Summer graduation ceremonies are now largely complete across the system. This is the last (or next to last week) to tidy up projects prior to the start of the Fall semester. In looking at the calendar for the week of August 14th, the following items of general interest are worth commenting on:
News
New
The proposed WebEx contract for FY18 has been distributed. There are a couple of proposed changes for slightly less money. Please pass along your thoughts. I have only gotten two comments so far!
The 2018 Tech Summit Call for Presentations is now open! If you have expertise in a technology, leadership or project management topics, presenting at the Texas A&M University System Technology Summit is a great way to build your professional portfolio. Submit your breakout session proposal. Presenters will receive a 25% discount on registration for the February 26-28 conference at Moody Gardens Galveston. Proposals are due September 22, 2017.
I was asked to check in with other schools to understand how they were dealing with Spectrim. Here is UT’s response: “Our institutions generally don’t use DIR’s Spectrim to do regular risk assessments. They do use it for the biennial Agency Security Plan and the required incident reporting. UTS has its own implementation for risk assessments that is available to our institutions. Our CISO has plans (don’t know if there will be budget yet) to launch a re-implementation and upgrade this Fall. Our first crack at it may not have hit the mark. It is a large complex system.”
System-Wide Contracting News
Repeats
Current System-wide Contracts
- Access Data provides members with preservation hold software (in annual assessment)
- Banner COE provides members with Banner-related services (discretionary)
- Cisco SmartNet (discretionary)
- Comevo provides members with online orientation software services (discretionary contract)
- Diligent provides board portal functionality for all members (discretionary)
- Docusign provides members with electronic signature and related workflow capabilities (discretionary)
- Duo provides two-factor authentication for all members (discretionary)
- Examity provides members with on-line proctoring services under a one-year master contract (discretionary contract)
- Hootsuite enables members to manage social networks, schedule messages and measure social media from a dashboard (discretionary)
- Laserfiche provides members with the digitization of documents, the automation of records processing, storage retrieval, security and archiving (discretionary)
- Modo Labs provides mobile application development support (discretionary)
- ProctorU provides members with on-line proctoring services under a one-year master contract (discretionary contract)
- Proofpoint email filtering and data loss prevention tools (in annual assessment)
- Siteimprove checks web pages, every five days, for spelling, grammar, broken links and accessibility. The cost is 54 cents per web page per year. Any member interested in adding this service need to contact me directly. (discretionary)
- Syncplicity licensing is available for all members (in annual assessment)
- WebEx is available to all members. Faculty/administrators can obtain licenses at the low cost of $1.44/month/license. (discretionary)
- WebQA is the TAMUS approved Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) solution for all members (in annual assessment)
System-wide Contracts Under Development
- Captioning Services will provide members with closed caption, transcription and subtitling solutions to make video accessible, searchable, SEO-friendly and more engaging
- On-line Course Evaluation Services will provide members with tools that allow students to evaluate academic courses (including instructors). As of last week, System Procurement had sent the contracts to the 4 vendors for signature. Ed Evans will notify the SO when the contracts are signed and send out a list of contacts at each company so the members can follow-up if appropriate.
- Learning Management Systems RFP responses have been received; a committee has been formed to begin the process of reviewing those responses
- Maxient will provide members with a tool to manage student discipline, academic integrity and Title IX matters
- Proctoring Solutions RFP is being reviewed by OGC
Projects
New
Workday (Project Helios)
- The team continued to close System Integration Testing defects.
- The Workday Post UAT Sandbox opened August 7 for member SMEs who attended UAT and employees who have a partner security roles. A select group of member HR departmental processors will have access to the sandbox beginning August 14. Approximately 446 employees will access the sandbox.
- A Workday & Legacy Systems Update was held August 10 briefing 100 attendees from various members on the impacts of Workday to our legacy systems.
- Business process coaches continued meeting with members this week, completing coaching sessions with A&M-Central Texas, PVAMU, the System Office, TAMHSC, TAMUG, Texas A&M AgriLife, Texas A&M, TAMUT, TTI and WTAMU.
- Results from User Acceptance Testing:
- 183 testers from across all members
- 1074 test scenarios executed
- 11 defects identified
SCIO Trips/Visits
- No trips are scheduled for this week.