IS&T Home

ACS Home
Research
Publications
Communications
Proposals
Agendas
Grants
ITR Project

Related Links:
AIS World Internet2 NSF Dublin Core eduOrg

Advanced Campus Services
Information Systems & Technology
Georgia State University
P. O. Box 3968
Atlanta, Georgia 30302-3968
Phone +1 404 463 9685
Email: avandenberg@gsu.edu

RESPONSIBILITYPORTFOLIO
February 15, 2000

Purpose

There are many emerging trends in the information technology (IT) arena generally, and in higher education IT specifically, as Georgia State University enters the year 2000. Analogous to the commercial sector's engagement with e-Commerce, today's institutions of higher education are rapidly entering a system of basic communications and transactional services that could be called the "eUniversity," or the electronic, next-generation institution of higher education.

There are several emerging trends:

• The recognition that identification of and electronic distribution of information to individuals in the eUniversity electronic campus requires a much broader paradigm of directory services than the traditional application-specific, limited-domain identification of and communication with these people.

• The pressing need for more thorough, comprehensive methodologies for validating the authenticity of an individual in the electronic environment.

• The related need to associate specific validated individuals with pre-specified authorizations to perform certain electronic functions in the e-University environment.

• An observed need for seamless, comprehensive interfaces between all components of the eUniversity, whether specific to administrative application systems, library services, e-mail, calendaring, accessing electronic course content, gaining access to buildings or rooms, or accessing technology resources like workstations or network ports.

• The definition of secure, reliable trusted processes for validation and authentication of individuals across all aspects of the eUniversity mentioned above.

• The need to reduce to singularity the number of multiple electronic identities an individual must have in the eUniversity environment. As an example, a single userid and related authentication processes should suffice for accessing networks, servers, applications, mainframes, e-mail accounts, public access computing lab machines, electronic smart-cards or id-cards, etc.

• An increasing growth in the dependency upon all constituents within the eUniversity environment upon available, reliable, secure and authenticated electronic mail capabilities. Over the past five years, this has become an expected essential component for success in the eUniversity, not merely a desirable extra benefit.

Because of the rapid emergence of these needs, most organizations, companies and institutions are attempting to develop acceptable common solutions to these concerns that will have a reasonable probability of surviving into the near future. There are few, if any, standards that have been developed to support these processes, but this makes the need no less pressing. Most companies and universities must respond rapidly to the eUniversity environment. In many cases, the institutions are participating somewhat unwillingly in a rapid development of industry standards.

Adding to the complexity of the problems themselves is the breadth of scope of the problems: they do not fall neatly into a specific unit within the IT organization, but span a scope much larger, usually impacting several functional IT areas. For example, single user signon does not fall neatly within the IT infrastructure unit, nor is it fully contained within administrative or academic systems support areas. Even though a functional area like the library, registrar or one-card office may need authentication and validation procedures, the development of this service within a single unit will most likely result in a less than comprehensive solution for the institution as whole.

Specific Scope

The Advanced Campus Services (ACS) unit of IS&T to be established will have a broad, coordinating role in the establishment of standards, methods and processes to address these emerging issues in higher education IT. This unit will not only investigate possible common solutions for addressing the next generation eUniversity environment, but will also develop plans and coordinate activities of Georgia State University's IS&T line units in the accomplishment of related undertakings.

The planned unit will be small in staff size, but instrumental in involving many staff from the other line units of IS&T. In a sense, ACS willoperate as support for a cross-functional team of representatives from the other units. ACS leadership must advance the development of a university-wide consensus regarding directions and strategies to be adopted in these identified areas. Interfacing in planning processes that span other universities and the University System will be essential. This is because directory services, authentication services and universal solutions require broad, open solutions that may involve other institutions.

Specific directions and detailed action plans must be developed and undertaken regarding:

• University-wide directory services and metadirectory solutions

• Public-private key infrastructure

• Definition of universal account creation, userids and password synchronization

• Universal e-mail solutions

• Interface to other electronic domains like the one-card and library patron systems

In many ways, the ACS unit becomes the functional owner , or user, of technology services provided by other units of IS&T. The other line units retain their responsibility for supporting the technology that will make ACS successful.

Composition of the Unit

Since the primary nature of this unit will be to focus on the accomplishment of cross-functional projects, the size of the unit will be small. There will be a director, a project planner/manager and some staff to assist in technical writing and office support functions. It is anticipated that these staff will be reassigned from current IS&T units, based on their experience in handling large, complex technology and communications projects.

Articulation With and Dependencies Upon Other IS&T Units

The ACS unit will perform primarily planning and coordination functions for implementation of the above-specified services. The actual technical staff required in establishing a specific implementation like directory services or PKI authentication will come from units like University Computing and Communications (UCCS). Establishing common, universal e-mail and single userids will heavily involve staff of UCCS, as well as University Educational Technology Services and University Information Services. Implementation of PKI authentication services for the library will require working closely with Library Support and Technology Initiatives, as well as Board of Regents staff and representatives from other institutions using the GIL Endeavor software. Communication will have to occur with the Information Technology Support subcommittee, which serves as liaison to colleges and schools on campus. ACS will be dependent upon Planning and Strategic Initiatives for communication and customer advocacy for the campus, and Finance and Management Services for basic business office support.

The plan for communication would have the director of ACS leading a cross-functional team of technology specialists from various IS&T units toward accomplishment of the defined objectives. This implies regular communication between the ACS director and directors of the other units. To accomplish this, the ACS unit would have a standing steering committee consisting of the IS&T directors group. This steering committee would review the activities of ACS and ensure that articulation occurs among the various responsible units. Also, this committee would help in identifying interface points between ACS projects and the functional IS&T units responsible for accomplishing tasks required in achieving the relevant goals.

Relationship to Campus Customers

 Besides other IS&T units, the ACS staff must also communicate effectively with various campus constituency groups. Adoption of many of the stated services and procedures will require adoption of university-wide standards. This will have implications in how various distributed technology support staff perform their current functions in the affected areas. Proactive and consensus-building communication styles will be imperative. It is intended that direct communication with campus constituency groups will occur via the units within IS&T already associated with the respective groups. For example, UCCS will provide liaison to network, server, workstation support and communications users; UETS will serve as liaison between ACS and both faculty and students. UIS will provide liaison to administrative information systems clients, as well as the data stewards responsible for feeding employee and student data into ACS services .