SIS Academic Liaison Group Advisory Committee Level 1 Meeting Minutes (flat text conversion by JGK) February 3, 2004, 10:00 a.m. Members: Chris Roberts. Hospitality & Tourism Management, Committee Chair Elizabeth Pyle, Registrar Rosio Alvarez, OIT (represented by Heidi Dollard) Richard Rogers, Resource Economics & Provost's Office Bruce Byers, Biology Wendy Matys, Sociology & Political Science Claire Christopherson, Computer Science Deb Picking, Plant and Soil Sciences Howard Stidham, Chemistry (10:15 a.m. arrival) Minutes from 12/16/03 meeting were not yet available. Elizabeth Pyle recounted "minutes" of last meeting from recollection including item regarding status of SIS Level II. John Dubach (OIT) was to have followed-up this item with a report at today's meeting. Heidi Dollard had no information to present from John on this item. Heidi indicated that she had forwarded to John a spreadsheet of OIT's SPIRE/SIS issues, but Chris Roberts (Chair) noted that this had not been made available to the committee. Elizabeth brought forward several issues for committee discussion. Report on Continuous Registration Elizabeth asked for feedback from the committee on the effects of continuous registration. The only initial concern was that students might postpone their enrollment, and based upon "preregistration" enrollment figures, this appears not to have happened. System activity was seen throughout December and January, but at very low levels. Comments were made by several members that students are generally not aware that the campus is now operating in a continuous registration mode. It was acknowledged that this awareness may take time to permeate. Looking ahead to Fall 2004 registration: after system opens in April it will go off- line for New Students Program (NSP) from early June to midJuly, and then reopen in "early" August for continuation of "continuous" enrollment. Report on System Upgrade Heidi was asked to comment on the upcoming PeopleSoft Version8.0 upgrade. Heidi noted that the conversion will occur in late March, with the existing system being shut down on March 26th with planned activation of the new system no later than April 2nd. There were comments that this timetable will bring us very close to the onset of Fall registration. It was noted that this time slot was selected from only two possible calendar windows. Other time slots were not possible due largely to the needs of the Financial Aid Office to access the student data base throughout the month of March. OIT is still working on portal appearance and security issues related to the upgrade. Heidi noted that invitations will be going out shortly for training sessions to be held during March. There will be drop-in practice sessions offered at OIT during the week of March 29th using a practice data base while the actual SIS data base is shut down. Elizabeth mentioned the new "roles" available with the upgrade. The Instructor's role is to remain largely unchanged with no additional training required. There will be a new Advisor role available. Staff roles will reevaluated with more specificity as to functionality and access required. SPIRE "B" users should have the same access as they currently do, but SPIRE "A" users will be reevaluated with several people reassigned to the new Advisor role, as appropriate. Functionality will be restored to the Deans' level for many items lost from the Legacy system under the original PeopleSoft product, including the ability to increase credit limits. Milestone tracking will also be available for those with graduate school access. More on the Advisor Role: data entry is required to link specific students with an advisor. Bruce Byers commented that large departments may not use this function because of the front-loading time needed for this linkage. Elizabeth noted that the registrar's office and OIT may be able to provide assistance with front-loading if data match identification numbers are provided by a department electronically. Communicating with Departments Clare Christopherson voiced frustration at the department level (from heads and staff) regarding their wish to be more involved in the decision making process for SIS changes affecting department staffing. Recognizing that input in the decision-making process may not be possible, it was emphasized that departments need to be better informed of changes in the SIS product/services before they are implemented so that they can better plan for staffing changes and/or duty revisions at the department level. Bruce reiterated his personal dissatisfaction that departments have lost their access to data with the PeopleSoft product, thereby making jobs more difficult. He also concurred with Clare that departments need to be informed of pending changes before they are implemented. With respect to the upcoming conversion, Elizabeth asked if departments would find it useful to have a list of their staff and their "new" security/access levels. Clare commented that it would be more useful for department heads actually to understand how upcoming changes might affect their staff's duties. Heidi pointed out that while OIT can broadcast upcoming changes in a general sense, they cannot predict the impact that the changes will have on an individual staff member or department. Bruce interjected that it is not necessary for OIT to do any "more" than it is doing, rather that the campus discussion (and perhaps the SIS Level I discussion) needs to occur sooner so that everyone can brainstorm about how the changes can be anticipated and any negative impact lessened. Clare noted that in some departments the people making staffing decisions are not included in the SIS information stream, rather this type of information is often filtered upwards from the lowest clerical staff, and this occurrence tends to be disruptive. The question was raised then as how best to communicate with department heads about SIS changes. Bruce suggested that a letter be circulated from the Registrar's and Provost's Offices that informed heads of upcoming changes to better allow them to prepare for any impact to staffing needs/duties. Grading Elizabeth commented that changes are being instituted to the university grading scheme (using the +/- scale) starting in either Fall 2004 or Spring 2005. Work is still be done to determine what "equivalents" will be used to equate with the current scheme. On-line grade submission: Time-out function on SPIRE has been extended to 40 minutes (instead of 20 minutes). Comments were made that people need to know that simply entering grades is not recognized as "interacting" with the system to prevent a time-out from occurring. Interaction does occur, however, when the "save" button is hit. Comment raised that the "approved" roster submission statement, which is displayed after grades have been submitted, needs to be BOLDED or otherwise highlighted. Bruce suggested that a pop-up "help" be added to assist faculty/staff when questions arise during the on-line grade posting/submission process. Graded course section: Elizabeth noted that it is possible to have the graded component of a large enrollment course be designated as the discussion or lab section (as opposed to the lecture section as we currently have). This would help some large enrollment courses manage their on-line grade entry more easily. However, there is a concern that this would create more confusion during the registration/enrollment process, because the lecture section would then become the "related" course component, and students would have to register for the lab/discussion first and then select the lecture in Step #2 of the enrollment process. This sequencing is counter-intuitive, and there is concern that more confusion would result. Wendy Matys asked whether TAs that were listed as instructors for individual discussions and labs could automatically be listed in association with the lecture component (thereby allowing them access to the on-line grade functionality). Elizabeth said this was not possible to do automatically, but noted that departments could certainly list TAs under multiple sections/components of a course. Independent Study Grading Elizabeth asked the committee's opinion on possible grading options for independent study courses under the Version8.0 upgrade. She noted that two plans are needed: one for this May (since we will be upgrading to 8.0 midsemester), and one for the summer and beyond. One option is to keep the grading set-up the same as it is now, with departments keeping track of sponsoring faculty members, collecting grades from the various instructors, and then submitting them under one course number after an administrative/faculty sign-off. With Version 8.0, it is possible to link students directly with an individual faculty member's name, although the sponsoring faculty member will not be able to submit the student's grade on-line. (It is not possible to give multiple instructors access to the same independent study course grade roster - unless all faculty members are individually listed by the department as instructors of record for the course and thereby linked with the roster. It was acknowledged that this task is too onerous for most departments to undertake.) There was a general consensus that simply having SPIRE ask for and record the name of the sponsoring faculty member would be an improvement over the current system. Departments will still need to coordinate the collection and submission of grades for these courses even after Version 8.0 is in place. Elizabeth reiterated that she wants a faculty member to be responsible for all grades, whether the data entry is completed by staff or not. Clare mentioned that system security is someone laughable at this point, as many faculty members provide their access information to staff and TAs to enter and submit grades for them. Bruce noted that many independent studies are registered as "late adds" and that the registrar's course change form needs to include a space for information linking a faculty member's name to the independent study. Elizabeth said that she would check to see whether Version 8.0 would "force" a faculty link for successful enrollment in an independent study, or whether it was merely an option that departments could use when and as they wished. Uploading grades Heidi commented that WebCT uploading of grades to SPIRE is coming very soon. Training would be required. The uploading process would occur over-night and then the faculty member of record would "post/approve" the roster. Comments were made that staff would likely be responsible for the posting of these grades. Discussion ensued about this practice as a security issue. Clare suggested that the registrar's office should provide options for grade submission and then let the departments manage themselves and determine what method works best for them. Communicating with Departments (revisited) Heidi mentioned that she is planning to email a time-line regarding the upcoming SPIRE/SIS changes to Deans, Department Heads, Department Reps, and Schedule Reps. She questioned the group whether this list was appropriate. Committee agreed that all should be contacted. Next Meeting Next meeting scheduled for Tuesday, March 2nd. Group will meet in OIT Lederle Low-rise Room A202 (accessible from the N. Pleasant Street corridor) so that we can preview the latest version of the SPIRE upgrade package. Goal set for upcoming meeting: to determine what else would be useful for faculty/departments to know about the changes prior to actual conversion. Heidi said that she would circulate the URL for the practice website prior to the meeting so that members could access it and come with questions and/or suggestions. Heidi was asked by Chris to follow-up with John Dubach about the status of the proposed SIS Level II web/email interface as well as about obtaining a copy of OIT's SIS priority spreadsheet list. Meeting adjourned at approximately 11:40 a.m. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Meeting minutes submitted by Deb Picking.