Academic Computing Committee
Meeting Minutes DRAFT

May 2, 2005



Members Present:
University Senate Representatives: J. Alvares,  M. Heller

Faculty Representatives: A. Adarkar [CHSS Faculty Rep.], A. Koeller (CSAM), M. Davidson [CEHS Faculty Rep.], R. Xing [SBUS Faculty Rep.]

Administrative Representatives (Academic Deans):  A.J. Kelton [CHSS Administrative Rep.], M. Mallery [Library Administrative Rep.], L. Jenkins [CEHS Administrative Rep.], R. Salomon [Proxy for Dean Alan Oppenheim], J. Youn [CSAM Administrative Rep.]

Non-voting Members Present:  R. Wolfson, Local 1904 Observer, T. Devlin, Academic Coordinator of Education Computing Network

Absent:  A. Pemberton [SART Faculty Rep.], R. Julian Robinson [SART Administrative Rep.], S. Shapiro [Library Faculty Rep.], E. Chapel ( Associate Vice pPresident for Information Technology), D. Stevens [Undergraduate Student Rep], A. Mohiuddin [Graduate Student Rep.],  Drew Stevens [Undergrad. Student Rep.], Vivian Lilikas [Undergrad. Student Rep.], J. Donadeu [Graduate School Administrative Rep.], VACANT, Associate Director of Academic Technology.

Guest: P. Kahn
 
Presiding: J. Alvares, Chair
Reporting: M. Mallery, Secretary
Distribution: ACC Web at http://frontpage.montclair.edu/acc
Convened: 3:15 p.m. [Library Special Collections Room]
Adjourned: 4:45 p.m.
1. Call to Order: The meeting was called to order at 3:15 p.m.

2. Minutes: Minutes for April 11 were approved.

3. Announcements:  Alvares announced that MSU EdTeXpo will be held on October 11. The Committee will be meeting over the summer, and John O'Brien is the Chair this year.

Kahn announced that the BlackBoard Content Management System went live today.  Faculty training sessions for Blackboard CMS will be held over the summer and announced via email.  She also noted that July 18 is the date for the New York/New Jersey Blackboard Users Group Manhattan Summer Conference (& Dinner Cruise), and a call for poster sessions was announced via the listserv with a deadline of May 15. More information is online at: http://www.njedge.net/activities/nynjbug.html

4. Reports
  • Chair's Report:  Alvares thanked all ACC members for their diligent work during this year of transition.

  • OIT Report: No report. Chapel was absent.

  • Ad Hoc Committee Reports:

   a) Learning Systems Subcommittee (LSS) – Koeller (Chair) reported that the committee discussed via email Blackboard posting archiving policies.  Kahn noted that in the Content Management System (CMS), instructors will have a default place for archives.  Kahn has interactive learning modules and training videos for CMS.  There was discussion about whether Blackboard training should be required for new faculty, but it was not decided yet.  All faculty will be invited to Blackboard CMS training during the summer.

   b) EDUCAUSE Membership: Kelton (Chair) reported that all schools have contacted him now, and there is one change from the Graduate School.  The President of the Faculty Senate has not responded yet; currently, Heller has the Senate EDUCAUSE seat. This year's FTE increase for MSU should be reflected in EDUCAUSE representation, and we will have more seats to give for more representation from each of the Schools.

   c) Mandatory MSU NetID Registration and Use: Heller (Co-Chair) and Youn (Co-Chair) reported that as follow-up to their March report, theACC should ask for a status report on leveraging the use of netID and central directory services using LDAP. Alvares added that the new Campus Administration System should include netID authentication. Youn said that we need to know about policies as well as systems capabilities.  Youn volunteered to write up the request and send it to Alvares for forwarding to IT.

   d) Restructuring Committee for ACC: Kelton reported that the Committee has not met yet and will resume discussion in September.

5. Ongoing Business:
  • Internet Access Control in Classrooms: Kelton distributed a proposed motion, which was discussed and amended.  The following motion passed (8 in favor, 1 opposed, no abstentions):
***

ACC Motion for Internet Access Control in Classrooms:

Whereas, the Academic Computing Committee supports the concepts and benefits of hardware and software that controls and enhances the classroom environment, and

Whereas, the classrooms in discussion are defined as an environment where there are fixed technology assets for each student, and

Whereas, the following three PC-based applications have been discussed and considered by both the Academic Computing Committee and several areas within the Office of Information Technology; NetOp School, NetSupport School, and LanSchool, and

Whereas the Academic Computing Committee also recommends Apple Remote Desktop for Mac-based environment, therefore,

The Academic Computing Committee encourages the Office of Information Technology to formally investigate the feasibility and costs involved in implementing such a system, with a final report presented back to the Academic Computing Committee in time for consideration and review at the first meeting of the next academic year, AY06.
***

Kelton will email the text of the motion to Mallery for recording in the Minutes, and to Alvares, who will forward the motion to Ed Chapel for IT's action.

 • Spyware Applications: Youn proposed a motion, which was discussed and approved with the following text:

***
ACC Motion on Spyware

Whereas Spyware has become an increasing distraction to computing usage at MSU and

Whereas active Spyware protection requires licensed software,

Therefore, the ACC encourages the Office of Information Technology to investigate the purchase and deployment of active anti-Spyware software for all computer users at MSU.
***
 
  • Mandatory MSU Email Use: Alvares reported that as follow-up to last month's meeting, he sent Karen Pennington an email, and he posted her response regarding the mandatory MSU email policy to the ACC listserv, which included the following: "When students are registered during orientations they are required to set up their MSU accounts and told that this is the University's official means of communication."

Xing noted that spam is filling up email for faculty and asked if IT could increase email space for faculty.  Heller suggested that faculty auto-delete spam, but Kelton said that some spam-tagged items are not spam.  During the summer, server-side mail filters are being installed by IT that may help with this problem.

Kahn asked if this is an issue for faculty training, where they learn how to save email off the server and delete old emails so that their accounts don't get too full.

Xing asked how long is retention for student email as well, and could we get alumni email accounts for students?  Alvares will put this issue on the list of future ACC topics for discussion.

6. New Business:
 
 • Next Year's ACC Meetings: Alvares will check the Faculty Senate calendar for next year's meeting dates.  Mallery will reserve the Special Collections Room.

 • Future Topics for ACC Discussion:
a) Student Response System - Salomon reported that SBUS is purchasing student response system units for research. If the units prove popular, MSU could use this unit for assessment. Heller said that this is a good item to discuss, but it is not a tool that everyone will use in their teaching.  Alvares requested that Salomon send him a note to place this on the ACC agedna for September.

b) Lecture 123 - Kahn reported that since the November pilot project of Lecture 123, she has had a lot of interest from faculty, and she is inviting Mitch Germansky to come and show this e-learning system to the campus.  Alvares asked that MSU faculty also participate in this demonstration and talk about how they use Lecture 123 in their classes and that the ACC should discuss uses of this e-learning tool. Dr. Susana Juniu in the College of Education and Human Services, Dr. Jack Baldwin LeClair in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences, and Dr. David Radosevich in the School of Business participated in the Lecture 123 pilot project at MSU.

c) New MSU Procurement System - Youn noted that the enw procurement system will affect every academic unit, including faculty who have grants. Youn and Mallery volunteered to investigate what is the impact of the new procurement system, including contacting the Office of Sponsored Research. Kelton will invite Tony Mejido to come to a future ACC meeting to speak about the new procurement system and answer our questions.

7. Adjournment: The meeting was adjourned at 4:45 PM.