Provost S Academic Computing Advisory Committee s1

Provost’s Academic Computing Advisory Committee Minutes for February 2, 2004

Attending: Claudia Bakula, Annie Becker, Don Carter, John Campbell, Fred Estrella, Ryan Ewing, James Fitzmaurice, John Hagood, Tom Knights, Marc Lord, Barry Lutz, Georgia Michalicek, Margaret Moore, John Placer, Susan Rieck, Jay Thompson, Gary Weidenaar

Minutes of last meeting: Minutes of the last meeting on November 24, 2003 are posted on the PACAC web site and have yet to be approved.

Updates WebCT automation/CHP implementation John Campbell reported that the Dean for the College of Health Professions required every course to have a presence on WebCT for Fall’03. Academic Computing worked with the college to create a naming convention and basic template for all their courses. However, John reported they did run into some problems. John said he would be working with a broad group that would include CTEL, Cline Library, the Registrar, and DLS in order to add personnel to create a better structure for this purpose.

Don Carter said they will be thinking through the process of recycling courses in WebCT from one semester to the next. There are life cycle issues such as how long a course should live, what the naming convention for all online courses should be, and how to sort courses in WebCT so old ones don’t show. He said the goal is to make things simpler for students.

John Campbell informed the committee that ITS would like to automatically turn on courses in WebCT on a published date each semester to eliminate the burden on faculty to do so.

Online evaluation John Campbell reported that ITS is in the process of rolling out the new replacement for Eval ‘a Jack. Data is being collected with the pilot product and reporting features are being developed. Jay Thompson in the School of Forestry is helping with the pilot. Cynthia Conn from the Office of Academic Assessment is in charge of implementation. Any colleges interested in using the new product can contact her.

Don Carter said NAU has joined a consortium called the BETA Project which will be developing an open source evaluation tool through a FIPSE grant received by Steve Gilbert of the Teaching and Learning Technology organization. Don and Jay Thompson will be attending the first meeting of that consortium.

USE-TESTING list John Campbell informed the committee that many faculty and staff members have subscribed to the list which will be used for testing software created by ITS. He and Georgia Michalicek are moderators for the group. Members can send messages to the list and the moderators will determine whether or not to pass it along to all members in order to keep messages in members’ email to a minimum.

PACAC Minutes for February 2, 2004 - Page 1 John Campbell said there will be differing requirements for testers depending on the software being developed. He provided two possible examples.

a) A new version of SPAM tool with new features may require a project manager to report test responses to the programmer. ITS will create a subset from the list for testing. b) The NAU Portal is set to be rolled out this summer with an email channel. Portal training may be needed by testers. This may be a good opportunity for novices to portal use.

John will monitor the participation rate from the list to determine whether more testers are needed.

HR 5.10 email use policy John Hagood reminded the committee that this policy addresses lobbying and political activity. He attended a meeting where changes to the policy were drafted and thought it draft would come before the Cabinet for approval sometime in February.

Technology Literacy Subcommittee Annie Becker provided the committee with an update on the work accomplished by the subcommittee as follows:  Next steps after developing Functional Technology Literacy Goals were implementation and assessment  Meeting with Pam Eibeck to obtain her perspectives on how committee should proceed was postponed  Two CIS 120 professors reviewed goals and indicated that only a couple areas from each bullet were covered by their course curriculum

Don Carter shared two main topics of feedback he gathered from conversations with Chairs.  Be careful of adding another requirement.  What would the value of a stamp or certificate be outside NAU?

Prior to voting on whether or not to endorse the Functional Technology Literacy Goals for Undergraduate Students, Version 2.2 document, which was developed by the subcommittee, members’ discussion included the following:  Students have critical literacy issues that equate to their ability to access resources.  There is no priority structure incorporated in the document.  A requirement of any sort needs to go through academic channels.  Parents are concerned about the use of technology for their students.  Some students could pass out of technology requirements while others have a need for remedial skills.  Certain technical skills are required to even get into the TIPS course that is available now.  The Learning Assistance Center and ITS have resources to teach these skills but would need a requirement from instructors to get students to go there.

PACAC Minutes for February 2, 2004 - Page 2 Action Items:  All members present voted in favor of endorsing the Functional Technology Literacy Goals document.  The subcommittee will meet with Pam Eibeck to help determine how they should proceed with this document.

Teaching Learning and Technology (TLT) group Don Carter announced that NAU has paid for membership in the TLT group in order to participate in their BETA project on assessment. Members of the NAU community can now login to the TLT Learning Times Network at http://home.learningtimes.net/learningtimes.

NAU will also be involved with the Teaching and Learning Technology Roundtable program offered by TLT. Steve Gilbert from TLT will be on the NAU campus the second Wednesday in April. Interests for this visit include the culture of assessment and fostering community and a web cast will occur from NAU during that time. Don clarified that an NAU Roundtable will include members from student services, faculty, and staff in a discussion on the use of technology at NAU and its impacts.

John Campbell offered that TLT provides training sessions for the Roundtable and it will not be an appointed committee. He said the Roundtable members are to be much more inclusive. For example, the NAU Bookstore will be a main player. John thought the campus is now ready for such an initiative and said a core of people would keep it going with one faculty representative from each college. Don Carter added that administrative units will also be represented while John Campbell highly recommended that everyone attend the event with Steve Gilbert in April.

Don Carter reported several other events that are taking place from the office of eLearning:  An Assessment Fair will occur two weeks prior to Steve Gilbert’s visit.  A Faculty Showcase is scheduled from noon – 5 p.m., February 19, to highlight technology other than WebCT.  Cynthia Conn, from the Office of Academic Assessment, will be providing a hands-on overview of Flashlight Online (part of the TLT organization.)  A list of events will be on the eLearning Web site at http://www4.nau.edu/elearn/.

Technology in learning in relation to strategic planning (See the handout attached to these minutes as Appendix A.)

John Campbell informed the committee that academic technologies are not getting the same attention in strategic planning as administrative technologies and stated that faculty members need to be more involved. He mentioned a document from 1991 that led to building the Learning Center at the University of Arizona (UA) which was provided to him by Barb Hoffman, his counterpart at UA, and said she had offered to come to NAU to speak to PACAC or, alternatively offered to host a tour for the group at UA.

Fred Estrella said the UA Learning Center was integrated into the library with student services nearby; it is used for classes, with a central technology facility, a conference area, and is shared between colleges to facilitate economies of scale. He told the PACAC Minutes for February 2, 2004 - Page 3 members an effort like this needs the backing of a committee like PACAC and the Deans; even though it could take ten to twelve years to complete, it would keep NAU competitive with other universities. He said the high-tech classroom, as described in Appendix A, is visionary and new buildings sometimes get people excited.

Claudia Bakula added that this kind of visionary planning had been helpful to the Cline Library in the past when adding to the university’s strategic plan. She said they are always asking what the students’ library experience will look like in ten years. She offered that PACAC is a good group to do that for and Academic Technology vision in order to keep those larger pictures in focus for times when the university has money.

Some discussion followed on whether and how PACAC wanted to become involved in the strategic planning process. Members agreed they were interested in doing so. John Campbell offered to send Barb Hoffman’s email to the list and members were asked to consider whether they would like to have her come to NAU to speak. ePortfolio product selection John Campbell offered to invite members by email to participate on a subcommittee to select an ePortfolio product to be used by the university. However, after talking with Pam Eibeck after this meeting, it was decided to postpone this until such a solicitation could include the Office of Assessment, and the Curriculum Committee. Don Carter volunteered to help determine who to invite beyond the PACAC.

Next meeting The next meeting is scheduled for Monday, March 1, at 3:00 p.m. in the ITS Annex Conference Room.

PACAC Minutes for February 2, 2004 - Page 4 Appendix A Technology in learning in relation to strategic planning Random Thoughts for the PACAC John Campbell February 2, 2004

“Technology is disruptive. Information technology is really disruptive.” Shirley Ann Jackson, President of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (Ahead of the Curve, Educause Review, 39:1).

Technology enhanced learning (large category)  Reading with online dictionary at hand (NAU students can access the Oxford English Dictionary without the obligatory hernia or magnifying glass).  Using a statistics package in your own home to improve comprehension.  Writing and rewriting with a word processor.  Course materials online: syllabus, reserved readings, assignment sheets. Sort of the noexcuse.edu approach to learning for those of us who misplace things.  The whole Internet thing: searching, finding, active learning, access to original sources (ok, access to digital copies of original documents which is not as tactile as the real thing, but still!)  Course management systems (WebCT) to collect course content, course communication, assignment collection/grading, and collaboration in a more or less consistent web interface.  Low-threshold technologies to aid learning/teaching (spreadsheets, tables in word processors, e-mail, etc.). Often key innovations spring from low-threshold applications.

Learning Spaces  Classroom Technologies or “Teaching Spaces” (David Smallden) 1. Technology enhanced: room contains at least a permanent data projector and a computer connected to the projector for presentations. 2. Technology intensive: classroom includes computer access for students (permanent desktop, wireless for laptops, power outlets, etc.) 3. Faculty laptop programs (a projector but no machine in the room) 4. “Several institutions have created committees of faculty, staff, and students to focus on the issues of classroom design and renovation…” (Smallden)  Physical learning spaces (outside classrooms) 1. Student Union, Wireless lounges, library, computer labs, Cyber Café 2. Integrated Learning Center at UofA (http://www.ilc.arizona.edu/) 3. Special learning opportunities (multimedia lab, learning assistance center, etc.)  Virtual learning spaces (on the web) 1. TutorLink (http://www4dev.nau.edu/edsup/TUTORLink/NAU.asp) 2. Learning Management Systems (WebCT expanded) 3. Virtual student unions, etc. 4. e-portfolios

Casey Green survey (compared to public university sector)  Average % computer-based classrooms: 29%. Reported for NAU: 5%  Average % courses using web pages for class materials: 48%. NAU guess: 25%.  Average academic computing budget cut last year: 7%. NAU: 20%.

Barb Hoffman’s offer  Visit from UofA and/or visit with UofA on strategic planning for e-learning.

PACAC Minutes for February 2, 2004 - Page 5