Office of Learning and Information Technology

UW System Joint Conference

April 11-12, 2005

Heidel House, Green Lake, WI

  • Information and Technology Management Council - ITMC
  • Educational Technology Management Council - EMTC
  • Campus Web Council of Wisconsin - CWCW
  • Learning Technology Development Centers - LTDC

Please send corrections to david@uwm.edu

April 11, 2005

April 12, 2005

Thoughts from the New Guy – Don Mash, UW System Executive Vice President

Don Mash took his new position as UW System Executive Vice President after 7 years as Chancellor of UW-Eau Claire. He said that the major challenges today are budget and flexibility. President Reilly also has experience on UW System campuses, and feels the need to get a message to the public about the value of the UWS to the citizens of Wisconsin. Communication, and making sense to the general public, are probably our greatest challenges. Public opinion polls are very positive regarding the UW System. However, our state leaders have been eroding our financial capacity over at least the last 10 years.

When Don Mash was working in Nebraska, the issue there was simply a matter of too few dollars. In Wisconsin, there is also a recent tone of contentiousness and animosity from some state leaders. For example, while the UWS was in the midst of successfully managing a reduction of 600 employees and doing the lion's share of the work to balance the state budget, the Legislative Audit Bureau was asked to do an audit. Immediately after their report was issued, headlines proclaimed that the UW System was top heavy and we were once again on the defensive. Program revenue employees and those supported by grants were deemed administrative overhead even though IPEDS data shows that we are one of the leanest higher education organizations.

If you talk to citizens around the state, you'll hear comments to the effect that we are continuing to do a great job. Long term, it will become apparent what the problem is when it is probably too late.

As a parallel example, in the mid 1980's the LAB did another study which showed that UWS had too many students for its funding level. The UWS response was to reduce enrollment to match financial resources and control it carefully thereafter. Now, twenty years later, we're not back up to those enrollment levels. That should be an embarrassment for a state with an institution of the caliber of the UWS. Meanwhile, everyone is lamenting that Wisconsin has slipped to 31st in terms of the number of citizens with bachelor's degrees.

In fact, everything is not fine. We've continued to circle the wagons and not enroll as many low income students or part time students who are working. We need to get public attention to these matters so that they have some concern about their state's future. For example, everyone is concerned about a shortage of health care workers. The five nursing programs are maxed out and turning away great students. We could produce more health care workers with more financial resources and more faculty.

We are all concerned about the governor's current budget proposal. It has some encouraging elements, but it includes reducing our administrative ranks by 200 positions as well as a budget reduction target, which in fact will require 300 positions. The centralization of technology under the Department of Administration is supposed to make us more efficient, but it is not clear that it will result in more effectivity. We need to get a reasonable pay plan to retain quality faculty and staff, but that appears to be self serving.

The BadgerNet converged network, the phone system, VoIP, etc., are challenges because of the perceived notion that centralization is always better although most of the technical staff in the UWS do not agree that it will be more effective or save us any money.

At the APBS Summit last week, it was made clear that we have a serious problem and have lost our way in the implementation. It is much more complex than any other common system we have tried to implement across all campuses. It appears that we started badly, the process was somewhat flawed and pre-launch discussions were lacking. We need to get unstuck and move toward a system that will work for us, which is as important as anything we are doing now as a system. Ed Meachen is bringing new life to the Common Systems Review Group (CSRG).

Q: The University is seen as the bastion of liberalism. How should we respond? What is the truth about the brain drain and how do we respond?

A: Liberals appear to be out of favor right now, and conservatives appear to be pushing the agenda. We need to keep talking about our agenda and the future of Wisconsin. Over 80% of all Wisconsin residents who have attended a UWS institution are still in Wisconsin. Wisconsin ranks near the bottom in terms of four-year degrees coming into the state from outside. So, we're not contributing to a brain gain, but there is not really a brain drain. We have to make sure that we are doing a better job of enrolling and graduating Wisconsin residents. Low income students are being shut out by increases in tuition without increases in financial aid. There is also a tremendous potential among those who entered the workforce right out of high school and who are in jobs that may go away or may not lead as far as they want to go. We need to stress that the state needs more people with degrees, and we can produce them.

Q: What is the UW System doing to reach out to those who are already in the workforce? A: A College is Possible campaign may be launched. A partnership has been created with the technical schools. Other initiatives will require additional funding.

Q: Are there any new communication initiatives? A: Much effort is beginning to go into strategic communications. The chancellors are more involved in legislative initiatives, some of which are sponsored by President Reilly. We need to invoke some third party advocacy, particularly the general public, which will take additional time. At this point, they are often passive cheerleaders.

Q: Won't lack of independence on IT issues have a significant impact on the future of the University? A: The reason the APBS implementation takes on such a tremendous importance is because we didn't invoke a process that was capable of delivering it in reasonable amount of time. We were not structured strategically to make maximum use of our IT. We need a strategic plan tied to our IT functions. Anytime we talk about effectiveness or productivity, we're talking about the need for a super IT platform. The jury is still out on the effectiveness of the effort to centralize everything statewide. There are daily discussions with the legislature on these issues. The challenges are:

  1. having had artificially low tuition for too long without a plan
  2. lack of GPR support
  3. lack of flexibility

It's true there are challenges, but there is a difference between being realistic about challenges and whining about them.

Charting a New Course for Learning Innovations – Leon Zaborowski

Leon Zaborowski started in the UW System as a student in the 1960's. He has also been a UWS faculty member and administrator. In 2001, he came back to UW-River Falls as a graduate dean. There he fostered three online graduate certificates with 15 courses based on Blackboard and WebCT, and later on Desire2Learn, in concert with Learning Innovations (LI). He has been at Learning Innovations since October.

Outreach and e-Learning is one of four programs within UW Extension. Each campus has its own outreach and continuing education office. Outreach and e-Learning provides a variety of online initiatives. They have an instructional design and development team for producing courses. Their Independent Learning department has over 300 print based courses. There are also a variety of collaborative programs. In 2003-04, the UWS institutions claimed they were offering 1,109 distance learning courses, of which 244 were produced by LI. Every incoming freshman in the UW System was admitted through the HELP system that is administered by LI.

Outreach and e-Learning is a $65M operation which is 75% self supporting. Most of the program revenue is on the UWS campuses. Every campus runs a highly successful, profitable, self-supporting program which collectively account for a quarter of a million enrollments administered by some 400 FTE. There are approximately 70 staff in the Outreach and e-Learning office. The campuses need to work with their local offices to foster and capitalize on great ideas.

A year ago there was a review of Learning Innovations. LI was initially created during the booming IT days of the 1990s. It was created to be self supporting and to make money in the commercial sector to support projects within the UW System. That didn't happen. There were also attitude issues between LI and the UW System campuses. LI went through a three year period of downsizing and eliminating positions. LI was ready for a new direction about a year ago. Since then, the LI Review Group has issued six recommendations:

  1. Offer a portfolio of products and services for institutions, i.e., Learning Innovations doesn't have to be everything for every campus
  2. Offer more developmental initiatives, such as marketing, market research and courseware evaluation
  3. Provide systemwide coordination and acidification of online course efforts
  4. Acquire grants and contracts
  5. Establish flexible agreements for partnering with campuses
  6. Establish national and global partnerships

The above recommendations have gone to President Reilly and a business plan is in the works.

The Committee on Baccalaureate Expansion (COBE, www.uwsa.edu/opar/cobe/) was formed as a result of high level discussions between UWS and the Technical Colleges. Wisconsin is ninth in the nation in associate degree completions. These people already have substantial credits towards a bachelor's degree. There are now twelve degrees in the UW System that are substantially online. The focus of the Gateway project is to put online all of the distant learning courses in the UW System within a structure that includes degree audit and other tools for students.

Desire2Learn Experiences and Update – David Wirth and panel

Peter Mann reported that the upgrade to version 7.4.1 is tentatively scheduled for the morning of June 2nd. An alternative would be to do rolling upgrades. The Hosting/SLA subcommittee is working to schedule dates for future upgrades.

A d2l course site is used as a communication channel that is always updated with the latest information. It includes a shared files area for the campus site administrators and the various systemwide teams. There is also a weekly newsletter that is sent via an unmoderated email list.

Andy Speth reported on the UW-Green Bay pilot to transfer final grades from d2l to the PeopleSoft student administration system. The steps include:

  1. Having the instructors set up working d2l gradebooks. Ultimately, a final letter grade needs to be generated for each student. The grades have to match the valid grade possibilities for the local student administration system.
  2. When d2l determines that it is minimally ready to export a course's grades, a new button appears on the instructor's screen. Clicking the button, generates an XML file that is sent to a server at Learn@UW. Every five minutes, the grades at Learn@UW are sent back to the appropriate campus.
  3. Three minutes later, the grades are pushed into a suspense table. An import button appears on the instructor's screens and they receive an email notification. Instructors have to approve the grades before clicking on import, e.g., they must ensure that they didn't report an A for a pass-fail course. If there are errors, the instructor must fix them in d2l, go through the export process, and wait for the email that says the new grades are ready for importing.

There were a few minor problems in the implementation. For more information see www.uwgb.edu/learntech/D2L/EndOfSemGrades.htm

Lorna Wong reported on the train-the-trainers model that was adopted systemwide when d2l was first implemented. Initially surveys indicated that most campuses wanted to train their own faculty. Since then, the Training Subcommittee has organized monthly Wisline Web training sessions that are conducted by volunteers from the various campuses. Prior to each new release, d2l staff are brought into the Wisline sessions to assist with the training.

The documentation supplied by d2l is often too superficial for trainers and support staff. It cannot be used as is. Campus trainers create and share their own training materials. These resources have been organized on the Learn@UW web site. Pressure is also being put on d2l for better documentation.

A learning object group, known as D2LLO, has created over 150 granular tutorials on the major features of d2l. This collaborative effort has been highlighted at major conferences.

The local d2l site administrators are responsible for:

  • liaising to Learn@UW
  • troubleshooting of problems
  • beta testing of new versions
  • customizing and configuring their local instances
  • providing course and user management

The site administrators have an informal structure with a monthly conference call and listservs.

This fall will mark the third year since the implementation of d2l. The train the trainer strategy will move beyond simple how-to topics and focus on best practices and effective use.

David Wirth explained that a short, systemwide survey of faculty use of d2l has been developed based upon work done at UW-Milwaukee. To date, there have been 543 respondents from all but two UWS institutions. 30% of the respondents say that d2l is easier to use than their previous CMS. Their overall experiences are positive. There is a suspicion that the survey results will be less satisfactory for faculty teaching large class sizes. More data will be shared as it is analyzed.

Donna Raleigh and Mary Mielke reported that d2l is intuitive for students once they get logged in. Most are using their standard campus IDs and passwords. Occasionally there are file access and quiz submission problems. Students like the 24x7 access. They are asking faculty to use d2l in more classes. Students on the UW-Eau Claire campus are able to directly link to e-reserve holdings and full text articles in databases.

Faculty appreciate that students can print their own handouts. The faculty appreciate the organization that d2l brings to their courses and the drop box feature. It is easy to email the students who haven't uploaded required materials. Faculty like choosing between the different grading schemes available, the group management functions and the course calendar which allows for sending reminders of exams and due dates.

Faculty would like to see improvements in the areas of:

  • product intuitiveness, e.g., assigning groups and permissions
  • file sharing for group work
  • copying components from one course to another
  • gradebook calculations, especially for weighted grades
  • Macintosh support

In moving to a course management system, faculty experience a learning curve and then develop confidence with the system over a couple semesters. It takes even longer to develop best practices and innovate. Typically, faculty cannot get to the level of innovative use because a new CMS is selected.

d2l has been used in many areas beyond credit courses:

  • faculty development courses
  • d2l user community courses
  • college committees
  • a blood-borne pathogens training class
  • continuing education
  • learning object development
  • storing student tutoring records

Q: How many continuing education students can the UWS license accommodate? A: A fair and appropriate use policy is now being negotiated with d2l. Faculty and staff development courses are covered by the current license. Campuses are asked to send David Wirth (dwirth@uwsa.edu) the numbers of people they want to accommodate for different purposes. Other institutions are dealing with the same issue.

Q: What is being done to integrate d2l with textbook vendors, such as McGraw-Hill? A: The d2l company has done some work in this area. The Blackboard and WebCT formats can be uploaded to d2l today, as well as the IMS standard, which is preferable. Ideally, the vendors should offer SCORM compliant packages.

Q: Any idea of what proportion of the d2l users are traditional full time students? A: No.

Q: Has there been any investigation of Net Tutor? A: No. Breeze Live is the whiteboard product that is currently being used. d2l is adding whiteboard functionality that they call mojo.

Student Technology Use and Skill: Convenience, Communication and Control, 2004 ECAR Study - Judy Caruso

In 2004, the EDUCAUSE Center for Applied Research (ECAR) conducted a survey of student uses of IT. ECAR subscribers have received a copy. The Key Findings document is available publicly (see www.educause.edu/asp/doclib/abstract.asp?ID=ERS0405). A follow up survey is currently underway this year.

The survey started with the hypotheses that:

  • students are demanding greater uses of technology in teaching and learning
  • faculty need to use technology to appeal to students
  • students are already facile with IT
  • students have gained their IT skills outside of the classroom
  • little further training of students is necessary

The survey methodology included:

  • a literature review
  • a review of other surveys
  • a comparison with the ECAR Faculty Use of Course Management Systems survey
  • a quantitative survey of freshman and seniors at 13 institutions
  • qualitative interviews with 132 students and 23 administrators

The sample included 38.8% males and 61.2% females. 95% were 25 years old or younger and 95% were full time students. 93.4% owned a computer and 81.5% had access to broadband either through their institution or a private ISP. Almost every student had a cell phone. The survey showed that PDAs and smart phones had not yet penetrated the student market.

The most popular IT applications were:

  • writing documents
  • email
  • surfing the Internet for pleasure
  • classroom activities and studying

In terms of hours per week, students spent the most time on:

  • classroom activities and studying - the major driving factors were senior status and academic major
  • writing documents - the major driving factors were the institution and being female
  • surfing the Internet for pleasure - the major driving factors were being male and the institution
  • email - the major driving factors were senior status and being female

Skill levels on the most common and popular applications were self reported at approximately 3.5 on a four point scale. Self reported skill levels were less than 3 for other, more complicated applications. The qualitative interviews showed that students tended to overestimate their skill levels, but they did differentiate in the skill levels they reported for different applications. The survey showed that students only learn enough skills to get by. When something doesn't work, they typically don't know what to do. Both students and faculty think the other group needs more training. There were not significant differences in the results for campuses that did and didn't have laptop programs.

Students preferred "moderate" use of IT in the classroom, which was lower than anticipated. Engineering and Business students had the strongest preferences for use of technology in the classroom.

The major benefits that students find are:

  • 48.5% - convenience
  • 16.6% - managing class activities
  • 16.1% - saving time

83% of students have taken at least one course that used a course management system. 76.1% of students reported positive experiences with course management systems. The primary features used were:

  • 95.0% - accessing the syllabus
  • 94.8% - online reading
  • 89.4% - tracking grades
  • 88.8% - taking sample exams

The CMS features that students felt improved their learning the most included:

  • 52.8% - sharing of materials between students
  • 47.9% - tracking grades
  • 42.3% - getting faculty feedback
  • 42.0% - taking sample exams

The features that students say make the greatest impact on learning, tend to be the features that faculty use the least. The most frequently reported barrier to use of IT was that it seemed like extra work, e.g., being required to participate in online discussions.

The trends show that:

  • course management systems are getting better for analyzing usage data
  • scholarly information and learning objects are becoming more prevalent
  • video game and simulation technology is finding its way into the classroom
  • students and faculty are becoming more technology literate
  • course management systems are improving dramatically
  • institutions need to create integrated instructional technology plans

CSIAWG Update / SOA at UW – Nina Boss / Jim Phelps

For background on the Common Systems Interoperability Architecture Working Group, see csiawg.wisconsin.edu

As Nina Boss and Jim Phelps explained at a previous ITMC meeting, the current common systems picture looks like a set of silo businesses and there are issues with exchanging data both within the UW System and within campuses. There is a spider web of point-to-point interconnections between a myriad of systems, which is difficult to maintain.

By moving to a service oriented architecture (SOA), interoperability can focus on services, not data transfer, using standard, loosely coupled technologies.

An SOA RFI was issued in November 2004 and 10 responses were reviewed in January 2005. Two product classes were identified:

  1. All in one, application-centric solutions
  • IBM, BEA, Oracle, Microsoft
  • Best of breed, targeted, message-centric solutions
    • Cape Clear, Sonic, systinet

    • The anticipated pilot project has morphed from a small, simple project involving a few vendors to a tabletop design exercise that will be constructed as a second RFI. The exercise will include four services:

    1. Role notification
    2. Role inquiry
    3. Key crosswalks between different ERP systems
    4. Key change notification between different ERP systems

    The four exercises grew out of work by the IAA group and the MILER CMS/SIS integration work at UW–Milwaukee. The goals are to answer questions such as:

    • What software is deployed during an integration? Where and how is it deployed?
    • What development is needed to accomplish an integration?
    • What is the development/deployment process?
    • How is the installation managed, maintained and expanded?
    • How do individual integrations work together to form an infrastructure?

    The next phase of CSIAWG will be a strategy for migrating to an SOA. This reflects growth in the vision of CSIAWG from tactical to strategic. It is important to ask, "Is the request for data really a request for service?", e.g., giving a real time answer to whether a particular student is enrolled in a particular course and therefore allowed to check out an item from reserves as opposed to sending a entire file of every student name, ID number and course roster to the library system every night. The aforementioned strategy would be more secure, more timely and less resource intensive.

    The migration strategy has five major components:

    1. organization
    2. process
    3. information
    4. infrastructure
    5. vendors

    On the organizational side, the focus is on change management; shifting from providing data (grades) to services (grading). This requires:

    • cultural shift, e.g., from sending data to providing services
    • staff training, e.g., from writing cron jobs to setting up web services
    • new expertise
      • service interface designer
      • service library manager
    • integration competency centers (ICC)
      • a move from project silos toward models based on shared and central services

    On the process side, portions of the UW System business processes need to be analyzed:

    • prioritization, e.g., most pain and most potential gain, such as registering students
    • define/document business process
    • look for optimization opportunities
    • data needs (timeliness, availability, etc)
    • using disruption to advantage

    On the information side, portions of an enterprise data identification process are needed:

    • let the business process analysis drive the data definitions
    • don't build a complete dictionary
    • start with the most needed definitions
    • build upon existing standards

    On the infrastructure side, the architecture and technology need to be examined:

    • a gap analysis to look at what pieces are missing, e.g., messaging
    • an architectural analysis
    • a business process analysis and enterprise data identification

    Vendors can be used to help with the evaluation to fill the gaps:

    • business process analysis
    • enterprise data identification
    • data definitions/schema development
    • service design
    • technology gaps

    The roadmap to SOA takes place on many levels: At the UWS level there needs to be:

    • an Integration Competency Center (ICC)
    • a registry
    • a governance structure
    • development standards
    • common tools

    At the business application level, there needs to be:

    • analysis of current interfaces
    • analysis of the business processes that the interfaces support
    • a reduction in the number of interfaces
    • schema definitions
    • migration from data transfer to services

    At the campus level, there needs to be:

    • a portion of the ICC
    • capitalization on disruptions
    • analysis of business processes
    • reduction of interfaces
    • migration toward services

    The next steps for CSIAWG are:

    • issue the second RFI, the Table Top Design Exercise
    • nurture the formation of an ICC
    • evaluate products
    • continue to educate
      • develop a standards document
      • give presentations
      • provide networking opportunities
    • develop a new charter in light of accomplishing most of the old charter's goals
    • evolve from a tactical to a strategic group
    • reconsider the membership to give people a break and involve all of the campuses

    The CSIAWG team is primarily technical in nature, and is not expecting to do the analyses of business processes. Likely candidates for business process analysis are instances where legal requirements need to be enforced between campuses. For example, FERPA requirements are easier to meet if institutions are just exchanging yesses and nos instead of data files.

    APBS (Appointment, Payroll, and Benefit System) Roundtable

    Participants in the APBS Summit on April 5 and 6 discussed the process and how they got issues out on the table. There was quite a mixture of people and backgrounds in the different discussion groups. The perspectives were quite different depending upon people's roles. Many of the comprehensive institutions are comfortable with the product and the most discomfort exists at UW-Madison and UW-Milwaukee. David Dumke and Bruce Maas are the two CIOs on the Steering Committee and their role was to listen to as many people as possible. Bruce noted the key themes of:

    • leadership of the project and the steering committee
    • a dawning awareness that the larger, and more complex campuses need to be involved in a significant way for a project to serve the needs of all institutions

    The Steering Committee now has a pretty clear charge and will benefit from the personal attendance of Don Mash and Bob Anderson. The Steering Committee will provide recommendations to the chancellors at their April 22nd meeting. The parallel test data will be reviewed by an outside consultant. A financial analysis will also be provided.

    MILER Update – Diane Mann

    MILER is in transition. The drivers are:

    1. David Hart's emphasis on integration
    2. organizational change and the loss of key staff

    Brian Busby from UW-Madison DoIT is the new manager. The upgrade to PS 8.9 student administration is coming soon. UW-Madison will do its upgrade sometime in December and will help with developing scripts. The MILER staff now available tend to be more technical than functional. The functional expertise that exists at the UW System institutions will be leveraged while MILER will follow the recommendations of the CSIAWG group to move to a Services Oriented Architecture.

    PeopleSoft / Oracle Merger / HEUG Update – Tom Scott

    Tom Scott is on the PeopleSoft Higher Education User Group's (HEUG) board of directors. He would like a half page list of bullet points from each person who was at the recent HEUG conference to form the basis of a newsletter article (email the bullet points to tscott@wisc.edu). At future HEUG conferences, those institutions with more expertise will be given preference as presenters.

    Tom has met twice with ORACLE's senior VP of applications development. The PeopleSoft/ORACLE 8.9 release will not have a lot of additional functionality, as has been expected. However, it will be possible to take advantage of partial maintenance strings. Version 9 is scheduled for 2006 and will have a lot of additional functionality. ORACLE is doing this to hold on to their customer base in the face of 75% discounts from SAP.

    The upcoming ORACLE Fusion releases will be a merging of the underlying technologies from the two component companies. The next toolset will probably be the last significant release, and version 9 can be used until 2013 along with that toolset. ORACLE is committed to making Fusion an upgrade not a re-implementation.

    ORACLE will take 12 months to decide whether customers will be forced to move to the ORACLE database. Ultimately, the decision will rest with the president of ORACLE.

    Business Meeting and Election

    The group continued the discussion begun by the CIO Council regarding the possible rotation of responsibility for the semiannual ITMC meetings to the members of the CIO Council with support from a systemwide steering committee. Since any change in operations would require a change in the ITMC by-laws, it will be up to the next executive committee to initiate a process to make any changes.

    A slate of ITMC Executive Committee members was proposed and elected.

    ITMC Executive Committee
    Past Chair

    Marian Ritland of
    UW-Eau Claire
    Chair

    Doug Wahl of
    UW-Stout
    Chair Elect Judy Caruso of UW-Madison
    Secretary and At Large Members
    • Nancy Crabb of UW System Admin
    • Paul Diedrich of UW-Eau Claire
    • Ron Kraemer of UW Extension
    • Beth Schaefer of UW-Milwaukee

    Next Generation Network – Ron Kraemer, Brian Remer and Ed Meachen

    The formal communications from DOA regarding the BadgerNet procurement are posted at www.doa.state.wi.us/wcni/index.asp.

    The BadgerNet contract was signed on March 2, 2005 and SBC is still putting together arrangements with their subcontractors, including Access Wisconsin, which is comprised of 47 smaller telephone companies. SBC is publicly in support of WiscNet, and has brought in Cisco to help design the network. It is currently being modeled in a Cisco laboratory. The major issues include:

    • it is pre-subscribed how BaderNet's customers will use the network and for what, e.g., circuits will be intended for specific purposes
    • the costs of each service are pre-subscribed, i.e., a customer will buy a given amount of bandwidth in different categories based upon volume, which could negatively impact smaller campuses
    • institutions will lose the capability of bursting their bandwidth in the same sense as they do now

    It would be advantageous to aggregate either all of the UW System's bandwidth, or regional partners, into larger volumes, but it is not clear if the contract is designed to allow that. Each campus will be asked to provide their bandwidth requirements through Brian Remer. A UWS committee is building cost models that will allow the campuses to play what-if games.

    Ron Kraemer and Ed Meachen are on an advisory council that is independent of DOA. DOA and SBC will hold non-voting seats on the advisory council which will have representation from the educational community, state agencies and local governments.

    The contract will run for five years once the last customer is brought over. A guaranteed payment to the vendor is specified. If certain minimums are not met, the prices could be renegotiated in the middle of the contract period. There are also five, one-year extensions possible. The cost/service categories are:

    • user managed/vendor managed WAN
    • user managed/vendor managed Internet transport to an ISP (possibly WiscNet)
    • vendor managed video service (if you don't want to run video as part of your data stream)
    • WBAA or alternate ISP service
    • WiscNet

    About 90% of the UWS IP traffic is data traffic, and about 90% of that is directed out of state to the Internet. At this point in time, it is expected that Internet traffic from each campus will be brought to a BadgerNet core router before being handed off to an ISP, such as WiscNet. Presumably, there will not be an option to send traffic directly from a campus to the Internet.

    Some of the notable cost issues are:

    • if two services are installed at a UW site, a 12% discount can be applied to their total cost
    • if three services are installed at a UW site, a 15% discount can be applied to their total cost
    • IP version 6 support is a $3,000 one time cost per site
    • jumbo frame support is a $3,000 on time cost per site
    • two hour on site response costs $25/month/site

    At this point in time, there are not "remedies" if the vendor does not meet the terms of the Service Level Agreements.

    For now, WiscNet is:

    • continuing with its current policies
    • upgrading and growing its network
    • maintaining POPs on the UWS campuses that connect to local partners
    • connecting to super nodes
    • able to invest $1M in maintaining the network and $1M in growth
    • provisioning services

    Transport services comprise less than half of WiscNet's budget.

    The next steps include:

    • addressing policy issues - CIO Council
    • developing cost models - CIO Council
      1. total costs to the UW System
      2. distributing costs among the UWS institutions
    • developing a deployment strategy - CIO Council
    • designing the network - engineers
    • working closely with WiscNet - all
    • working closely with DOA and vendors
    • documenting concerns and questions - all

    For many years, WiscNet has been the networking agent for the UWS. Thus far, WiscNet has been purposely held at arms length by DOA throughout this process.

    UW Colleges / UW Extension Integration Update – Ron Kraemer and Dick Cleek

    The first milestone for an integration of UW Colleges and UW Extension was the "Ward Report", which generated a series of recommendations to the president. It specifies a single chancellor for both institutions and consolidation of their Madison offices. It specifies leaving the missions, campuses and facilities of the two institutions largely unchanged. It also speaks to potential future initiatives.

    As of today, a search and screen committee is being formed to recruit a new chancellor, but there have not been any other structural changes. Over the next several months, the complementarities of the two institutions will be investigated. Potential IT savings may result, but it would take investments to get there.

    Ron Kraemer and Dick Cleek serve on the Integration Steering Committee, which is co-chaired by the two interim chancellors. They are currently meeting twice each month. Their charge is to analyze ways to pursue administrative options with a goal of having recommendations ready for the new chancellor.

    The challenges include:

    • understanding and appreciating each other's cultures and organizations at the most fundamental levels
    • process
    • expectations
    • communications
    • governance
    • identifying concerns and opportunities

    Possible work teams that could begin implementing change even before the recommendations are released include:

    • audit
    • degree completion
    • equal opportunity and affirmative action
    • facilities management and space utilization
    • financial services
    • human resources payroll and benefits
    • information technologies
    • risk management and safety
    • university relations and public information

    The Regents have indicated that any savings will be rolled back into the two institutions. Meanwhile, the Regents have launched efforts to look at possible regional consolidations and efficiencies. The Colleges/Extension developments could be a harbinger of things to come.

    Purchasing Update – Judy Caruso and Lorie Voss

    The Silver Oak firm has been contracted by the state to save money in procurements. There are eight contracts out to bid that cover such things as printers, peripherals, software, networking, copiers, travel, etc. Silver Oak is being paid based upon the amount of savings they project for the state.

    The current contract for IT services expires on June 30 2005. Last year's RFP for a vendor management system (VMS) has not yet been awarded but is expected to be awarded soon. A couple percentage points are charged to the vendors supplying contractors through the VSM to fund the VMS. In addition to the VMS, Silver Oak is going to do an RFP for identifying and setting rates for contractors. Their goal is to have fewer vendors than the current 200+. By April 29th, the UWS institutions need to apply for waivers for any of their current contractors that need to be extended through 2006. After July 1, 2005 new contractors need to be hired off of the new list.

    The Silver Oak strategy is to select vendors that offer a wide breadth of services as opposed to niche or best of breed consultants. When they respond to the RFP, vendors will have to put a ceiling on the rates they will charge, although they can always choose to sell a service for less. On a project basis, it will still be possible to issue specific RFPs for consultants, although those RFPs will have to go through DOA purchasing. At this point, it is not clear if the UW System will be subject to mandatory contracts for printers and peripherals.

    Responses to the software RFP will be due next week. The RFP is split into two parts, Microsoft and non-Microsoft. The UWS will not be covered by the Microsoft portion for the coming year. CDWG will remain the Microsoft reseller, but costs will go up on July 1 as part of the existing three year agreement. Fourteen, non Microsoft publishers will be covered by the other portion of the contract. It is not clear how many resellers will be available. Direct relationships with publishers will probably be left as is. It will likely require a waiver to continue to purchase software through the CIC or other consortia.

    Since the last ITMC meeting, the dispute with ORACLE has been settled by the UWS agreeing to not use certain features of the 9i and subsequent versions. If those features are needed, contact Lorie Voss (lvoss@uwsa.edu) for assistance in negotiating a price.

    Common Systems Review Group – Ed Meachen

    A working group had a retreat to develop a creative, long range plan for common systems. It has been vetted with CIOs, CBOs, the provosts and Don Mash. Draft vision, definition and values statements were created, as well as a funding model. The documents will be altered to take into account Don Mash's appointment.

    The meaning of Common Systems has been reinvented. Previous efforts to come to a definition had not reached a satisfying conclusion. The new definition is based upon a value proposition, rather than simply focusing on running common software applications.

    In the new view, common systems are common applications, standards or services that meet systemwide needs or value propositions that are agreed to by all of the UWS institutions. Common applications will be adopted by participating institutions when and where it makes sense. A common application may be mandated when the overall benefit to the entire UWS is clear. In many cases, multiple solutions will be acceptable.

    The decision and management roles will be fundamentally changed. Until now, each common system has set up its own steering committee and project manager independently of the Common Systems Review Group (CSRG). The APBS project has shown the lack of wisdom of this structure and the possibility of the Common Systems Review Group being at odds with a project's steering committee.

    Going forward, responsibility for all of the projects and project managers will likely be centered in Ed Meachen's office. The CSRG will be advisory to his office and have a representative from every campus. Functional offices will sponsor projects, but not be in charge of them or hire the project managers.

    Generally speaking, the new funding principles call for implementation from central funds but with maintenance funded by the campuses. Debbie Durcan has floated a number of proposals to the CBOs to generate funding for the implementation and maintenance.

    The CSRG needs to have more of a visionary role. The Shared Financial System is coming upon a major upgrade and will need an infusion of funds and strategies for integration with other systems.

    BadgerNet Contract Overview / Q&A with DOA, SBC, Cisco and Norlight

    The DOA administrative costs that will be charged to the new statewide BadgerNet network will be at an all time low, especially at the higher bandwidths. The network is designed to serve:

    • public libraries
    • K-12 public and private schools
    • technical colleges
    • universities
    • private colleges
    • state government
    • local governments

    There will be four core nodes at Milwaukee, Madison, Green Bay and Eau Claire located in Norlight POPs. In addition, there will be 17 aggregation routers at local telco central offices that will connect to routers for metropolitan Ethernet services that are shared with other business customers in the area. Those BadgerNet customers that purchase vendor managed services will receive a connection on a Cisco Ethernet switch. The connections will be native Ethernet from the aggregation router to the campuses unless distance limitations require the intermediate use of Sonnet. Customers can purchase redundant links if they wish.

    The standards are based on MPLS P/PE routers with:

    • redundant power supplies
    • dual processors
    • on-site spares
    • additional redundancy through SBC aggregation routing design

    The network services will include:

    1. WAN
      • connectivity from one location to another on the in-state network via VPNs
      • bandwidth options from 256Kb to 1Gb
      • logical separation of customers and applications
      • either BadgerNet managed service or user managed service
    2. Internet transport
      • connectivity from one location to the BadgerNet Converged Network ISP POP
      • bandwidth options from 256Kb to 1Gb
      • logical separation of customers and applications
      • either BadgerNet managed service or user managed service
    3. Internet service
      • ISP service provides connectivity from the BCN ISP POP to the Internet
      • End users contract directly with an ISP (such as WiscNet) for service, not SBC or DOA
    4. The managed video service includes:
      • 1x3 continuous view which the K-12s are accustomed to using
      • H.264 compliant codecs that the vendor is required to keep up to date
      • temporary gateways to connect new and old BadgerNet networks at the four core cities
      • permanent gateways for outside connections (e.g., virtual field trips)
      • a scheduling system
      • other options (e.g., 1x1, rolling cart)
      • the highest QoS on the network
      • a separate VPN for all managed video users so they can communicate with each other

    The features of the video scheduling and control system are:

      • Renovo software which features:
        • control of codecs
        • multiple levels of authority/access rights
        • customized features desired by the State of WI
      • owned and administered by WBAA
      • dedicated to the BadgerNet Converged Network
      • web accessible
      • initial scheduling procedures similar to the current BadgerNet video network:
        • network directors will schedule all intra-network sessions
        • inter-network scheduling will schedule sessions between BadgerNet consortiums
        • inter-network scheduling for sessions requiring gateways and/or MCUs

      The WBAA Network Management Center (NMC) will be housed at Norlight's Brookfield location and will provide:

      • a single point of contact for all trouble calls for Wisconsin Badgernet Access Alliance (WBAA) services (video, WAN, Internet transport, WBAA ISPs)
      • a synergistic, open working environment that includes management, engineers and customer support personnel
      • routing of incoming trouble calls to engineers, not clerks
      • proactive issue notification
      • on-side video troubleshooting classroom and physical hosting of the scheduling system
      • a web tool for opening and monitoring tickets
      • a secure data center housing scheduling system and DL Navigator Hub servers
      • backup facilities in Janesville, WI and Oakbrook, IL
      • hourly customer notification of trouble ticket status on the web or via phone
      • customer escalation of trouble tickets
      • automatic escalation of trouble tickets
      • no ticket closing without customer agreement
      • a dedicated support team in Wisconsin for oversight and customer service

      A Norlight web portal will be customized for BadgerNet to provide a control center through which various information can be accessed and provided, including:

      • opening, updating and checking status of repair tickets
      • placing and checking status of orders
      • reviewing of billing
      • viewing network status, trends and statistical information
      • reviewing the migration schedule
      • video scheduling

      Classroom and mobile video equipment can be procured through the two existing state contracts. Mobile video units will be provided by:

      • 1x1 mobile carts tied to the vendor managed video service
        • SBC provides a codec inside of a blue box
        • end user provides the cart, monitors, cameras, microphones, mobile site controller, cabling between the blue box and mobile classroom locations and LAN segments within 250 feet of the blue box
      • user managed mobile video equipment used with the WAN or Internet Transport service
        • end user provides mobile unit with codec
        • no access to scheduler or the MCUs
        • uses WAN or Internet transport QoS

      The common elements of vendor and user managed video services include:

      • increments of bandwidth
      • the network infrastructure
      • Quality of Service (QoS)
      • High priority, low latency
      • VPNs that determine who you can talk to. It is possible to be a part of multiple VPNs.

      The vendor managed video service has the following features that are not contractually provided for user managed video:

      • 1x3 session
      • H.264 codec
      • BCN scheduling system
      • BCN MCU/gateway
      • continuous view
      • continuous audio
      • NMC video support
      • onsite network and codec maintenance
      • site controller upgrades

      The video gateways will be of two types:

      • Permanent
        • located at three of the four core nodes (Madison is not included)
        • each can handle 40 simultaneous H.323 calls
        • 8 simultaneous H.320 ISDN calls also available
      • Temporary
        • for purposes of the migration
        • located in each LATA
        • built up during the migration to support increased usage
        • decommissioned at the end of the migration

      The SBC MCUs will be used for providing video services within BadgerNet, including:

      • vendor managed video for more than four sites
      • vendor managed video to user managed video sessions
      • vendor managed video to non BadgerNet site sessions
      • scheduled by Internetwork Scheduling Office

      ICS bridging services are available at end user expense for other session types regardless of whether a site is using managed or unmanaged video. Only sites on the vendor managed side of the video network can go through one of the network MCUs to get to a non BadgerNet site. There will be no cost to either the user or vendor managed sites for transporting video to ICS.

      WAN services have a lower quality of service than video services. State agencies on vendor managed WAN services will not have access to the MCU, neither will user managed WAN services. Internet transport services, whether vendor managed or user managed, will have the lowest quality of service, i.e., best effort.

      Tentative dates for the migration include:

      • July 5 - core layers built
      • July 12 - aggregation layers built
      • July 22 - access layer for pilot ready
      • July 25 - video and data pilots begin

      The acceptance pilot will include both video and data services simultaneously. The locations are being finalized this week. There will be a 30 day acceptance period of error free performance.

      The conversion strategies include:

      • Vendor managed video:
        • DL Navigator conversion before the video service conversion
          • campus provides site contact and the personnel to be trained
          • interface changes available prior to site conversion
          • training at the time of conversion
        • the existing blue boxes will be re-used
        • regional migrations
        • approximately 25-35 sites per month will be migrated
        • migration will occur on a video network by video network basis
      • Data:
        • spread across geographic areas to provide flexibility
        • customized scheduling to minimize user disruption

      Prior to the conversions, each institution must:

      • appoint a single point of contact for each campus
      • identify locations, bandwidth and services by May 31st
      • have personnel available for site visits, installations and testing
      • ensure local environmental conditions have been met
      • coordinate training for DL Navigator and Renovo for the vendor managed video sites

      The BadgerNet Core Team contacts are:

      Q: Will all managed video sites have to be part of a video network? A: That is hard to answer. The state and TEACH cannot mandate that an entity belong to a video network, but they recommend it to facilitate scheduling. New video networks can also be formed.

      Q: Why not allow someone to have a local, user-owned, video unit that connects to the MCUs and schedulers? A: If any mobile device is going to access the scheduler, the scheduler has to know its IP address. If two locales know each others' IP addresses they will be able to make their own, un-scheduled, point-to-point connections. ICS will also provide some connection services for user managed video services

      Q: Will each university video classroom be a separate managed site and incur a separate charge? A: Each 1x3 managed service will have a separate charge. However, running video over WAN services only incurs a flat, monthly rate.

      Q: What will be the replacement schedule for the codecs? A: The vendor will provide natural software upgrades. Going to a different codec technology may require separate charges that have to be negotiated.

      Q: What are the on-campus requirements for participating in the managed video service? A: The service provides a "blue box" cabinet with codecs and a switch inside. It has an interface panel with connectors for baseband audio and video. It typically should be located within 250 feet of the classroom unless additional baseband transport is provided on the campus.

      Q: Will the classroom systems have echo cancellation? A: No, that is considered part of the campus infrastructure.

      Q: What would stop a campus from buying only user managed "video" services and using it for all of their video and data transport at the highest quality of service? A: There is no way to prevent it, but it violates the spirit of the contract which has designed the service to provide video to the K-12s.

      Q: Would it be cost effective to use the user-managed WAN service and user-managed codecs at the UWS institutions and their customers? A: User managed, high priority, low latency (video) service is the same price as the user managed WAN service, and it gives access to the MCU. It will cost $2,640 per month for 20Mbps WAN service anywhere in the state.

      Q: Will QoS extend through the ISPs? A: QoS markings will be handed off to ISPs. From there it depends on the user's contract with their ISP and so on down the Internet. (There was a rather involved discussion as to the conditions where WBAA will and won't remark the QoS of traffic.)

      Q: How will you do route selection for large national videoconferences with Internet 2 members? A: The WBAA MCU will not have Internet 2. The ICS bridge may have policy issues associated with Internet 2. It may be necessary to provision another option, but there will be no guarantee of priority within BadgerNet.

      Q: When will WiscNet know its circuit prices? A: DOA has asked for pricing and SBC should have answers back in a week or two.

      Q: What is the ultimate timeframe for the conversion. A: The goal is to have everyone converted by March 2006.

      Q: UW-Superior is concerned that their data service costs will go up significantly because the rates are proportionately higher for low bandwidth services. A: From the DOA perspective, the total costs to the UWS will go down. Some campuses may cost more and some cost less than they do now. At this point, each campus pays its own bill and campuses generally don't subsidize each other.

      Q: At what level can the UWS aggregate its bandwidth? A: The more bandwidth the UWS buys at any individual location, the greater the discount. The UWS can internally average the costs of all its circuits if it wishes. This represents a shift in the business model that the UWS has been using.

      Q: Can the WiscNet customers in Superior aggregate their bandwidth, e.g., the university and vocational school? A: QoS could not be guaranteed to the subtending campus under an SLA. There are private fiber networks around the state. It is SBC's hope that someone on the community area network will purchase BadgerNet services.

      Q: Probably 90-95% of the UWS traffic goes out of state, often through Internet2, and thus is not covered by the BadgerNet quality controls. Should the UWS institutions just buy more bandwidth than actually needed so they don't risk filling up the pipe? A: Can the UWS provide separate interfaces for its Internet and Internet 2 traffic? If not, can the UWS mark its traffic before it gets to BadgerNet? If the UWS purchases layer 2 user managed services that are wrapped within a virtual pipe, the markings of the traffic in the pipe won't be changed by BadgerNet. The pipe itself will have an overall QoS marking.

      Q: The I2 community has an end to end initiative for QoS, in which case the tunnel solution may not work. A: A campus could have multiple services for different types of traffic to different customers, e.g., both layer 2 and layer 3.

      Q: Would it be possible for the UWS to have MPLS solutions to technical colleges and others? A: From a technical perspective, yes, its all the same infrastructure. Brian Remer and Ben Banks can coordinate these discussions.

      Q: If a customer buys different quantities of different services, will there be different caps for the different bandwidths or an aggregate cap? A: Bandwidth could be capped per sub-interface or per trunk. Caps for managed video make more sense on a per VLAN basis. For other services, the location of the cap depends upon the equipment in the chain.

      Q: Up to this point, the UWS has heard that an institution can burst traffing from one service into the other services they are not fully using at the moment. A: Correct, up to the aggregate amount of the access layer. How it occurs depends upon on the particular design.

      Q: What about intensive I2 applications that run only intermittently? How much should the campus buy? A: Today the UWS accommodates that situation with a large transport pipe that is burstable and is only charged for actual usage. In the new business model, the UWS would pay for a transport connection to BadgerNet and then pay an ISP for the I2 access. The institution would have to buy the maximum size pipe they ever expect to need, unless they were willing to deal with congestion and packet loss at peak times.