July 2007 Report
Here are some of the month’s highlights by area:
Instructional Technology:
· The old Geek House is being transformed into the new ITV classroom. The site is now ready for the relocation after the end of the quarter.
· Instruction is changing its preferred vendor for the learning object repository. ITS will re-insert itself when a new preferred vendor is found.
· Summer Quarter classroom/lab imaging went as planned. We are starting the planning process for the Fall Quarter image. Faculty have asked for some different software for the coming quarter.
· ITS was awarded funds from the UTFee to replace student-facing computers in four labs.
· ITS was awarded funds from the UTFee to add UPS protection to instructional servers.
· We repurposed and upgraded the computer lab in AT109 as part of our partnership with Middle College. The Seattle School District paid for the computers and the college will have 25% access to these computers. As part of the deal, ITS will provide technical support for these 15 computers.
· ITS partnered with Instruction to look into “clicker technology”. A meeting with Quizdom is scheduled for early July.
Administrative Technology:
· Continuing with the computer upgrades and migration to Active Directory for employee computers. Process is purposefully slow given the nature of what we are doing. We put a temporary halt to the process so that we could focus on the in-between quarter work. Work will resume in early July.
· Troubleshooting network slowdowns in Registration and Advising.
Audio/Video:
· The SSCC graduation was the big event with live 4 camera video that was also fed over to OLY 120 for overflow seating.
· The nursing pinning ceremony required a tech for their program.
· Supported the Tea and tour at LHO and the Brockey Center.
· Supported the A/V requirements for the Workforce Development Automotive forum.
· Supported the final budget presentation in the Olympic Hall Auditorium
· Supported the Puget Sound Career Consortium.
· Supported major outside groups such as: Arts West; LELO; The D.A.D.S. network and the National Audubon Society.
· Managed the AV requirements for a meeting of the State Co-coordinating Board for Workforce Training.
· We filmed two choir Concerts and delivered over 40 CD's and 50 DVD's.
· We brought the multimedia set up in the Student Life conference room online.
· Installed and made operational the Plasma screen in the Cafeteria.
· Rewired and re-installed a data projector at Duwamish.
· Delivered the edited version of the new automotive video.
· We began the move of the main ITV room with the projector, screen and furniture completed and we brought our new IP basedITV equipment online over the k-20 network.
· Last but not least we had walk throughs and plan reviews for the AV in the Auto body building, the first Duwamish building and the new LHO building.
ITS Planning Efforts:
· The 2007/2009 ITS Plan has been forwarded for final review before asking to be presented at Cabinet.
· Completed execution of the 06/07 IT Training plan for ITS team members.
· The Equipment Replacement Plan needs to be updated to reflect changes in priority.
· ITS is waiting for the status of the 07/08 budget to assess +/- impact to plan.
HR Stuff:
· James Affeld, Computer Services Manager, has given notice that he has accepted a job in the IT Security sector. This is a great career move for him. We will be hiring for his replacement. The position announcement will be public on 7/8/2007. We have already assembled the hiring committee.
SSCC Information Technology Literacy/Proficiency:
· Meeting with Highline on 4/2 to discuss new assessment instrument. I feel that their plan will need a lot of work for it to work well here. Not much progress has been made as this is actually a TLC project within which ITS has a vested interest.
· Working with Instruction Technology Committee on hosting an Assistive Technology Forum during Convocation.
Potpourri:
· ITS upgraded and performed a major cleanup of the data in our trouble ticket system (TrackIT)
ITS Projects:
1. Barnes and Noble (Stalled)
1. Goal of this project is to have an interface between the HP3000 and vendor system where we create opportunity for students to purchase required text books and materials via an online automated process.
2. Need vendor contacts
3. Talked with Mike Lock at District. He is over-committed at this time.
4. ETA for resolution will be sometime after ReHosting
2. STEP aka Nelnet (Started)
1. Goal of this project is to automate the installment payment process for our students. The desired outcome would be a report that can be used for data entry into SMS/FMS.
2. Need to meet with vendor and Mike Lock to identify next steps
3. Talked with Mike Lock at District. He is over-committed at this time.
4. Meeting held on 3/28 to explore how District and Vendor can link
5. Decided that there were 2 ways the District could send student data.
6. The deliverable product will not upload to the HP3000. Manual entry into the FMS system will be done via a reconcilement report.
3. Learning Object Repository aka SAKAI (Stalled)
1. This is a project that stalled in 2005-2006. This is an instructional content repository that has many of the features found in Blackboard and Vista.
2. In order to kick start this again, we will need to devote more of James’ time. Bob Hughes is looking into funding back-filled help for ITS to compensate us for James.
3. ITS is funded for James and we have set up the technology necessary for this project.
4. The project has determined that SAKAI is not the proper tool and Instruction is looking at different public search tools so that the stored LOs can be catalogued and found quickly.
4. STAR (Started)
1. Goal of this project is to make accessing student information quicker and easier for advisors. It will also integrate advisor notes into the database record.
2. District will host the SQL database and the college will need to find someone to customize 75 or so web pages for the college. PIO and District is initially reluctant to supporting us with the customization. We will need to find talent.
3. Sent GRCC a request for detailing what would be needed.
4. Received OK to go ahead in production.
5. Projected start date with SCCD is set for May
6. The project is starting earlier than expected. Teams are being assembled.
7. Seattle District has made the changes necessary to the data feed to support this tool. Jason Gruenwald is customizing the stylesheets to reflect SSCC branding. Mark Mitsui is getting counselors to test the tool. Product could be in production soon.
8. Jason is still working on customizing the screens for SSCC use. He anticipates this being mostly done by end of July.
5. Secure Remote Desktop (Stalled)
1. Goal of this project is to create a bootable CD where users will be safely connected to college systems via VPN and Remote Desktop
2. Been alpha testing. Finding challenges with diversely configured home computers. Concern that the diversity may be too much for us to anticipate. Will continue testing and will explore other options.
3. Tested new version on 4/27.
4. The direction we chose is somewhat limited. The auto-run of LINUX is pretty picky about the hardware used remotely. This is not the plug and play tool we had hoped for.
5. We need to rethink our strategy and abandon this effort.
6. ITV Conversion (Active)
1. The college will be converting its ITV classroom from ISDN to IP. This will save the state money and will allow us greater flexibility.
2. We also are expecting hardware (via a grant) that will allow us to open up a mobile ITV site on campus.
3. We are currently learning about how to properly do the conversion.
4. Conversion scheduled for end of Spring Quarter
5. The hardware has been relocated to the new location and we are waiting for the break to complete the project.
7. Middle College (COMPLETED)
1. The goal of this project is to put MC students in contact with computers.
2. Suggested they fund upgrade of computers in automotive lab and allow them access. Sounded good to them.
3. They are looking for funding
4. Mark Mitsui and Mike Klim met with Dr. German to discuss details. Waiting for final contract in order to start.
5. Mike Klim created conceptual classroom layout drawings for Bear to ensure the wiring, power and furniture is ready. We are expecting this to be ready come Fall.
6. Wiring and equipment installs are complete. Waiting on funds from Seattle School District along with student names so that we can build the accounts for Fall Quarter.
8. HW Order (Active)
1. The goal of this is to create a large order to get a volume purchase.
2. Waiting on final OK for $100,000 from college for employee computers. This will be combined with classroom technology upgrades.
3. Computers Ordered
4. Computers Received and we are testing a new desktop image. We are also creating an Active Directory for the new computers so that they can be better managed by the ITS team.
5. Final touches on the 2 images are being completed.
6. The new images are set and are being deployed. The slowdown is because of logistics. Most departments have network shares and we can not easily accommodate shares across multiple server platforms. So we are converting departments AND installing the new HW at the same time.
9. Nursing Software (Restarted)
1. The goal of this project is to install a nursing-centric database and related software which was donated and can not run on any of our systems.
2. We told Nursing and Marsha Brown that we would need $10K to move forward. Been waiting for several months for some activity for funding.
3. We purchased a new production SQL server for this tool. We sent 2 employees to SQL training so that they can administer the tool. Need to put this project back into the production stream.
10. Megamation (Restarted)
1. Goal of this project is to utilize this Facilities Management System in order to become more efficient.
2. We are licensed to go with this.
3. Met with Matthew and decided best approach would be to start with the work order feature. We identified leads within his organization to run with this.
4. Need to secure support from Campus Services
5. Looks like we have the support. Working with Bear on rolling this out. ITS will not use the tool as we have a more comprehensive tool of our own to use.
6. Bear has a plan to roll out gradually within Plant Ops.
10. King County Corrections / WorkForce (Completed)
1. Provided technical specifications to KC for remote classroom to be located in Seattle’s Prefontaine building.
2. Waiting for specs to be loaded on KC-provided computers to test.
3. Computers imaged and are working on stabilizing the VPN link between the Prefontaine building and campus.
4. The computers are imaged and linked to SSCC network
11. Scanning (Stalled)
1. The goal of this project is to modernize our student record retention practices by scanning the paper documents.
2. SS interested in Hershey Systems, but does not have enough funding to handle both the scanning station and infrastructure upgrades.
3. The District invited colleges to attend a meeting with RMS Software to explore a potentially more cost effective and global solution.
4. Waiting on funding and direction from District.
12. Aviation HS Move (Stalled)
1. The goal of this project is to identify what if anything needs to be done with the old facility.
2. ITS wants to keep the wiring and infrastructure for reuse.
3. Waiting for move to be complete so that we can reuse the space.
13. International Website Rehosting (Starting)
1. Move International’s Site from an Instruction Server to production.
2. Need to Virtualize a server and load software. Need SQL
14. Remote Backup (Stalled)
1. Install infrastructure to handle reciprocal disk to disk backup to NSCC. James Affeld is working on this.
2. Waiting on NSCC to fund their half.
3. NSCC can not comply AND there is a distance limitation that would make transmitting large chunks of data a time-intensive ordeal. We are rethinking our options.
15. Panic Button (Started)
1. The goal is to use network capability for us to send a screen flash across campus as an immediate warning.
2. Need to work out the details on how to make this be reliable and immediately noticeable. Josh Grant is working on this.
16. DUWA Shuffle (In Process)
1. DUWA is vacating space in BLDG A to make room for a new banking tenant.
2. Move is scheduled for 6/12 and 6/13.
3. Met with new tenant and agreed to allow them to use the building wiring but have no access to K-20. They will use our MDF and will be granted 10u on our rack.
Open Work Orders by Priority
(Since 1/1/2000 to Present)
This is a snapshot of open work orders. The numbers have been drastically reduced from prior months since we closed or completed many of the aging work orders.
As of this report, we have 114 open work orders which are predominantly unplanned requests of the ITS team for support. The first column contains tickets that have not yet been prioritized. The rest of the columns are in descending order of priority.
Work Order Trends by Type
(Year-to-Date View)
Most of the work orders have been assigned categories so that we can better track trends. However, 400 of the work orders have made it through the system without a proper type associated with them.
New Open Work Orders by Month
(13 Month View)
The chart above shows the trend of new Work Orders for the past year.
Completed Work Orders by Month
(13 Month View)
The number of Work Orders completed is a true indicator of ITS activities.