Agenda

  1. Roll Call (by timezone - East to West)
  2. Scribe Shout-out - It's easy to scribe: How To Scribe Itana Notes
  3. Agenda Bash
  4. EDUCAUSE Top 10 List
    1. https://er.educause.edu/articles/2018/1/top-10-it-issues-2018-the-remaking-of-higher-education

  5. Itana Org Updates
    1. Working Group Updates
      1. API Working Group
      2. Business Architecture Working Group
      3. EA Maturity Model
      4. IoT Whitepaper
    2. Book club update - Dave Gray, The Connected Company (2012)
    3. Steering Committee Update

Attendees




Brendan Bellina-UCLA

Discussion items

Louis King led the discussion by reviewing the the Educause Review: 2018 Top 10 Issues for IT Issues

The themes pulled out of the issues are:

Institutional Adaptiveness
Improved Student Outcomes
Improved Decision Making
IT Adaptiveness

Institutional Adaptiveness:

Jim Phelps: Stated the themes resonate at the University of Washington

Wayde Nie of McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada expressed the underlying themes of the need for open standards and how many problems are assigned to IT but they don’t really belong in IT.  Dana Miller from Miami University of Ohio asked Wayne to provide examples of problems that are assigned to IT but don’t really need to belong to IT and he suggested ERP implementations.  Jim Phelps mentioned the HR and Payroll modernization effort at the University of Washington started out in the HR Office but the project soon found its way into the IT group.

Louis King from Yale mentioned that his institution is getting better at the change process by incorporating into IT into larger change efforts.

Chris Gaschler from the University of Saskatchewan has noticed the message from vendors to business departments is that you don’t need to IT to implement this cloud-based solution but often problems arise and then the business department comes running to IT for help to save the day.

Jim Phelps mentioned this is the classic sales pattern where the best example is that Salesforce will first work with the business units and not central IT.
 
Louis King said this unfortunate scenario is a component of decentralization in the university structure.  The Provost loosely controls the academic departments which enable this kind of behavior.  In this environment, It is hard to understand investments and how to leverage them.

Louis also mentioned there is a customer expectation of IT to provide a champagne service on a beer budget which is always a Catch-22.

Dana mentioned that during the book group discussion of the “The Connected Company” there was the agreement that IT needs to refine and develop better the service of 3rd Part Integrator. 

Jim Phelps served on an Educause panel over the past summer and there is a Digital Transformation Task Force developing that is working with University Presidents and Provosts to help them understand that to transform the business of the university there needs to be better strategic partnerships with IT.   The executives need to understand that you can’t be efficient if you can’t think forward a few years.  Historically IT has been viewed as a cost center or commodity and not a strategic partner.


Improved Student Outcomes:


Louis asked what data do we have on the systems the provide teaching and learning.  

Jim mentioned the need for more graceful entry and exit points for different types of students.  You don’t have just one entry and exit point at this point in time.  There are also different methods of delivery and pedagogy. 

Universities still appear to not be designing services around students too much.

Having multiple registrations processes to endure for example.

Piet Niederhausen from the University of Washington also mentioned there are structures imposed from being a state institution such as only recognizing a 4-year degree and not setting up structures to understand distance learning certifications for example.  Our governmental structures have not kept up with the changes in society.   

Louis mentioned the Yale undergraduate residential experience is somewhat unique in that the value of the network and brand is validated by graduates experience.   A Small percentage of colleges are focused in this way…with a student-centered focus and these institutions tend to have larger endowments that can enable the higher touch services for the student. 

Dana thought but did not speak to the fact that Miami University spends a great amount of marketing budget presenting itself in the same residential type model of a Yale but does not have the endowment to fully compare itself.  There are banners on campus saying the institution is a “Public Ivy” but is that statement perhaps an oxymoron?   
 

Improved Decision Making:


Louis explained progress Yale has made in the area of improved decision making.  

-The BI department now reports to the CIO
-Research data management has developed a policy  
-The data governance has been using the CAUDIT Data Model for 3 weeks so far and is starting to map applications to data topics


At Yale there is a 3 Prong approach to better decision making:

-BI and Analytics

-Data Governance Framework-committee in place-organizational approach

- New effort to support data management policy

The implementation of the ERP, Workday for HR and Finance has also been a catalyst for the data governance effort.

Jim Phelps said the UW is redesigning their data governance structure. 

He posed the questions:

What is the stance of your institution regarding data?
Risk mitigation?
Data as an asset for decision making?
What is the culture around data? 
Is it one of fear?

He mentioned that Notre Dame has taken the unique higher ed approach that all data is open and shared.

In regards to data in the risk adverse higher education environment, the usual best answer is no.  

Louis mentioned that the data stakeholder needs to work with the data steward so they better understand the needs of each other. 

Use of data has risk…but if you don’t use it you are flying blind.  There needs to be a balance between risk and reward in the use of date.


IT Adaptiveness:

Staffing:  There has been some emphasis on developing outward facing business relationship staff.


Louis asked how useful is this information to your EA Practice?

Dana said his efforts are more outwardly focused and this information validates those efforts.

Jim will bring these themes in front of IT leadership and ask where are we in response to this information?

Louis has been trying to engage leadership with these questions but is still trying to make progress.

Itana Org Updates

API Working Group - Last week's call was cancelled

Business Architecture Working Group - Last week the group had a productive call with 25 participants.  Jeff Kennedy and Nigel Foxwelll who represent CAUDIT were on the call and they shared a presentation of the CAUDIT Capability and Data models.  Dana mentioned the material of this talk may have larger interest for the ITANA Group?  If any institution is interested in accessing the models we have developed of method for people to get them.  Contact Dana Miller (mille704@miamioh.edu) if interested.

EA Maturity Model - Louis called for others to participate if interested.  The group is working to firm up the model over the summer and use it for the Educasue Face2Face session this fall. 

IoT White Paper - On hold for the time being

Book club - 3rd discussion is Thursday, March 1st 2:00 to 3:00 pm CST.  See Itana calendar for connecting info and agenda.