CCFIT > Calendar & Minutes > 1998-2003 Minutes > June 3, 2002 AdC3 Minutes

Agenda

1. Approval of Minutes
2. Announcements
3. Report on Data Administration
4. Enterprise Directory Services, Pre-Feasibility Report Review

Minutes

Excused/Absent: Mike Allred, Mary Duthie, Bob Franks, Janet Hamilton, Barry Klein, Celeste Rose, Dave Shelby, Kathi Sylva, and Keith Young.

Guests: Sandra Stewart.

Staff to the Councils: Randy Moory, Julie Saylor, and Babette Schmitt.

I. Approval of Minutes

Chair Smiley asked the Council for edits and amendments to the minutes from the May meeting. Council approved the minutes as submitted.

Chair Smiley announced that there is a time conflict in his schedule with the July and August meetings. He suggested finding a substitute chair for these meetings or attempting to reschedule to other times.

Vice Provost Bruno announced the transfer of the Data Administration staff and responsibilities from Resource Management and Planning to Information and Educational Technology. John Bruno indicated that he has been working with Vice Chancellor Meyer and Director Zubov to finalize this transfer by July 1, 2002. He noted that the Data Administration group already has a history of working with IET as the two units have been collaborating for a few years now on such activities as the formulation of standards and access policies for institutional data, and the development of the pilot data warehouse.

Given IET's oversight responsibility for campuswide technology planning and for major administrative systems where much of the data reside, Vice Chancellor Meyer and Vice Provost Bruno agreed that the Data Administration group would be better served by being integrated into IET. This new organizational affiliation is expected to result in greater coordination, more efficient planning, and the ability to provide more consistent, accurate, and useful data to meet the strategic and management needs at all levels of the campus administration.

John Bruno outlined the functions that this transfer would involve, as follows:

• The policy development function that has primarily been associated with the development of the Access to Institutional Data policy,
• The development of data naming and metadata standards, and
• The pilot data warehouse project.

John Bruno indicated that the one-time funding for the data warehouse pilot project was running out. Campus administrators, however, have not identified the data warehouse project as a high priority for campus technology budget allocation. Bruno reported that there are a number of users who rely on the data warehouse for institutional data, including some in academic departments, deans' offices, and the Office of Student Affairs. Over time, these users have grown dependent on tools and data in the data warehouse for planning, auditing, and report-generating purposes. Bruno reported that the campus will need to address these dependencies and provide for them until long-term plans can be developed. Bruno indicated that he would seek funding from the campus to continue support for the pilot project only through December, 2003 so as to give the campus sufficient time to assess the dependencies and make all necessary adjustments.

Council commented about why pilot projects become commitments by the campus. Council suggested when a pilot project commences, users be notified on a regular basis that the project is a pilot and has a projected ending date. Vice Chancellor Meyer remarked that campus has learned many lessons from this project. It is important that we begin the evaluation of the project early and continue to inform the users that the project will end.

Council asked about the transfer of the different functions within the Data Administration group. John Bruno replied that the policy and standards functions would probably remain in the Vice Provost's office. The transfer of the responsibility for the data warehouse itself has not yet been finalized.

Council asked about how the deans and department offices have been using the data warehouse. Bruno replied that they were accessing student data (such as student progress and class information) and producing custom reports (e.g., course enrollment, GPA summaries, and student outcomes). These users find it easier to use the data warehouse than Banner.

Council questioned the need for 1.5 years of campus funding to support the data warehouse needs assessment. Vice Provost Bruno replied that the process might not take as long, but identifying and providing appropriate alternatives to current data warehouse users could take some time. Council requested that Bruno present his formal request to Council in the Fall.

Vice Provost Bruno provided a brief update (since the presentation at the previous meeting) on the enterprise directory services implementation project. Bruno reported that the first year of the project will focus on the development of the person registry for the campus so unique individual identifiers can be shared across systems. The project team will work to implement a common authoritative identity for all Tier 1 and 2 systems. This is critical for assessing campus information assets and to meet future and more complex reporting requirements imposed by legislative and regulatory authorities. Bruno also commented that the establishment of a common authoritative identity is a security issue. As the campus expands its common authentication environment, it is critical that individuals be assigned the proper authorities and roles. Bruno also reported that California School Information Services has initiated a registry project to establish a common identity for all California K-12 students. He commented that this group has already examined some of the same issues facing our campus. The Enterprise Directory Project Team has been in contact with the CSIS team.

Bruno then reported on the Enterprise Directory project team's efforts to date. He noted the following progress:

• Coordination efforts have been initiated with a team working on a UC-wide directory project.
• The team is identifying administrative systems that will be considered for the initial iteration of the registry project. Systems under consideration include the Student Information System, the Payroll Personnel System, and possibly the Library Information System.
• The team is documenting the attributes used in the administrative systems for identity matching. The processes being evaluated are those that create new persons and match existing records. The algorithms that the systems use for matching purposes are also being documented.
• Information and Educational Technology (IET) has established a core project team led by Sandra Stewart and Randy Moory. The project plan proposes the addition of a new programmer to the core team.
• IET provides oversight for the project.
• A customer advisory team will be developed as the project proceeds.

Bruno indicated he'll be requesting campus funds of approximately $116, 000 to support this project.

Council members commented about the effort necessary to integrate a distributed computing environment. One member noted that, several years ago, like other campuses, UC Davis followed the Gartner Group recommendation to move from a mainframe central computing environment to a distributed model. Now the middleware infrastructure necessary to integrate that distributed environment must be built. Bruno replied that this was true, but the distributed model presents the advantage of moving computing closer to the user. Now one of the main issues we're facing is how best to coordinate our distributed environment.

Council asked about the budget request. Bruno replied he would be submitting a request to the Provost when it is finalized.