OPINION

Can We Do the Same Stuff but Without the Toxic Waste?

Terry Calhoun, Commentator
Society for College and University Planning (SCUP)
University of Michigan

I was reading an interesting article about “green chemistry” the other day. The designer of a new chemical who is a “green chemist” will consider the effects of its use in the world from the moment of its creation, throughout its entire life cycle in the ecosystem. The development of green chemistry as a worldwide industry is being driven by financial needs from manufacturers, as they face expensive cleanup costs. But it’s also driven by university research, and institutions are training the materials engineers and other scientists who can think and operate this new way.

At the same time I came across an article about the disposal problems consumers are facing as millions replace their old television sets with flat-panel displays. Most of us don’t think about how to dispose of that metallic box full of toxic wastes that we call our laptop, and which contains our lives. When we do, it’s easy to understand that we have a waste disposal problem with the laptop itself. But the problem is vastly greater than that.

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IT NEWS

UV Undergraduates Experiment with HP Computers

No one seems to be moving faster toward implementing tablet PCs into classroom instruction than the University of Virginia--with the help of HP. (FCW.com)
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Government Uses Color Laser Printer Technology to Track Documents

It's a previously little-known fact that micro-markings on most color laser printers make it possible to determine from whose laser printer such pagers have been printed. Some companies include the serial number and the manufacturing code of their color laser printers and color copiers on every document printed from the machines. (pcworld.com)
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Using Your Cell Phone as Your Wallet--Priceless

Maybe you already wave your key chain around to pay for gasoline at some service stations? Big manufacturers are planning right now to bring payment-by-cell-phone functionality to many common points of sale. (csmonitor.com)

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Carroll College Relies on Appliance to Fight Spam

Carroll College, a private institution in Waukesha, Wisconsin, services 7,000 e-mail accounts that receive approximately 1 million messages per month. The college's commitment to freedom of expression and to privacy precludes the use of an outside anti-spam service to filter all this mail, as d'es the cost of such a service, which is why Carroll's IT department chose to go with an appliance-based anti-spam solution. (eWeek.com)
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University of Michigan E-Mail Crashes Due to Power Outages

The latest e-mail problem hit students coming back from the long holiday weekend--it was traced to power failures in the Arbor Lakes building, a few miles north of campus. (The Michigan Daily)
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Columbia U Departments Merge to Help Address Network Problems

Academic Information Systems and Administrative Information Services, two major technology providers on campus that are currently separate departments will merge into one organization called Information Technology. The merger will be conducted by a soon-to-be-hired new VP of IT. (Columbia Spectator Online)
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Disc Golf Hot Spot Becoming a Wireless Hot Spot

Rock Hill, SC, home of the United States Disc Golf Championships at the Winthrop University campus is fast becoming a wireless hot spot--due to the University, to York Technical College, and also to local retailers and vendors. (The Charlotte Observer)
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The Firefox Surge

Microsoft can't ignore it much longer--Mozilla's "Firefox" is cutting into MSIE's market share. 2006, for Longhorn, is a long time to wait for an MSIE upgrade! (Forbes.com)
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RESOURCES

How to Win New 'Friends' with a Click

This much-better-than usual article about how students are using and adapting to "facebooks" is well worth reading for its sociological implications. Among others, students compete to see who has the most "friends." (post-gazette.com)
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Do Hidden Costs Shortchange Open Source Software's Appeal?

The US Marshal Service is jumping onto the open source bandwagon, along with many colleges and universities, and federal departments. But as this comprehensive article investigates, there are those who say that hidden costs are waiting down the road. (FCW.com)
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Are Virtual Courses Vacating Classrooms?

The second annual Sloan Report on online learning is titled, "Entering the Mainstream: The Quality and Extent of Online Education in the United States, 2003 and 2004," and is based on a survey of 1,100 colleges and universities. It suggests that quality of online courses is now less of a concern than a few years ago, and that online courses are viewed as just another option for learning delivery. (eSchool News)
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DEALS, CONTRACTS, AWARDS

Long Island U Picks PeopleSoft for Central Admin Systems

To upgrade outdated legacy mainframes, Long Island University recently tapped PeopleSoft to upgrade the institution’s core systems, including its Enterprise Financial Management, Human Capital Management, Student Administration and Customer Relationship Management assets. The total deployment will reach across more than 27,000 students and 4,000 university employees. Under the deal, Long Island University will also pick up PeopleSoft’s User Productivity Kit (UPK), which enables the generation of customizable content for classroom and Web-based training.
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