Information Technology Has Changed Everything . . . Including Our Expectations

Can the University Meet Our IT Expectations?

UNC’s Information Technology Strategy Project

Phase I: Developing an IT Vision and Assessing Campus Networks

Phase II: Developing an IT Strategy

The Information Technology Strategy

Services for Students

• Web-enabled Services
• Integrated Services

Campus Teaching and Learning with Technology

• Campus Activities
• Collaborative Initiatives
• Leadership Activities

Distance Education

Administrative Systems

Logistical Needs

• Network Maintenance
• User Support and Training
• Collaborative Procurement

The IT Action Plan

The IT Strategy Steering Committee

The world, and the way it works, is very different now than it was even five years ago. Business, industry, government, entertainment and, of course, education have been revolutionized by nearly light-speed advances in information technology, or IT; and the revolution continues.

IT is shorthand for the computers, software, networks, satellite links and related systems that allow people to access, analyze, create, exchange and use information in ways that, until recently, were almost unimaginable. Much of our world now runs on information technology. It fosters innovation and promotes economic development. Increasingly, people depend on IT – and expect it to be there -- to help them not only do things better and faster, but also to do things they could never do before.

In North Carolina, people expect much the same of the University: help in expanding their opportunities and achieving their goals. They have come to rely on the 16 campuses to improve the quality of their lives by educating them and their children, by giving them access to a world of ideas and possibilities, by helping them achieve their goals and by serving their communities. People now expect their banks, supermarkets, gas stations and airlines to have the IT capability to offer them better, faster and more convenient services, and they are going to expect the same of their University.

Each of the UNC campuses currently uses IT to perform a variety of functions – from teaching and learning to financial administration -- and a few campuses are recognized as national leaders in the development and creative use of IT. But a number of the campuses have not had the opportunity to lay the foundation for the IT systems they will need to continue meeting the expectations of those they serve. And every campus is facing challenges that cannot be addressed with their current IT resources.

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More than two years ago, President Broad and the chancellors began discussing the need for a strategic plan to guide the University in prioritizing IT needs, allocating IT resources and developing or expanding IT-based services. Early last year UNC initiated the IT Strategy Project led by a steering committee of nine chancellors.

Their goal has been to find ways to complement, not replace the IT planning that is being done by the campuses. They recognized that collaboration among the campuses may be the best way to address their common interests.

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The first phase of the IT Strategy Project, initiated last year, focused on:

• Developing a strategic vision as the foundation for IT planning, and
• Assessing campus data networks, which will be needed to support future IT applications.
• Faculty, staff, students and administrators from all UNC institutions participated in workshops and discussion groups on the role of IT in the University. These helped shape an IT vision statement that includes the following goals:
• Student success
• Access and outreach (linking all North Carolinians to the educational resources they need to succeed)
• Academic excellence (high quality teaching, research and services)
• Stronger faculty-student relationships
• Access to global information resources

The evaluations of campus data networks were conducted by teams of campus and outside specialists. First, they defined the basic capabilities that all UNC campus networks should have. Then they visited the 16 campuses to assess the status of their networks. On every campus they found gaps between the network capabilities and the baseline standards.

In response to their findings and the University’s request for funding, the North Carolina legislature appropriated $35 million to begin the work of bringing all campus data networks at least up to current baseline standards. Much of that work has already been completed, and the University is seeking additional funds to move ahead with further network upgrades.

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IT Strategy Project staff and outside consultants visited each campus and talked with students, faculty, staff, administrators and IT professionals to solicit their ideas on improving and expanding IT-based activities. They identified four areas of common interest that the campuses might wish to address by working both independently and in collaboration:

• Services for students
• Campus teaching and learning with technology
• Distance education
• Administrative systems
• A fifth area was identified as being crucial to success in the other four:
• Logistical needs (i.e., infrastructure and support)

Task forces of campus representatives were then formed to study the IT needs and opportunities in each of the five areas and to make recommendations to the IT Strategy Steering Committee.

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The chancellors’ IT Strategy Steering Committee used the task force recommendations and the consultants’ reports as the basis for the UNC Information Technology Strategy, which the committee adopted and presented to the UNC Board of Governors in early September.

The IT Strategy is not a set of directives that all of the campuses must follow in developing their IT capabilities for the future. Rather, it is akin to a menu of recommendations for making the most of finite resources and maximizing the effectiveness of IT-based programs and services. The IT Strategy encourages the campuses to work with each other to find common solutions to their common IT needs.

Following is a summary of the recommended initiatives that, together, form the UNC Information Technology Strategy:

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"Imagine if…students have access to reliable, accurate and consistent information accessible anytime from anywhere that enables them to make informed choices about their academic programs, their careers, their financial obligations and their personal development."

-- Final Report of the IT Strategy Steering Committee

Services that support students’ educational and personal development are delivered by many offices and departments across UNC campuses. These include admissions, financial aid, student affairs, career services, advising and student accounts. Increased IT investment in student services is critical for a number of reasons:

• The impact of improved services on student recruitment, retention and graduation rates.
• Predicted enrollment growth means more student needs must be managed with limited resources.
• Enhanced IT-based services are needed to expand distance education opportunities.
• The people of North Carolina expect UNC to provide high-quality student services.

Students and their parents will expect not to:

• Wait at an office to complete a transaction
• Fill out forms repeatedly by hand
• Stand in long lines at crowded bookstores or offices
• Chase down signatures from multiple offices.

Recommendations

The IT Strategy calls for developing programs to provide Web-enabled services and integrated services for all students.

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Web-enabled Services

These would provide students with self-service access to information and services, allowing them to interact with personalized tools that will support and enrich the learning experience in and out of the classroom.

Most campuses already have student information systems that are similar to each other. These campuses are encouraged to form a service center, to be called the "Alliance," to provide software support to member schools for common administrative systems. This collaboration would allow them to greatly reduce their costs and increase their buying power.

The few campuses that now use unique systems or have very different service needs should buy or develop their own Web-enabled systems.

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Integrated Services

The goal is to deliver an array of logically related, on-campus services as seamlessly and as flexibly as possible. Greater integration would increase efficiency, convenience and value to students and, at the same time, allow staff to give more attention to students with unique needs.

The Student Services Task Force found that nearly half of the UNC campuses would be interested in collaborating to develop a common one-stop-center as a model for providing multiple student services at a central campus facility. Each campus would then use the model as the basis for creating a one-stop center that reflects its own unique culture and needs.

Those campuses for which the one-stop model may not be appropriate, either because they have already implemented one or they have different needs, are encouraged to make policy, organizational or process changes that would enable them to provide more convenient and flexible student services.

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"Imagine if…

• New teaching technologies and methods create an unbounded classroom and free faculty time for increased interaction with students.

• Students become more active learners, (developing the) self-directed learning skills (that) become the foundation of an expanded tradition of life-long learning.

• Teaching and learning leadership differentiates UNC from other institutions, attracting the best students and faculty and providing the best educated graduates to the state and the world."

On many UNC campuses, "early adopters" among the faculty are already experimenting with new methods of teaching and learning with technology (TLT). However, much greater support, primarily at the campus level, is needed to achieve widespread use of IT in teaching and learning.

The IT Strategy Steering Committee emphasized that technology must be used to enhance the capabilities of faculty, not to distract or displace them from their role as educators.

One challenge is finding ways for faculty throughout the system to benefit from the knowledge and insights being gained by those who have taken the lead in utilizing IT.

Recommendations

The IT Strategy calls for creating a collaborative network of services to provide TLT support for UNC faculty and students. The network would have three components: campus activities, collaborative initiatives, and leadership activities.

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Campus Activities

• Strengthen or establish TLT Centers on each campus to provide integrated faculty support.
• Enhance faculty and student support for TLT by increasing services over the next five years.
• Equip a development lab on each campus so faculty can experiment with and learn about technology.
• Create campus-based TLT grant programs to support faculty efforts to adopt new technologies.

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Collaborative Initiatives

• Create a TLT Collaborative organization (with all UNC campuses welcome to join) to facilitate development, exchange and storage of system-wide TLT knowledge.
• Establish fellowships to allow faculty to conduct research-and-development activities on TLT.
• Develop a web site for sharing knowledge on TLT developments. (Suggested name: UNC PORTAL, an acronym for UNC Professors’ Online Resources for Teaching and Learning)
• Create a system-wide collaborative grant program to support multi-campus faculty efforts to adopt teaching and learning technologies.
• Initiate a series of workshops and symposia for faculty development on TLT.

One of the many benefits: Collaborative initiatives attract more attention and funding from federal and private sources that wish to expand the reach and effectiveness of TLT more rapidly.

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Leadership Activities

• The president and chancellors should continue to publicly encourage faculty use of technology for teaching and learning.
• The TLT Collaborative should have a steering committee that includes chief academic officers and faculty members.
• Discipline-based advisory groups should provide intellectual guidance.

"Information technology will play an increasingly important role in the teaching and learning process over the next decade, so UNC must develop the support capabilities and infrastructure to ensure that the new tools and techniques are employed in the most effective and efficient manner."

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"Imagine if…people everywhere in North Carolina could avail themselves of high-quality higher education, either for career advancement or personal fulfillment, and could do it at a time and place that is most convenient for them."

Most UNC schools have distance education programs; however, many of them consist largely of on-site, face-to-face instruction at remote sites. Teachers go to the students, rather than having the students come to campus.

A few UNC campuses have developed extensive programs of "technology mediated" distance education, in which the instructor is in one location and the students may be scattered throughout the state and beyond. This is the future of distance education, because it allows an institution to serve many more people, and students can "go to class" virtually wherever they are and whenever they want.

Goals

The IT Strategy Steering Committee saw four possible goals of a UNC distance education strategy:

• Meet the state’s education and training needs by expanding access to underserved populations.
• Alleviate capacity constraints: Accommodate the expected 31% increase in enrollment over the next 10 years by teaching a large number of students online.
• Pursue new markets for education, such as "corporate learners" and "professional enhancement learners," in order to meet individual needs, generate revenue and contribute to regional economic growth.

• Position UNC to capitalize on new opportunities, to be responsive to students’ needs for flexible learning options, and to increase student choice.

"Given the rise in "e-business," the increasing competition among colleges and universities, and the demand for greater educational accountability, it is likely that distance education will be a major driver of change within higher education."

Recommendations

The ITS Strategy Steering Committee identified several issues related to system-wide vision and policy that should be answered before the University develops a long-term distance education strategy. The committee’s preliminary recommendations are intended to promote resolution of critical strategic issues and to bring greater coherence to UNC’s existing distance education programs. The specific recommendations are that UNC:

• Undertake a process to engage the chancellors in resolving high-level, enterprise-wide strategy/governance issues. Issues to be addressed include:
  • UNC’s view of the future: Define a shared perspective on high education’s future to provide context for deliberations on distance education.

  • Brand/marketing: Define the value of the UNC brand and how it will be used in the distance education arena.

  • Strategic alliances: Decide the extent to which UNC should pursue internal and external alliances.

• Develop business plans for a small set of pilot projects to test distance education theories, assumptions and goals. The projects likely would be designed to explore issues such as how to ease capacity constraints, improve access by underserved populations and/or address market opportunities.
• Establish a task force to evaluate current distance education programs and related services to identify opportunities to improve effectiveness, efficiency and utilization.
• Establish a transitional Distance Education Office. Its director would develop business plans for the pilot projects, help evaluate existing programs, and provide leadership for program coordination.

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"Imagine if…

• The coordination of campus administrative system activities generates savings, increases access to new technology, and supports campus efforts to explore new ways of delivering services.

• Campuses increase the efficiency of their IT utilization through shared staffing and elimination of redundant tasks."

Administrative systems provide the flow of information needed to sustain virtually all major campus administrative functions including finance, human resources and student administration. The administrative systems at many UNC campuses are nearing the end of their usefulness. To maintain existing services and to meet the growing demand for more sophisticated data gathering and analysis, new approaches to supporting administrative computing are needed.

The IT Strategy Administrative Systems Task Force found that, in addition to having systems that are fast becoming outdated, most UNC campuses have very limited capacity for training staff and faculty on administrative systems. This lack of training limits their effectiveness. Many campuses also have inadequate staffs for software implementation, support and maintenance.

Recommendations

The IT Strategy calls for campuses to collaborate in providing shared software support. A proposed support center (the Alliance) would provide campuses with fee-for-service support for common administrative systems work. The Alliance would be governed by its member campuses, and all UNC campuses could join.

The expected benefits of this proposed collaboration are:

• Reduced cost of software procurement and support
• More consistent and timely software upgrades for all campuses
• Greater influence over vendors’ software development decisions.

The IT Strategy also proposes that UNC implement automated data sharing to streamline data collection and processing. This would result in improved data quality, easier access to data, and significant savings of staff time.

"A data warehousing system would automatically gather data from relevant campus systems and make it accessible in a variety of formats to approved users. Access to various types of data could be restricted based on the level of user privilege."

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Members of the Logistical Needs Task Force reviewed the support requirements of the initiatives recommended by the other four IT Strategy task forces. They identified three major logistical challenges:

• Supporting the new multi-million-dollar campus network infrastructure being implemented as part of Phase I of the IT Strategy project.
• Meeting the support and training needs of ever-increasing numbers of faculty, staff and student users.
• Paying for IT hardware, software and support services while trying to contain costs.

Recommendations

Network Maintenance

• Provide campuses with additional network support to meet growing demands for service. Increase the capability of every campus to ensure reliable and accessible network services.
• Create a network electronics renewal process to upgrade or replace network components on a regular basis.

User Support and Training

• Expand current campus-based support and training services to faculty and staff on administrative and personal computer systems, and create a collaborative forum for sharing training and knowledge.

• Develop campus capabilities to support the growing number of student users in labs and residence halls.

• Establish a training fund to ensure that the professional development needs of IT staff are met.

• Invest in local training facilities as a foundation for increased training of faculty, staff and students.

Collaborative Procurement

Some campuses already have stretched their budgets by collaborating in the purchase of various types of equipment and services. The Logistical Needs Task Force recognized that campuses could realize significant savings and increase their buying power by voluntarily banding together to purchase IT hardware, software and services. The task force recommended establishing a formal collaborative procurement program to facilitate such multi-campus IT purchases.

"UNC will need to seek economies of scale in procuring technology and services in order to contain costs, create benefits of strategic vendor alliances, and offer all campuses comparable purchasing opportunities."

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The chancellors’ IT Strategy Steering Committee has recommended that UNC undertake 11 strategic IT initiatives and 29 projects or programs over the next five years. While some of these will require much more study and planning, many others could be initiated relatively quickly, provided enough of the campuses endorse the proposals and adequate funding is available.

The IT Action Plan adopted by the Steering Committee includes a three-year implementation schedule:

• Expand campus network maintenance
• Create a collaborative procurement program
• Enhance campus activities in teaching and learning with technology (TLT)
• Create a program of inter-campus TLT collaboration
• Implement Web-enabled student services and establish the Alliance Shared Software Support Center
• Estimated cost: $10 million

• Continue first year’s initiatives
• Initiate coordinated UNC distance education programs
• Enhance user support training
• Estimated cost: $36 million

• Continue first and second year initiatives
• Expand the Alliance Shared Software Support Center
• Develop integrated services programs
• Create a system-wide data warehouse
• Estimated cost: $47 million

The IT Strategy Steering Committee also proposed creation of an Implementation Program Office to support an IT transition team whose job would be to:

Coordinate tactical planning

• Integrate planning task force members into implementation
• Launch programs

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Chancellor John Bardo, Western Carolina University

Chancellor Frank Borkowski, Appalachian State University

Chancellor Mickey Burnim, Elizabeth City State University

Chancellor Julius Chambers, North Carolina Central University

Chancellor Marye Anne Fox, North Carolina State University

Chancellor Jim Leutze, University of North Carolina at Wilmington

Chancellor Bill McCoy, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Chancellor Pat Sullivan, University of North Carolina at Greensboro

Chancellor Jim Woodward, University of North Carolina at Charlotte

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