Administrative Computing Advisory Committee

ADMINISTRATIVE COMPUTING ADVISORY COMMITTEE

APRIL 5, 2011

Present:  Jim Fergerson, Joel Cooper, Sue Traxler, Dan Bergeson, Julie Anderson, Julie Thornton, Rod Oto,  Roger Lasley, Linda Thornton

Guests:  Julie Latham

Agenda:

1. Approve minutes from 3/1/2011 meeting

2. Update on Colleague migration meetings; discussion of reporting tools review (Julie Latham)

3. Finalize ACAC charge

4. COLLAB migration (Joel or Sue)

5. Brief Recruitment Plus update

Approve minutes from 3/1/11 meeting:

The minutes were approved with the inclusion of “ease of support” added to the Recruitment plus features we are looking for in a new product.

Update on Colleague migration meetings; discussion of reporting tools review

Julie Latham joined our meeting to give us an update on the Colleague migration and report on discussions about reporting tools.  As we look to make a change to the underlying software that runs Colleague, we know that there will need to be some changes to our reporting environment.  In order to choose a new reporting environment that best suits our needs, the group is conducting a Colleague reporting assessment.  This involved interviewing people who use information from Colleague in various ways: printed reports, data extracts, spreadsheets, and e-mails.  They are currently having discussions about reporting, priorities, and concerns about our current reporting environment.  They also want to have a clear vision of campus needs, before talking about specific tools.  Other branches of this project they are exploring include:  how to improve security, backups, training users and ITS staff, data access, report writing, and delivery of reports. 

The current tools we are using for reporting are Envision reporting, Safari views/Report Writer, Safari Views/Excel, and the colon prompt.   The list of possible solutions include:  Tableau, Crystal Reports, Business Objects, Cognos, SSRS, Access, Excel and Datatel’s analytical tool.  We plan to continue to keep an eye on the direction Datatel is moving in. 

Next steps are to take the lists arrived at from the reporting discussions and create an evaluation form to use when we look at demos.  They want to go into the demos with a plan and a clear definition of our needs. Linda pointed out that our priority is to find a solution that meets the functional needs of the College.   Julie will periodically join our meeting with updates.

Finalize ACAC charge:

Jim handed out a draft charter or charge for the committee.  Joel described the new working relationship ITS has with Web Services.   After discussion, the group felt that the Web should be a component of this charge and be included somewhere in the document.  Joel plans to share the document with Joe Hargis and get his feedback.   He will then report back to the committee.

COLLAB migration:

ITS is in the process of migrating from Novell services to Microsoft file storage by the end of June. 

In addition to a number of technical improvements and cost savings, we anticipate faster network drive access, larger amounts of storage, improved security, limited root access, and a separate volume for protected data.  These changes are an outcome of the College’s auditor report that we make steps to improve our network security.

Recruitment plus update:

Rod updated us on the Admission’s project to find a replacement for Recruitment plus software.   The selection committee has moved up their timetable and has plans to invite vendors to campus and select one sometime this summer.  Their plan is to take a phased-in approach where both new software and Recruitment plus will work in parallel for approximately 6 months.  The class of 2012 will be the last one entered into Recruitment plus.  Two members from ITS will be attending the College Board conference in June where vendors will be giving presentations.  After the conference, they plan to narrow down the list of vendors.  Richard Goerwitz and Mark Heiman have also been talking with vendors and doing some initial research to see if their products will integrate with our systems. Linda recommended that they schedule vendor demos before June.  As progress is made, Rod or Linda Borene will give us periodic updates.

Meeting adjourned at 4:10.

Submitted by,

Candyce Lelm