Three information technology governance councils have reviewed and revised the University’s previous Flagship IT Strategy from 2006 to create FITS 2011.
The strategies are guidelines for Information Technology Services to follow when looking to change, update or gain new technology around the University.
The FITS 2011 document says it is a new strategy that aims to continue what was started in the previous version and instate new goals for upcoming years.
One of the new recommendations describes a need to change the University’s information systems. Action Item 8.01 explains the need to replace the mainframe system, which is currently written in a programming language that has become obsolete. When this change is made, students will notice a difference in the interface when performing tasks like class registration.
“This affects bits and pieces of business and student processes,” said Sheri Thompson, IT planning and communications officer. “Some are automated and some are not automated through the current mainframe system. In the end, we hope they will all be automated.”
The updated FITS also calls for further work toward course content capturing. Students would be allowed to enroll in classes beyond normal capacity by making all class materials available digitally.
Though plans for this idea are not yet concrete, the belief is if a class could normally hold a set number of people, a class utilizing course content capturing could have sizably more people enrolled by allowing students to access the class online. The plan would give a class remote accessibility for people who would not be able to physically reach or fit into a classroom.
FITS 2011 is broken down into recommendations and action items, which outline and explain the goals IT plans to achieve, including unrealized points from FITS 2006, plans that need further effort and new ideas for the advancement of technology on campus.
Thompson said a new version was needed to cope with the changes made in technology in the past five years.
“As things come up, we ask, ‘How will this fit into FITS?’ All of our actions in IT are guided by this document,” Thompson said.
 
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Contact Morgan Searles at [email protected]