27 / 9 / 0
PERH MSCTC / 0 / 0 / 0
UMC / 25 / 8 / 10
WDNA MSCTC / 6 / 2 / 0
Warroad / 0 / 0 / 0
UM / 61 / 21 / 0
Out of Region / 61 / 19 / 0
NETS / 212 / 73 / 9
Total / 334 / 113 / 19
Usage Character & Traffic Patterns:
Video Conferencing
In-Net traffic, involves activity between member sites only that never leaves the NETS WAN in northwestern Minnesota.
Off-Net, involves access outside of the NETS WAN.
K12-Library is traffic between NETS colleges & K12 school districts &/or regional libraries.
Webcasting done by NETS either from video rooms or using NETS encoders. This is video streamed over the web for live &/or asynchronous viewing.
User Technical Support Record:
NETS tracks technical support calls to the NETS network operations center requesting assistance.
Maintenance calls are repairs or failures that did not affect scheduled activity.
The percentage of member help calls are correlated against the percentage of network video activity.
Categories:
NETS=Region WAN infrastructure core, i.e. lines, routers.
Site=Room equipment or room operation.
OET Statewide service or statewide infrastructure core. (Office of Enterprise Technologies)
UM=U of M Mpls. Video services.
Other=Issues or infrastructure outside of NETS.
LINKS=K12/library network infrastructure.
FY10 / FY10 % of Total / FY09 / FY08 / FY07 / FY06 / FY05
NETS / 17 / 9% / 26 / 64 / 45 / 40 / 63
Site / 133 / 70% / 158 / 266 / 232 / 194 / 176
OET / 11 / 6% / 8 / 39 / 27 / 43 / 51
UM / 9 / 5% / 4 / 9 / 12 / 7 / 6
Other / 24 / 13% / 38 / 50 / 42 / 43 / 20
LINKS / 0 / 0% / 0 / 0 / 5 / 11 / 9
Total / 194 / 234 / 428 / 363 / 338 / 325
Maintenance
NETS / 12 / 24% / 3 / 12 / 16 / 5 / 5
Site / 38 / 76% / 38 / 67 / 27 / 28 / 15
OET / 0 / 0% / 1 / 3 / 5 / 2 / 2
UM / 0 / 0% / 0 / 0 / 1 / 0 / 0
Other / 0 / 0% / 1 / 0 / 1 / 0 / 0
LINKS / 0 / 0% / 1 / 0 / 0 / 1 / 0
Total / 50 / 44 / 82 / 36 / 22 / 79
Maintenance:
Maintenance events are efforts, preemptive or reactionary, to fix site or network issues that are not disruptive to network activity.
The increase in maintenance activity relates mostly to upgrades completed this year.
The largest are of help calls, site, were to assist users typically with room hardware that needed to be put back to proper levels, i.e. monitors amps, mixers.
There were no WAN failures in NETS FY10 to date. There have been several LAN failures due to a campus power outage.
Area of Correction / Help % Change from Last Year / Maintenance % Change from Last YearNETS / 65% / 400%
Site / 84% / 100%
OET / 138% / 0%
UM / 225% / 0%
Other / 63% / 0%
LINKS / 0% / 0%
Total / 83% / 114%
Cost Efficiency:
Total network costs are made up of recurring base infrastructure & staffing costs.
Cost Efficiency:
This chart measures the cost of regional digital access infrastructure on a per full year equivalent comparison. Last year’s FYE data is used. Costs are divided by the total FYE of all NETS members.
Utilization History:
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Access History:
NETS tracks access patterns for video applications. Because video applications consume bridging resources, a high level of bandwidth & are allocated a significant level of NETS tech support resources, this is important to network resource planning.