IT Policies
Instructional Technology Policies (Revised 11/08/2006)
1. Public Drive: Softlib
a)Computing Services’ policy on the Public (P:) drive:
i) The Public (P:\) drive is a short-term space to share files and/or copy them from one location to another. These files are accessible on campus to anyone who logs in. Always keep a local copy of anything you put on the P:\ Drive.
ii) Place your files inside a folder with your username or course code on it to help keep the (P:\) drive organized. Avoid using leading 0s or As in the folder name. It just confuses students. It’s easy for them to scroll through an alphabet listing.
iii) Computing Services will delete all files on this drive at the end of every term (or in an emergency will delete if the drive fills up to close to capacity). You will need to re-copy files that are used for more than one term.
iv) Whenever possible, faculty, staff, and committees should use department drives, Lotus Notes databases (web pages or e-mail) and Blackboard accounts to share files.
2. Blackboard & Related Issues
a) Archiving: Faculty members are responsible for archiving individual courses periodically by going to the Control Panel/Course Utilities/Archive Course for each course. This ensures backup copies exist in case of a server crash.
b) Faculty should be aware that Blackboard online grade books are not archived with the rest of the course data. They must separately export them by going into Control Panel/Online Gradebook/Export Gradebook. Wait for a minute and then be sure to click on SAVE Exported Gradebook! NOTE: Whenever you enter grades in Blackboard, you should export the grade book! Don’t wait until the end of the course to do this!
c) Course deletion: Computing Services will keep Blackboard courses active for one term after their creation date (to allow for incompletes, etc.). At the next term, courses will be deleted without notification. Make sure you have a backup Archive if you plan to re-use the course in the future.
d) Copyright: Faculty with questions about copyright issues should refer them to Julie Balamut in the CSC bookstore.
e) Protection of original materials: Faculty members who are concerned about sharing files that contain their original research or teaching ideas have some avenues for protecting them:
i) PDFs can be password-protected by changing settings in the Adobe Acrobat program; password-protection can restrict who reads the file and whether data can be extracted from it.
ii) Powerpoint presentations can be converted to streaming media (via Impatica) so that individual slides cannot easily be copied or changed.
f) File size goals: Faculty who share electronic files with students are advised to limit file sizes to 3-5 MB. File sizes of 5 MB and over can take more than 10 minutes to download, and may cause a student’s ISP to timeout. Computing Services can advise faculty on strategies to limit file size, including:
i) Editing graphical images to lower image resolution
ii) Using Impatica software to compress Powerpoint presentations
iii) Converting Word documents to PDFs
iv) Chunking documents into segments that can be individually downloaded
g) Online exam length: Students can get timed out by their ISP when they are taking
online exams if they are more than 1/2 hour in length. Typically, web browsers do not register activity from the time the student clicks START and they click the FINAL SUBMIT button on an exam. If you have concerns about how long students may take to complete an online exam, you may want to create it in "Parts" (e.g., Exam 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, etc.).
3. iMovie Guidelines
a) Faculty considering projects and/or course assignments using digital video should make an appointment with Computing Services Instructional Technology staff to discuss their needs well in advance of the term/dates of their projects. Limitations include the following:
i) Movie segment length = 10 minutes (start with this goal in mind). We absolutely cannot accommodate individual movie segments longer than 20 minutes. You can create a series of 10 minutes movies that we can “stitch” together into one movie after it’s been edited and ready to produce (up to 40 minutes total runtime).
ii) Group projects. Large classes (e.g., LIS724, THR360) should plan on 2-3 minutes movies per student group. We can physically accommodate five groups of 3 or 4 students each.
iii) Group project/TA support. For large classes with multiple group projects, you should arrange for TA support for groups while they are working on their projects. The Resource Center is open 8-5pm M-F. If you provide staff, we can open the RC in the evening or on weekends.
iv) All iMovie projects must be backed up to CD-ROMs, DVD (tape or disks), or VHS tape. Computing Services will not be responsible for projects that have not been backed up properly. Computing Services does backup these projects periodically during heavy use. However, individuals should not rely on just one backup of their work.
v) Time estimates: A ten-minute iMovie can take 80 hours of work to produce. For high quality work, think in terms of "1:1:1" - an hour’s filming and a day’s editing to make a minute of film. If you're working with ambitious perfectionists - or just disorganized - it may take longer.
vi) Class projects must be deleted two weeks after a project is complete to make room for new work. Use the same options as for making backups (see above). Any project that has not been worked on for more than a week may be moved to external storage. Projects not worked on for several weeks may need to be deleted from external storage drives to make room for new work. Make sure you have copies of all your files on DVD or CD-ROMs.
vii) Projects are dependent on availability of DVD cameras which can be checked out from AV. Currently, video editing hardware is available in CDC. Contact Media Services to reserve this equipment (690-6658).
viii) Project priority. first priority goes to faculty and/or students with academic projects; last priority goes to faculty with professional development projects, and we are no longer able to assist faculty with personal projects.
4. Wireless laptop carts.
a) Use the lab/scanner reservation database in Lotus Notes to reserve laptops two days in advance. The database can be accessed through Lotus Notes from on-campus: FILE/DATABASE/OPEN. Switch the server to Minerva. It’s on the list as “Lab Scanner Cart Reservations.”
5. Special Software Support
a) Setup a one-on-one training with Instructional Technology Staff so we can prepare to support the software.
b) If needed, we will co-teach the first time you introduce the software in class.
c) If needed, we can attend class as a TA the second time you use the software in class.
6. Departmental IT Services
a) Research on special academic department-specific software:
i) Locate and test software to be sure it will work on our systems.
ii) Instructors need to try software to be sure it works the way they expect it to work so they can teach their students to use it.
iii) Install software. Two weeks lead-time is needed the first time we install software in our labs for student use. NOTE: At the beginning of each term we “re-image” the labs. If you have identified software, tested it out for a term and plan to use it again, please let us know so we can add it to the appropriate lab images and have it automatically installed the next time we re-image the labs.
b) Reimaging labs. We do not reimage public labs in the middle of an academic
term (unless there's a compelling reason to do so). We make it a practice to reimage all public labs in late summer to include newly purchased software for the upcoming academic year. Sometimes, we reimage public labs in January if new software has arrived mid-year or we need to make changes to the systems.
c) Instructional design: Our IT staff members have all taught classes and have
backgrounds in media services, tech support, and/or instructional design. We are interested in how students learn with technology and in helping faculty teach with technology. We are available to discuss your plans for using classroom technology. Please feel free to contact us.