Welcome
Welcome to the inaugural issue of C2 (pronounced "C Squared"), designed
to open an exclusive forum for discussions on technology among top-level
campus administrators: chief executives, provosts, vice presidents,
and directors across all areas of the campus who are concerned with
the progressive use of technology to further learning and streamline
campus business and instructional processes.
In each edition, you'll find one-on-one "behind closed doors" interviews
or C-level opinion pieces, quick bites of who's doing what where, and
career moves of interest to the top campus echelon.
C2 was created in response to the need for a personal dialogue among
top-ranking campus officers concerned with technology as a bridge to
the next generation of higher learning. We hope you will see this twice-monthly
letter as an opportunity for C-level information sharing, mentoring,
expression, and enlightenment. Feel free to send your thoughts, ideas,
commentary, and pertinent news items to Mary Grush at [email protected].
IN THIS ISSUE
FROM THE TOP
NEED TO KNOW
WHO'S WHERE
PAST ISSUES
From the Top
Piracy on the Seas of Higher Education
By Graham Spanier,
President, Penn State University
Advances in information technology have allowed universities to gain educational tools we never dreamed of 20 years ago. Engineering classes can meet online to solve problems. Political science students are able to post their papers on class Web sites for peer review. And oceanography researchers are holding video conferences with teams of collaborators from thousands of miles away. But as high-speed Internet access has enabled so many great opportunities at universities across the country, we are faced more than ever with the challenge of using that technology responsibly.
At the core of our mission at Penn State is the creation and dissemination
of knowledge. The knowledge created and taught by our faculty is a form
of intellectual property. And part of our mission is to support integrity
and ethical behavior in respecting such property. But we are now confronted
with a tough reality: College campuses have become ground zero for the
online piracy of some of our nation's most sought after intellectual
property--movies, music, and software.
When we stand by idly and allow our students to abuse the privilege of high-speed Internet access for illegal downloading, we are failing our principles and we are failing our students.
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Need to Know
Administrators at UC Berkeley are still reeling from the realization that on the same campus where Nobel laureates push at the boundaries of human endeavor, 98,000-plus Social Security numbers were left exposed on an easily lifted laptop computer.
Chancellor Robert Birgeneau remarked in an open letter, “UC Berkeley
became the world’s premier teaching and research institution by being
precise and cutting edge. When it comes to protecting the data we store
and use I will insist on the same precision.”
On March 11 someone walked off with a notebook containing the SSNs
of thousands of applicants and students, current and former, from UC
Berkeley’s Graduate Division records. The computer, taken from
a restricted office area, contained data from as far back as 1976 to
the spring of 2004, including birthdates and/or addresses to match the
SSNs and names in about a third of the records.
Birgeneau promised an independent audit of campus practices regarding
personal data, as well as departmental reviews of databases and better
data encryption. Notably, he will instruct administrative units to remove
all non-essential data.
By California law, the university must notify all 98,369 individuals
regarding their compromised personal information. On April 4, campus
officials announced they had worked their way through about 6,700 of
them. A new “I.D.
Alert” button on Berkeley’s home page (www.Berkeley.edu)
now guides visitors to helpful information about the incident and offers
a variety of useful resources on identity theft.
Take a good look at UC Berkeley's "I.D. Alert" Web pages,
they serve as a great model for dealing with a painful issue.
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Mellon Awards Funding for Financials
The Kuali Project (www.kualiproject.org)
organized in 2004 on a firm footing, and it’s getting stronger. The
Andrew W. Mellon Foundation announced in March the award of $2.5 million
to the project for continued development of a new open source Financial
System for colleges and universities. The grant expands on Kuali’s $7.2
million in aggregated resources of founding partners Indiana University,
the University of Hawaii, the National Association of College and University
Business Officers (NACUBO; www.nacubo.org),
and the r·smart group (www.rsmart.com)
plus the investments of new institutional partners Cornell University,
San Joaquin Delta College (CA), Michigan State University, and the University
of Arizona.
The r·smart group’s Chairman John Robinson, a seasoned, 35-year veteran
of large-scale computing systems for higher education, predicts a bright
future for Kuali and a big win for its member institutions. “There’s
always an issue raised about whether you’re going to save money in open
source or not. When you look at small application systems, you’re probably
not going to save much money in the short term, but when you consider
the Kuali Project for major financial systems,
absolutely you’re
going to save lots of money. Nowadays, you’re paying in the multiple
millions of dollars for those [large-scale] installed systems. Institutions
don’t want to go through either the huge expense and disruption of installing
the systems, or the constant level of dependency on the vendor who is
headed who knows where longer term, and at what cost.”
Brad Wheeler, Kuali project chairman of the board and associate VP
and dean of IT at Indiana University cites more immediate benefits of
open source. “Kuali’s modular design has already attracted interest
even when an institution isn’t looking for a financial system now,”
says Wheeler. Kuali’s Electronic Research Administration tools—already
partially in use at IU—are drawing additional investment as research
offices look to true open source solutions for their needs.
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Who's Where
UC Berkeley's Jack McCredie Reflects Before Retirement
Associate Vice Chancellor for Information Systems and Technology (John
W.) Jack McCredie will retire this summer. Before joining the Berkeley
campus in 1992, he honed his IT leadership in both the academic and
corporate worlds, notably at Carnegie Mellon University (PA) and at
Digital Equipment Corp. During his four-and-a-half year tenure in the
early ’80s as president of EDUCOM (predating the merger with CAUSE),
he pioneered a series of "Campus Strategies" monographs that
put IT planning on the map in higher education.
McCredie has reflected on his years at Berkeley, providing his "top
ten" highlights in “Looking Back As We Move Forward,” a piece published
on UC Berkeley’s Information Systems and Technology Web site, noted
below. (iNews)
Read Jack McCredie’s Looking
Back As We Move Forward
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Brian Voss Assumes CIO Role at LSU
Brian Voss made the move to Louisiana State University this month,
to become CIO and lead the Office of Computing Services. Voss left his
role of associate vice president, Information Technology (Telecommunications)
and chief operating officer for the Pervasive Technology Labs at Indiana
University. “I’ve joined an institution that believes in the fundamental
strategic value of IT to accomplishing its larger missions in teaching,
learning, research, outreach, and economic development,” says Voss.
“The Flagship Agenda in particular makes this opportunity particularly
attractive.” Voss counts the location of Ed Seidel’s Center for Computation
& Technology, the state’s investment in the Louisiana Optical Network
Initiative (LONI; www.cct.lsu.edu/projects/loni/index.php),
and involvement in Internet2 and National LambdaRail among the positive
factors coming together at LSU. He hopes to create and implement a community-developed
strategic plan for IT at LSU before the end of the decade. (For appointment
details, see the press release below. The LSU Board of Supervisors has
subsequently given final approval to Voss’s appointment.)
Read more: LSU
Press Release
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