Fall 2008

Welcome
Shawn Beattie, ITS, editor

Welcome to Augie Techknowledge from ITS, an e-newsletter to share "what's new" in ITS and provide useful tips and articles on Information Technology and Educational Technology at Augustana.  We hope you like it and find it useful.  The newsletter will be archived at http://campus.augustana.edu/offices/its/techknowledge.  Enjoy! 

New Faces in ITS
ITS Staff

Three new employees started with ITS over the summer.  From left to right, Brad Isbell and Phil Bennett are new in the area of Web Support.  Brad and Phil are supporting Ingeniux as well as supporting intranet and internet websites and applications.  Also new to ITS is Sophia Wu, right, Database Administrator.  Sophia is finding new and exciting ways to tap into Colleague, SQL Reporting Server, and much more.  Be sure to say "hi" and welcome our new staff on campus.

The Summer of '08
Chris Vaughan, ITS

The summer of  ’08 was a particularly active summer for the ITS department and the current academic year is proving to be equally dynamic.  Immediately following Spring graduation, ITS began to implement the major projects drawn up during the cold months of winter.  Our June and July goals included transitioning student e-mail services to Google, introducing the campus to Microsoft’s new suite of office productivity tools, and assisting in the relocation of several academic departments to their new home in Evald hall (not to mention preparing the technology classrooms and student laboratories located within the new building).  There were also several additional projects underway, more “behind the scenes”,  however no less important, such as increasing network storage space, continuing to customize the Ingenuix web content management system, network hardware upgrades, a Moodle upgrade, and, of course, routine desktop replacements. 

Over the next several months we will be moving forward with more items on the College’s strategic agenda.  Soon ITS will be releasing a new web based reporting tool based on Microsoft SQL Reporting Services which will interface directly with Colleague data. Reporting Services will not only benefit administrative offices but will improve services for faculty and students by allowing for the redesign of familiar applications like Class List and custom student reports.  Another project in progress is testing and adoption of a student work portfolio management system. Students will be able to organize, manage and display their work developed throughout their experience at Augustana.  Once in place, an e-portfolio will allow students to securely share accomplishments and capabilities with family, potential employers and graduate schools.  Together with the new department of Web Services and the Communications and Marketing department, we will continue to capitalize on the benefits of the web as a reliable universal communication vehicle for all campus constituencies. Towards that end,  IT will be upgrading the content management system improving reliability and ease of use, as well as,  continuously offering additional training classes and help sessions.  

ITS has worked very hard to achieve our lofty summer goals. We look forward to the innovation associated with technology in the curriculum and continue to enjoy our role as integrator and supporter of technology in the education environment.  

Electronic Portfolios
Shawn Beattie, ITS

Electronic portfolios, or e-portfolios, allow students and faculty to create a web-based portfolio of work.  Mahara, which means "think" or "thought" in New Zealand's native language, is a system we are planning to pilot for consideration as an ePortfolio system for Augustana.  Mahara ties in with Moodle, providing a single sign-on between the two systems.  The idea is that students will upload papers, files, or other "artifacts" from their coursework in Moodle and build a portfolio over their college career at Augustana.  Different views can be created for different audiences.  Mahara provides a drag-and drop interface for building a resume or portfolio of work.  Look for more details on Mahara very soon.  In the meantime, contact Shawn Beattie if you are interested in learning more about Mahara and ePortfolios.

Coming Soon:  Lunch Bytes
Shawn Beattie, ITS and Tredway Library librarians

ITS and the Tredway Library are proud to announce Lunch Bytes.  Twice a term, we plan to host a brown-bag discussion of the issues big and small facing information and technology literacy on our campus.  We plan to address copyright, ePortfolios, digital classrooms, online resources...and more.  Look for more information coming soon about this discussion series.

Google Labs on your GMail Sean McBride, ITS

Reducing printing on campus
Shawn Beattie, ITS

Over the past decade, many departments have made great strides to reduce our paper consumption.  For example, Colleague moved paper reports online, Faculty Senate moved to electronic distribution of reports; Webadvisor eliminated grade sheets, master schedule copies, and much of the paper we used to shuttle around campus.  The Tredway Library has moved to electronic reserves rather than paper reserves over the past decade.  While more electronic resources has reduced paper use in these areas, at the same time printing has become more ubiquitous, faster, and therefore more convenient for all.  The end result is that paper printing has increased in some areas - most notably in Olin and Library computer labs - while it has decreased in others. The low-hanging fruit of eliminating printing of reports and handouts has been taken, and now we need to find ways to encourage more digital consumption and less paper consumption of information overall. The first step to understanding your own printing habits includes our new print monitoring system, PaperCut.  By logging in at printing.augutana.edu you can make note of your printing habits and begin thinking about why you print - and perhaps how to reduce your paper use.  Together, we can continue to strive for reducing our environmental impact through reducing our paper printing.

Briefly...

• Did you know?  ITS loans laptops, digital cameras, camcorders, and digital projectors and much more to students and employees. Contact Laura Meyers with your requests.

• For sales tax reasons, ITS does not sell CDs, DVDs, or MiniDV tapes; however, these items are available in the College Center Bookstore along with other conventional outlets like Walgreens.

• Need a poster?  ITS can print posters for you up to 42 inches wide on either glossy or plain paper with a 24-hour advance notice.  Contact Bonnie Hewitt with your request.