Date:
Attendees:
Relevant document: Minutes from November 6th ACAC Meeting, Report of the Network Security Task Force, Subcommittee on Appropriate Technology & Efficiency Minutes, Subcommittee on Distance Education & Outreach Minutes, and the Library Subcommittee Minutes, Executive Summary of the Academic Technology Plan.
1. Approval of Minutes from the
November 6th Meeting
The minutes of the November 6th meeting were
voted on and approved.
2. Update on Faculty IT Development Grants (Leigh Anne Melanson) Funding is available to support faculty in developing new information technology initiatives, and ACAC has been instrumental in the awarding of grants in the past. We will get an update on available funds, submission deadlines, and the evaluation process.
The
Faculty IT Development grants were proposed by ACAC in the Academic Technology
Plan, and amount to $200 thousand per year for five years. The purpose of these
grants is to provide the means for faculty to integrate technology into their
teaching. Proposals are sought twice a
year, and those proposals are evaluated by a subcommittee of ACAC, which includes
all of the faculty members serving on ACAC, the Assistant Provost for Academic
Administration, and the Director of CIS Academic Technology. A synopsis of the latest round of proposals
will be presented at an upcoming ACAC meeting so that members can provide
comments on the process.
3. Overview of the Task Force on Network Security (Chamberlin) As reported in the last ACAC meeting, the Network Security Task Force was convened to look at the balance between privacy and enforcing security on the USNH network. The Task Force is prepared to submit its final report to President Leitzel, and ACAC is being asked to comment on its contents.
The Task Force has submitted its interim report to the
President. That report calls for CIS to
be proactive in monitoring and securing the USNH network, while at the same
time preserving user privacy. This
report will next be forwarded to CIS with the expectation that they will write
new policy in response to the report recommendations. Once the new policy is available, both the
Task Force report and the new policy will be presented to the appropriate
groups, including ACAC, for comment and review, and should take place early next
year.
4. Update on the Academic Technology Plan (Winters) A past effort of ACAC was to develop a technology plan outlining how technology monies should be allocated. We will be updated regarding how the process has gone in its first incarnation, along with work that is being performed in conjunction with Student Senate to determine an appropriate fee structure that will go into effect in FY03.
The role of ACAC in the past
with regards to the Student Technology Fee has been to define programs relating
to technology that should appropriately be funded by the fee. Some examples are classroom enhancement,
faculty desktop replacement, and Academic Technology Liaison (ATL)
program. These and other programs
started in FY01 and FY02, and over time ACAC will be asked to provide feedback
how well they appear to be working. Consequently, ACAC members are asked to
become familiar with the programs funded by the Student Technology Fee, and to
seek input from their constituencies regarding them. It is likely that ACAC will revisit these
programs late in the spring semester so that it can make recommendations about
those programs in fall 2002.
5. Report on the activities of
the Supported Products Advisory Committee (
As indicated by its name, SPAC makes recommendations about
which software products should be supported by UNH. At present, there are no formal mechanisms in
place to assess how many individuals on campus are using a particular software
package, so SPAC relies on its members and associated groups, such as ACAC, to
get the word out. For example,
consideration had been given to dropping support for WordPerfect, although
informal feedback suggested that there were enough users on campus to continue
support. SPAC is looking to find more
formal approaches to communicating with users in the future.
It was reported that UNH support for the FTP program QVT-term will be withdrawn because it is known to be incompatible with some UNH firewalls.
6. ACAC Subcommittee Reports
In our previous ACAC meeting, we formed subcommittees to address the issues posed in the ongoing academic planning process. The subcommittees that have met will be reporting on the results of their meetings.
The minutes of the subcommittee meetings were reviewed;
those minutes are hyperlinked under “relevant documents” at the beginning of
this document.
7.
ACAC Retreat
in January
The Provost’s Office has offered to provide ACAC members a
retreat to facilitate brainstorming on some of the topics it is addressing,
particularly those relating to academic planning. ACAC members voted for a half-day morning
retreat, ending in a “free lunch”. The
retreat will likely take place during the week of January 14th, and
ACAC members will be notified by e-mail of possible dates for the retreat.