Department Interviews - 1997

Interview with:  Peter S. Brouwer, Interim Provost
                 2/4/97




Questions:

1. How things are going?

     - In general, things seem to be going well.  Very few complaints
       have been heard in quite awhile.

     - The statements made in the '96 interview (see below) still hold.



2. What can be improved?

     - Follow through on the use of the SUNYCard for student printing. 

     - Improve dial-in access and monitor its usage.  It may be necessary
       to limit usage to dial-in accounts requested by departments rather
       than individuals.  That is, we should have departments make the 
       request for a dial-in account, rather than individuals, so that the 
       usage would be primarily for school/business reasons.  That is, a 
       individual would ask his/her department for an account and the 
       department would determine whether it was appropriate rather than us.

       [NOTE:  We implemented a "business-use only set of dial-in modems
       for which individuals must obtain authorization from their department 
       head in order to use.  Seems to be going well.]

     - Develop web resources, especially access to Banner information.

     - Continue improving the Helpdesk, our responsiveness and follow-up.

     - Should we consider offering basic computer sessions (e-mail, WWW,
       word proc, etc.) for students, faculty and staff based upon credit at
       some point in the future (perhaps by hiring adjuncts?)



3. What new directions we should be exploring?

     - DC/TM should develop a life-cycle plan for desktop computing
       resources

     - Should begin looking at what is needed to upgrade our current 
       academic/administrative network to meet our needs in the coming 
       years.

     - Provide support for asynchronous web-based distance learning 
       projects/initiatives.

     - There may be as many as 30 new faculty arriving for Fall '97.  WE
       should meet their expectations and orient them properly to 
       information technology at SUNY Potsdam.



4. What directions we might want to consider drawing back from? 

     - Questions of the type, "Can we afford to continue supporting x", 
       should be dealt with as they come up.

     - It was suggested that we should continue to try to utilize students to
       assist with the "service support crisis" (e.g., internships 
       experiences could be structured so that students gain academic credit 
       by working in DC/TM)

       [NOTE:  This is a difficult solution.  We do rely heavily upon 
       students, but we pay them.  Internship experiences would probably add 
       more to our burden than to the support-crisis solution because of the 
       added work of evaluating them for academic reasons on top of work 
       performance.]



5. What are your most important concerns and priorities for the next
   year?

     - President Scott will be authoring a vision statement (a "niche" 
       statement) for SUNY Potsdam.  Our mission and goals should be in 
       alignment with this statement.



--------------------  1996 Interview notes  -----------------------


1. DC/TM Mission - OK as is.

   Public service:  This should be based upon availability of time and the
   interest of the staff.

   Requests for service and support have to fit into the set of priorities 
   and activities already going on.  It is *important* to acknowledge 
   requests.

   Priority for DC/TM should be the academic mission (instructional 
   activities).


2. Instructional Development:

   "Instructional development" is defined as developing customized 
    applications and integrating existing technologies into the curriculum.

   The College doesn't currently have this (staff do not have time, though
   some may have the interest), although Peter would like to move to a
   situation in which this could be supported..

   The "will" to carry out the technology must the faculty's 
   responsibility.

   There must be a balance between creating and supporting demand for
   technology.

   There should be more emphasis on the "average" faculty member's use of
   technology.  They should be encouraged to attend more conferences and 
   obtain more training and personal development.  They should be using 
   more email and Internet resources (systematically).

   There should be more use of presentation technology; expand technology
   in our classrooms.

   We need to get more students up to speed with email and continue 
   offering basic email training, though it will be important to consider
   our ability to provide adequate support for this increase of usage.

   Other basic technological functions would include word processing and 
   using Internet resources such as the Web.

   We should remove the obstacles to the use of information technology in
   instruction.


3. Information Technology Literacy:

   Though this may not be a high priority in the immediate future, this is 
   an area Peter is very interested in and it addresses a major problem.  
   This should continue to be considered in our planning and should be 
   long-term priority.


4. Involvement with SUNY-wide activities:

   This is somewhat like public service.  On-campus issues should take
   precedence.  We should each be careful not to become overcommitted, but
   that aside, Peter feels that any legitimate SUNY business-related travel
   should be reimbursed.  It is an important component of professional 
   development to be involved in these activities, although it must be 
   balanced with needs here.   We must each decide for ourselves what we 
   can get involved in, and Potsdam work should be higher priority than 
   outside work (other factors being equal).


5. Collaboration with other schools:

   It there is time, interest and a clear benefit to the College, we should
   continue pursuing this.  There are no specific plans for projects with
   Canton College at this time.


6. Distance Learning Technology

   We should continue to monitor activity here and stay abreast of the
   technology involved.

   We should stay involved with the BOCES project and remain aware of what
   Oswego is doing.


7.  Destkop Strategy:

   We should adopt a system life-cycle for our desktop resources.  We need
   to plan for funding needed to purchase computers as part of a life-cyle
   approach.  Relying upon lapsing funds to pruchase computers (especially
   faculty computers) is not a prudent strategy since these funds may "dry
   up as budgets get tighter.

   We should articulate our desktop strategy but it does not necessarily
   have to be subject to campus debate.  We should continue to talk about 
   this more with Peter.