University of California, Berkeley
MINUTES OF THE E -BERKELEY STEERING COMMITTEE
Meeting of April 12, 2004
Chancellor's Conference Room, California Hall
Members present: EVC and Provost Paul Gray, Chair, Trish Cascardi for VP Catherine Koshland, Director Jon Conhaim, VC Ed Denton, Acting Controller John Ellis, Professor Ken Goldberg, Director Laurie Goldman for VC Beth Burnside, Director Phyllis Hoffman, VC Jim Hyatt, Assoc. Dean George Johnson for Dean Richard Newton, Charis Kaskiris, Graduate Student Representative, Director Rosemary Kim, University Librarian Tom Leonard, VC Christina Maslach, AVC Jack McCredie, Chief Technology Officer Tessa Michaels, Director Barbara Morgan, Director Helen Norris, Professor Philip Stark .
Also attending : Victor Edmonds, Educational Technology Services, Dennis Hengstler and Jill Martin, Business & Finance, Katherine Mitchell, COrE.
1. Welcome and Review of Minutes
Paul Gray announced that Barbara Morgan, Director of Strategic Technology Planning, IST, will retire this June and that this will be her last meeting. He said that her work in support of the Steering Committee over the past four years had been essential to its success, and wished her well with her future plans. Paul also noted that Jim Hyatt, who has accepted a position as Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer at Virginia Tech, will be leaving UC Berkeley in July. He said that Jim has contributed tremendous energy as the point person for the e-Berkeley program and that it will be important to continue his efforts in the future. The Committee applauded both Barbara and Jim in recognition of their work.
Paul asked for approval of the minutes, and received no objections.2. Information Technology Strategic Plan
Paul opened the discussion by saying that the impact of the strategic planning experience has been a revelation to him, with the Strategic Academic Plan representing a broad consensus, setting the direction for future campus endeavors. The IT Strategic Plan will follow the same course, integrating the planning process that has been going on with IT-related committees across campus. The Steering Committee will have an opportunity today to assist in the process, through an exercise in rating guiding principles for IT developed in last week's thought-provoking and creative meeting of chairs of the nine IT-related committees. The Steering Committee will also be responsible for overseeing the implementation of the principles.
Jack McCredie provided background information on the planning process, thanking Katherine Mitchell of COrE for her guidance and participation throughout. He said that last spring and fall during the initial planning meetings, Ken Goldberg and Jack felt that, in lieu of starting up a new committee to formulate an IT Strategic Plan, it would be more useful to work with all the IT-related committees on campus as partners. Jack said that these meetings and others held with the Academic Senate COMP committee had provided a rich "soup" of ideas concerning key IT issues on campus and resulted in the draft "Critical Issues: Opportunities and Challenges" document included in the meeting packet.
Last Tuesday the committee chairs worked through a draft statement of guiding principles. During May, a web-based survey of these principles will be presented to the campus at large for input and prioritization. Jack stressed the importance of being able to provide the new Chancellor with a paper presenting "the best thinking on campus of where we really need to go," building on the Strategic Academic Plan and the five new academic initiatives.
Jack asked Ken Goldberg to describe the work COMP has been doing in this area. Ken said he thinks the IT strategic planning process is bringing to the fore some issues often relegated to the background. He described COMP's effort to gather data on computing in academic departments by working with Professor Merrill Shanks to formulate a survey for this purpose. The survey has been sent to all academic department chairs, and Ken will report on the results at the next Steering Committee meeting.
Katherine Mitchell then asked Committee members to participate in an exercise, with each person around the table offering a word or two on how they would like to describe campus IT in five years. Sample responses were "ease-of-use, robust, integrated, agile, collaborative." Katherine then asked members to take 15 minutes to assess the guiding principles developed by the group of IT-related committee chairs, by voting with "dots" on each principle (on posters around the room) using a scale of 0 - 4. Jack McCredie, Ken Goldberg and Tom Leonard will consolidate the voting results. After the exercise, Katherine asked for general comments. Paul responded that some of the principles overlap and should be consolidated; Victor Edmonds noted that the language describing some principles encourages a certain kind of reaction, suggesting that more neutral wording be used. Katherine asked Steering Committee members to look at the material in the handouts, pointing out a summary of the responses from all the IT committees. Other comments and information can be viewed on the strategic planning website at: http://technology.berkeley.edu
3. e-Berkeley Roadmap
Jon Conhaim referred to two documents handed out at the meeting: (1) a copy of a PowerPoint presentation titled "Overview of the e-Berkeley Roadmap", and (2) a draft of the "e-Berkeley Roadmap Update for 2004." He said he would spend some time going over the development of the roadmap to date, and then present the kinds of projects that are being considered for the next two years.
Jon summarized the e-Berkeley goals:
Improve teaching and learning through the appropriate use of Internet technology.
A timeline of projects completed through the period 2000-2004 shows that many processes have been converted from paper to online format, and that progress has been made in all three goal areas. Jon proposed a new goal in addition to the three listed above:
Jon said this goal places greater emphasis on integration of services and improvement of cross-campus communication and collaboration, and should be kept in mind while work proceeds on the first three goals.
Jon outlined future projects, standards that need to be developed, and some roadblocks (and solutions) to achieving the e-Berkeley goals. He highlighted the Campus Community Portal, explaining the stages that have been completed and those that lie ahead. The portal is the vehicle for pulling together "dozens of campus e-services into a single web site." Some projected timelines are:
IST will rebuild Bear Facts and Telebears using the uPortal software (December 2004)
The MyBerkeleyApp checklist application will be integrated into the portal architecture (April 2005)
The Haas Student Portal will be integrated into the Campus Community Portal (August 2005)
ETS and IST will launch the new SAKAI learning management system on the portal (December 2005)
Jon described the CalNet Identity Management System, which will extend the current CalNet system by bringing a more authoritative and secure service to all applications and departments. Jon discussed the need for campus-wide standards for Graphical User Interface and Usability to make applications easier to use; application Programming Standards for campus web services; and Data Exchange Standards to help make data more accessible.
Roadblocks include:
• Key staff lack adequate project management skills
• Project governance is not well-defined
• Campus business process conversion from paper to web-based system results in complicated, difficult to use applications
• Lack of technical expertise to support e-Berkeley architecture specifications
• Delays in data exchange due to lack of technical expertise to support applications
• Poorly designed interfaces for web applications
• Campus web developers try to cover all areas of technical support, rather than concentrating on quality and effectiveness of campus web applications.
Some solutions proposed are:
Project Management Issues and Training : Staff training in project management is being offered, and further training in project management communications will be introduced.
e-Business Process Planning : Training for staff in conversion of paper to web-based processes will be introduced.
Development of Staff Technical Skills : Continued training in technical skills is needed to support development of web-based applications and adhere to campus e-architecture guidelines.
Establish Campus Best Service Providers : Sharing expertise among campus web developers needs to be encouraged. Jon proposes a "Best Service Provider Pilot," with ETS as the core Interface Design and Usability Testing resource. In addition, a campus registry of experts would be created to identify functional and technical staff competencies.
Jon concluded by listing the next steps for the e-Berkeley Roadmap:
Paul asked Jon to clarify the new goal he described earlier, by explaining whether the goal is tied to XML and collaborative work. Jon said that it addresses breaking down stovepipes, and would make it easier for students, staff and researchers to collaborate on campus, adding that there may be better way of expressing the goal.
Tom Leonard said that BearFacts has been very popular with students and asked Jon why it is seen as something to improve. Jon said he has found that students feel the interface should be improved, and that the information needs to be easily integrated with the learning management system.
Jon noted that many of these issues, such as identity management, will be put on the back burner until after the data center move. Paul reminded the Steering Committee that the budget situation requires that we think about the best use of our limited resources. He felt the emphasis on training is very good, and asked whether these programs would be accomplished through the e-Berkeley Program Office. Jon replied that it depends upon the type of skills needed; some programs may belong in other units.
4. Selection Process for 2004-05 e-Berkeley Proposals
Jon Conhaim presented the "Suggested Plan for Selecting e-Berkeley Project Proposals for Funding in 2004-05," modeled after last year's process. On May 4, all e-Berkeley Innovation Project proposals will be made available via the web to the members of EBSC, ETC, ASSCS and EBITF. The EBITF will vote on the proposals using a web-based voting system and the e-Berkeley Program Office will consult with the chairs of ETC and ASSCS for recommendations on the proposals. The e-Berkeley Steering Committee will make funding decisions at the June 23 meeting based on the recommendations from the three committees. On June 24, proposal applicants will be notified of the funding decisions, and the proposals selected will be posted on the e-Berkeley web site at http://eberkeley.berkeley.edu
Katherine Mitchell suggested that the IT Strategic Plan guiding principles be made available to those voting on and recommending projects, and Jon agreed that the principles would be posted with the Innovation Project proposals. Paul commented that this is the third year of funding for "pilot projects" (instead of the significant money made available in the first year), and he asked Jon whether overall projects are growing from the pilot phase to another stage of development. Jon said that some are exploratory and some have gone into production. Departments are sometimes unable to support operating costs for a successful larger project.
Jack said the Student Data Warehouse is an example of a project that is "too successful" and an ongoing struggle to fund. He asked Jon whether there is a way to highlight the top e-Berkeley priorities (the community portal and the identity management system), so that funding decisions can be made taking these priorities into consideration. Jon said he would write these two projects up as proposals, so that they can be considered along with the other proposals, and will discuss project ownership with Jack. Paul agreed to this plan. Jim Hyatt noted that $1 million was allocated last year for permanent funding for ongoing projects from the first year.
5. Campus Response to Allegations of Illegal File Sharing
Jack McCredie presented the Steering Committee with a briefing on illegal file sharing that he prepared for the Chancellor, including Jack's statement to the media regarding the suit filed by the Recording Industry of America (RIAA) against individuals. The University expects to receive subpoenas requesting the names of people associated with IP addresses listed in the suit; four addresses are from UC Berkeley. UC is one of 21 universities affected by the lawsuit. Office of General Counsel will determine whether UC will comply with the subpoenas.
Jack added that the Governor of California is considering issuing an Executive Order requiring state agencies to curtail improper usage that would be close to impossible to implement (state colleges and universities may be exempt). UC Berkeley complies very carefully with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), and we are not liable for any breach that has occurred.
Jack said that UCLA and UCB are working with entertainment groups to find a legal way to allow file sharing, and will meet with the Campus Entertainment Network (Ruckus) on April 22 nd to hear a presentation of their product. However, Jack believes that many students will not be compliant even though UC may offer legal ways to download music.
Rosemary Kim suggested training for staff on the rules regarding illegal file sharing, and Jack agreed that this is a good idea (we have been concentrating on students). Jack will be sending out an all-campus memo soon with information on the University position regarding the DMCA. Jack added that UCLA's policy when a person is identified as an illegal file sharer is to put the person into a quarantine that allows them to use their computer to access the internal campus network, but not connect with the Internet. At UCB, file sharing incidents have been successfully managed on an individual basis.
6. Data Management and Use Policy
Helen Norris, co-chair of the Data Stewardship Council with Dennis Hengstler, introduced Jill Martin and Dennis, who presented the draft Data Management, Use and Protection Policy (DMUP). They are asking for review and approval of the policy, which has been in development over the past year. ASSCS, EBITF, CISC, ITAC, the IT Management Team, ASOC and COMP have reviewed the policy and provided input which has been incorporated into today's version.
Jill presented an overview of the policy: its purpose, who it applies to, what it applies to, and what it provides. The policy acts as a repository of principles and guidelines for handling data and establishes campus information as a valuable campus asset, calling for each member of campus to be responsible for proper management and use of data. The policy was created to define clear accountability, improve data sharing, and decrease campus risk with regard to mishandling of data. The policy applies to anyone handling data in all areas of campus business. Data is identified as any form of information, with certain types of data being subject to special protocols, i.e., research data, survey data, marketing data and outsourced data.
Many data stewardship roles are defined in the policy:
Individual roles are not new; the policy names functions that are already being performed, in order to increase awareness and clarify accountability for data management. Jill said that feedback from departments introduced to the policy has been positive. In some cases the policy acts as a training document and provides departments with a basis for writing data handling procedures, as well as identifying needs for further training.
The e-Berkeley Steering Committee's role with regard to DMUP is new; the IT oversight role already performed by the Committee would be extended to include dispute resolution. Even though very few problems are anticipated, Helen Norris explained that a dispute might arise during the process of sharing data. Helen described the proposed procedures for arbitration of disputes, which would occur after efforts had been made for one to one resolution, moving through the Data Stewardship Council to the Steering Committee for a final decision, and implemented by the Vice Chancellors of the disputing parties.
Helen said that the policy is presented to the Steering Committee for approval today, after having been passed through the relevant groups on campus. She asked for questions, and Ken Goldberg said the COMP committee had discussed the policy and is concerned about the very broad definition of "data" which may not fit education and research. Laurie Goldman also expressed concerns about sharing research data and the lack of consultation with campus researchers. Paul commented that the policy is extraordinarily complex and seems to apply to every individual on campus. He asked whether there is a way to summarize the basic concepts ("DMUP light") for easier communication. Helen responded that implementation guidelines are coming, with examples. Ken asked for more guidance for distinguishing between sensitive data and "other" data.
Paul said that the Steering Committee needs time to absorb the policy, and proposed that a further discussion of the issues be postponed until the June 23 meeting. He added that the Chancellor's Cabinet will also need to review the policy.
7. Announcements
New Grant for AirBears Wireless Service
Phil Stark announced a new grant from Hewlett Packard for 240 new wireless access points, referring to a summary he prepared for renewal of the original grant. Philip's report outlines the justification for the grant and its renewal, the current status of AirBears (including a list of courses using AirBears this year), and a write-up of the first year's experience. A map of AirBears coverage can be viewed at:
http://airbears/map/
Philip said a Deans and Directors memo will be sent out to announce the free hardware for wireless service for departments that pay for installation charges. He also handed out an Intel website list of the "Most Unwired College Campuses" (i.e. those which are wireless) which did not include UC Berkeley.
New Data Center
Jack McCredie reported that the campus Data Center move is on schedule for late June, and referred to the Data Center move schedule at http://systemstatus.berkeley.edu/schedule.html for details. Most IST staff will not move until December 2004.
The meeting was adjourned at noon.
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Next meeting: Wednesday, June 23, 2004, 10:00 - noon, Chancellor's Conference Room, California Hall
Future
meetings:
Fall Semester - TBD
