Annual ReportInformation Services & Technology

Pepperdine University, Malibu, California

2009

Brian Aasen

J.J. Akilu

Terence Anderson

Dianne Asis

James Ballcchino

Felix Baronikian

Tom Bashara

Tim Bodden

Scott Bolan

Brian Bowen

Matthew Bush

Ross Canning

Kim Cary

Omar Cayasso

Jennifer Cha

Lotte Cherin

Lance Coert

Anthony Cortez

Ted De Guzman

Ory De La Rosa

Rebekah Dillingham

Jason Eggleston

Sean Fife

John Figueroa

Gerard Flynn

Brian Fujitani

Danna Gianforte

Mark Giglione

John Gladwin

Jose Hernandez

Dave Holden

Dana Hoover

Jerry Hoover

Thomas Hoover

John Horton

Joel Howard

Peter Kain

Zorinan Kasilag

Hong Kha

Ryan Kim

Henry Lai

Luis Lara

Ernie Lauer

Tom Layman

Shu Chi Liou

David Lockett

Christopher Low

JoAnn McNayr

Rene Mendez

Joe Munoz

Ken Noone

Raphael Norton

Jackie Paicius

Dennis Papenhausen

Nirali Patel

Kevin Phan

Carter Quinn

John Quinn

Hector Ramirez

Alan Regan

Novita Rogers

Tim Rogers

Erik Rush

Rita Schnepp

Jonathan See

Evan Shanks

Prakash Sharma

Bronson Somerville

Ronn Stinson

Vic Suphasiri

Robert Telmar

Cesar Uribe

John Vannoy

Martin Vazquez

Sara Voeks

Micheal Waitley

Ronit Weiss

Michael Weng

Lynn White

University PartnersJoy Asamen

Phillip Bohl

Lauren Cosentino

Janet Davis

Robert deMayo

Michael Dula

Stella Erbes

Michael Feltner

Constance Fulmer

Deborah Galuhn

Susan Gautsch

Eric Hamilton

Susan Imholz

Connie James

Sheryl Kelo

John Kim

Hung Le

Mark Mallinger

Matthew Midura

Bob McQuaid

John Mooney

Cindy Morgan

Maire Mullins

Linda Polin

Margaret Riel

Susan Salas

Shelley Saxer

Michael Shires

David Smith

Michael Stamper

Brian Thomason

Phil Thomason

Linda Wallace

Michael Williams

ContributorsINFORMATION TECHNOLOGY DIVISION EMPLOYEES

ImageThis report chronicles the achievements of Pepperdine University faculty and staff in their use of technology over the past year. In highlighting these individuals, we draw attention to our belief that technology is a means, not an end.

Over the past year, we continued to reorient Information Technology to focus on the people we serve and their use of technology to work collaboratively, solve problems, and expand the capacity of the University’s academic and administrative services. Each individual highlighted in this report is a leader in this area. Because of their foresight and hard work over the past year, student services were enhanced and the quality of the academic experience strengthened.

The past year was also a time that required us to set priorities and make difficult decisions. We carefully reviewed our hiring, retention, and professional development practices to ensure that staff members have the right competencies to be successful in their roles supporting the University community. We renegotiated every contract for software, hardware, and maintenance and through competitive bidding we were able to reduce expenses without reducing the quality or quantity of our services. In addition to this work, we focused earnestly on our most important initiatives: supporting technology and learning, extending the reach of the PeopleSoft applications, and ensuring that the network infrastructure meets the ever-growing needs of our community.

The employees in Information Technology, along with our colleagues and partners throughout the University, are the reasons for our success. It’s with their dedication, service, and support that the individuals highlighted in this report were able to achieve their aspirations.

This is a different kind of report. Instead of talking about the nuts and bolts of technology, we have deliberately chosen to feature stories of Pepperdine University faculty and staff who use technology services to realize their academic and administrative goals. As technologists, we support them in their use of technology; it is their success that truly matters. The business of delivering and supporting technology is not about information, or technology – it’s about the faculty, students, and staff who depend on us each day.

Dr. Timothy M. ChesterVice Provost and Chief Information Officer

"The podcasts get them pumped up."

-Susan Salas

The first time a student hears Professor Susan Salas's voice pouring out of their headphones, they can't help but settle in and listen closely.

"I want my students to feel like they were sitting across the table from me when they hear my podcasts," said the associate professor of telecommunications and director of broadcasting at Pepperdine University.

Unsurprisingly, her course lectures are among the most popular downloads from Pepperdine's iTunes U website.

When Salas initially heard of podcasts she was curious enough to visit the first few universities that posted content in iTunes U. After listening to a few recorded lectures, most with inconsistent audio capture and quality, Salas realized that she wanted to do something very different.

Knowing that her students would be listening to the lectures with sound coming directly into their ears, she set out to create the best experience possible: a clear, consistent audio recording that would be as engaging as a face-to-face discussion.

To do this, she recorded her lectures on a DJ microphone in a sound booth, thinking and speaking as if she was having a dialogue with one student.

To add the spontaneity and casual flow of a real conversation, Salas used bullet points to guide her thoughts instead of a script. She also made a conscious

choice not to edit her lectures. The impact on her students has been powerful.

“They feel like they know me,” said Salas, “because I’m sharing something that I am so passionate about.”

Before she started podcasting, she was warned that her attendance would drop. "That hasn't been the case at all," said Salas. Her lectures and course materials build on the content in the podcast, in fact, students are required to listen to them before they attend class.

"Everyone in class can tell when one student hasn't listened to the assigned podcast, that student has no idea what they are doing," said Salas, "and they let their group down."

Salas noted that her students often arrive to class talking about what they learned in the podcast that week.

"The podcasts get them pumped up. They challenge me on stuff," said Salas.

Salas's goal was not only to relay content in a familiar environment for her students, but also to spark their curiosity. "I set them up to be curious, to want to learn more," Salas said, "and it's working!"

Professor Susan Salas shares her thoughts, secrets for success, and triumphs as the creator of some of the most popular educational podcasts at Pepperdine University.

“They feel like they know me, because I’m

sharing something that I am so

passionate about.”- Susan Salas

Since summer 2009, Michael Williams, assistant professor of information systems at the Graziado School of Business and Management (GSBM), has become a devoted advocate of Pepperdine University's newest learning management system, Sakai.

"As a faculty member, you should expect to use a tool that saves you time, serves all your course needs, and is easy to use,” said Williams. “Sakai is that tool."

Learning management systems serve an important mission at most universities. At a minimum it helps faculty organize and distribute course materials to students, but beyond that it is often used as a place to collaborate and share information outside of class.

Williams is using Sakai for coursework and committee work this fall, but he noted that not all systems are created equal.

"Sakai was created by educators for educators,” he said. “It does everything I want and requires 40 percent less labor than other learning management systems."

Williams saves time by using a Sakai feature called "Post'Em," which allows him to batch download student assignments, grade them offline, and then batch upload them directly to students' personal folders inside Sakai.

"As a faculty member, it's simply easier for me to work this way. I don't have to lug around papers, I can access and grade papers from anywhere without having to bring

them with me," said Williams. "This system also provides more timely feedback to students, they have their homework grades immediately."

When speaking about the added benefits of Sakai, Williams remarked, "We manage our lives online, why not our courses?"

Beyond serving as a web space for course management, Sakai encourages less printing and emailing by providing students with a one-stop-shop for all of their course materials online anytime, anywhere. It allows faculty to post

their syllabus and reading materials and to activate tools that allow them to collect student work, distribute assignments, and post grades.

They can also activate several Web 2.0 tools such as blogs, wikis, and podcasts, giving students the opportunity to learn these tools while they are learning the subject content.

Sakai is available to every faculty member at Pepperdine University. Support and workshops are available through Pepperdine IT's Technology and Learning group at http://services.pepperdine.edu/techlearn/.

As a faculty member who is well versed in the value of labor and capital, Michael Williams saves time and energy in his daily life by using Sakai for course management.

“Sakai was created by

educators for educators.”

- Michael Williams

"As a faculty member, you should expect to use a tool that saves you time, serves all your course needs, and is easy to use.”

- Michanel Williams

As early as 2006, Duane and Kelly Roberts Dean and Professor of Law Kenneth W. Starr began podcasting select lectures and events, using TWEN, the School of Law’s learning management system. Today, the School hosts the largest number of tracks on Pepperdine's iTunes U site.

"Podcasts create additional opportunities for the 'Aha!' moments," said Starr.

While the choice to begin recording lectures was not intuitive for Starr, he was inspired by fellow colleagues and began recording his large lecture classes. Starr’s recordings and other audio, video, and enhanced media files created from lectures are broadcast through platforms like iTunes U and learning management systems such as Sakai, Blackboard, and TWEN.

When media files are broadcasted, they become known as podcasts, which is the concatenation of the words "iPod" and "broadcast."

Starr was further encouraged to record lectures because of the student response. Many students use podcasts of course lectures as a valuable study and review resource.

"Law is solitary - you have to do it alone," said Starr. "It's important to provide students with materials that engage them in learning outside the classroom."

The law section of Pepperdine's iTunes U site contains frequent audio recordings of lectures from School of Law faculty members, such as Gregory Ogden and Grant Nelson, as well as recordings from School of Law events with popular speakers such as Supreme Court Justices Antonin Scalia and Samuel A. Alito.

iTunes U serves as a world-wide, online repository for free, education-related content that can be easily downloaded to a desktop media player or to a portable device such as an iPod or iPhone.

On the Pepperdine iTunes U site, podcasts of lectures and events can be kept private for the University community or made public. Features, such as content privacy, are left to the discretion of the faculty member or content creator.

Starr noted that the School of Law Information Technology staff makes podcasting easy.

"All I have to do is remember to turn it on," said Starr. "Ease of use is a huge motivating factor when it comes to actually making the recordings."

To learn more about podcasting and its use in education, contact the Technology and Learning group at http://services.pepperdine.edu/techlearn/.

Dean Kenneth Starr explains how he became involved in podcasting and talks about the value of podcasting in law education at Pepperdine University.

"Podcasts create additional opportunities for the 'Aha!' moments."

- Kenneth Starr

As chair of the Fine Arts Division and associate professor of theater at Pepperdine University, Cathy Thomas-Grant's office serves as a hub of student activity and connectivity. So, when it came time to plan her biennial student summer trip to Edinburgh, Thomas-Grant sought out technology as a means to preserve a sense of community and connectivity among her students who were home for the summer.

Using a wiki, Thomas-Grant was able to engage her students and prepare them for several weeks of non-stop rehearsals and performances. A wiki is a collaborative website that allows multiple users to create and edit pages, add content, and share resources.

"With nearly 30 students in different states around the U.S., and very little rehearsal time once we arrived in Edinburgh, I had to find a way to prepare the actors and the crew for our productions. A wiki worked perfectly," said Thomas-Grant.

Thomas-Grant set up her wiki to contain subsections on music, production, research, dialects, and cast lists for the productions.

"Everything you can think of, we added to the wiki: sheet music for download, images of props, a calendar of events...it was all in one place," said Thomas-Grant. Even the London-based music director was able to connect via the wiki.

According to Thomas-Grant, the subsection on dialects was one of the most useful resources in the wiki. "Many parts required a strong Kentucky or Cherokee dialect, which was difficult for students to master," said Thomas-Grant.

In the wiki students were given helpful hints for speaking, links to YouTube videos, and a series of audio files to listen to and repeat. The students also added their own research to the wiki, sharing resources and information with their classmates.

"Because of the wiki, the students were better prepared when they arrived and they took these productions much further,” Thomas-Grant said. "The wiki site was a big step

forward for me. It was a load off."

To learn more about using a wiki to extend learning outside the classroom contact Pepperdine IT's Technology and Learning group at http://services.pepperdine.edu/techlearn/.

Cathy Thomas-Grant knows how to direct a successful production company on campus, but what happens when the production is on foreign shores? Thomas-Grant turned toward technology to maintain students’ momentum and motivation.

“The wiki was a big

step forward for me.”

- Cathy Thomas-Grant

Everything you can think of we added to the wiki: sheet music for download, images of props, a calendar

of events...it was all in one place.”

- Cathy Thomas-Grant

Professor Christopher Heard is rarely seen on campus without his laptop, so it came as no surprise when he told his students they would not need to buy a textbook for his fall semester course.

"A learning management system allows instructors to post and organize course materials online," said Heard, "It allows me the freedom to focus on the content that I want to give my students."

Heard started using Blackboard nine years ago, before he arrived at Pepperdine. He was drawn to the learning management system because of its ability to serve as a central location for course management and materials. In the beginning, Heard used the system simply to post grades online for students, but over time he found himself using the quizzes and documents sections, and finally, using it as a mechanism to deliver supplemental textbook-like content online.

Heard used Blackboard to set up learning units and placed materials into folders that matched the units. The first page of the learning unit contained a preview, then a bullet point list of reading materials, and at the end of the list there was a quiz.

By posting a short quiz every week, Heard was able to gauge his students' understanding of the material and determine if extra time needed to be spent on a concept or subject area. In turn, his students were grateful for the instant feedback on quiz results.

In addition to posting course materials online, Professor Heard also encouraged use of the discussion board. On the discussion board, students can link to external

websites or to materials that had been added to the document section of Blackboard.

"Using the discussion board well takes time and dedication on behalf of the instructor,” noted Heard. “It's important to engage in the discussion with the students.”

"The best feature of Blackboard is its ability to organize content. The online resources allow me to focus on what we really need for class.”

Heard found that his students quickly adapted to the system, and appreciated not having to purchase a textbook for the course.

Blackboard is available to all faculty members at Pepperdine University. To learn more about Blackboard contact Pepperdine IT's Technology and Learning group at http://services.pepperdine.edu/techlearn/.

Professor Chris Heard explains the value behind using a learning management system such as Blackboard and talks about why he uses it to teach at Pepperdine University.

"The best feature of Blackboard is its ability to organize content. The online

resources allow me to focus on what we

really need for class.”- Chris Heard

As the dean of the Graduate School of Education and Psychology at Pepperdine University, Margaret Weber not only leads her faculty and students in educational excellence, but she also leads in technology innovation.

Like many graduate school faculty, Weber advises, mentors, and collaborates with doctoral students on research papers.

"With all the documents emailed back and forth, everyone had their own system for organizing materials,” said Weber. “We needed to find a way to bring it all together in one place."

At first, Weber decided to try using a wiki. However, it soon became clear to her team that while a wiki can be an excellent tool for drafting papers and tracking edits, it was not ideal for compiling and organizing documents that already exist in PDF, Microsoft Word, and Microsoft Excel format; such as white papers, institutional review board documents, and other research materials.

In June 2009, Weber decided to try Google Apps, which had just been introduced by Pepperdine IT.

Google Docs, one of the many Google Apps available to Pepperdine's faculty and students, provides users with traditional folder creation and document organization,

while still allowing users to share and draft materials in one common, online space.

Google Docs proved to be the ideal solution for Weber's team. Together with her students, she created folders for literature reviews, data analysis, and research protocols, while drafting sections of a research paper. Weber was also able to create a folder of documents on research methodologies that applies to all students regardless of

their research area.

"One of the most powerful features of Google Docs is the ability to synchronously edit the same document from anywhere, anytime, and to have those edits highlighted in different colors to show individual contributions in perpetuity," said Weber. "However, it is the document organization features that make this tool perfect for research."

Google Docs is a powerful tool for collaborative editing, group work, journaling, and reflective papers. It comes fully integrated

with the Pepperdine's single sign on system, which allows faculty and students alike to use their Pepperdine NetworkID and password to access the system.

To learn more about using Google Docs to collaborate with students or colleagues, contact Pepperdine IT's Technology and Learning group at http://services.pepperdine.edu/techlearn/.

Margaret Weber speaks about her experience using Google Apps to help organize research materials for herself and her graduate students.

Google Docs is a powerful tool for

collaborative editing, group work,

journaling, and reflective papers.

“PeopleSoft is a very smart

system.” - Hung Le

After a year of using PeopleSoft, Hung Le, associate vice president and university registrar, believes that the system has changed things for the better at Pepperdine University.

The system used prior to the PeopleSoft implementation was functional, but Le admits that it was held together by strings.

"We modified the old system to the nth degree and our business processes were filled with workarounds," he said. "PeopleSoft wasn't just new software. It was an opportunity to look at how we do business."

"We had 100 percent knowledge turnover our first year. The PeopleSoft implementation taught us to think critically about our work, to embrace change and new technology, and ultimately, to discover how we can better serve the Pepperdine community," said Le.

During the implementation, Le and colleagues worked closely with Information Technology staff to maintain both of the systems for nearly eight months until PeopleSoft was fully implemented on August 1, 2008. At the same time, faculty and staff from all five schools collaborated to determine how to best serve students with the new system. A significant portion of the pre-launch collaboration focused on cleaning the legacy data in the conversion process and standardizing the input of future data for the new system.

"PeopleSoft is a very smart system; when you change one thing, it has an affect elsewhere," said Le. "Because of these checks and balances, everyone using the system had to be retrained and much more informed in our business processes."

Le is grateful for the opportunity to use PeopleSoft to better serve students. Besides streamlining business processes, PeopleSoft allows for more integrated online services. For example, using the guest access option students can grant and remove guest access for other individuals who want to see their grades, enrollment, and financial information. It also offers students online billing and allows them to accept or decline financial aid online.

A year after implementation, Le and his staff are still learning and adapting to the PeopleSoft system.

"Our success is dependent on our ability to keep learning and to apply our learning to everything we do," said Le. "I'm grateful for those people University-wide who have stayed engaged in the learning and change process. They have made the biggest difference to the way we serve our students and the rest of the University community."

One year after the PeopleSoft implementation, Hung Le, associate vice president and university registrar, speaks about the learning curve, the opportunities, and the future.

"Our success is dependent on our

ability to keep learning and to apply

our learning to everything we do."

- Hung Le

As director of e-learning and instructor of information systems at the Graziadio School of Business and Management (GSBM), Susan Gautsch is constantly pushing at the boundaries of the classroom to expand the use of online learning spaces and to bring outside influences into the classroom.

A few years ago, Gautsch motivated her colleagues at GSBM to try Elluminate, a web conferencing tool that allows instructors to conduct class online.

"We needed to find an online tool that could empower both students and faculty in real time," said Gautsch.

Some web conferencing tools are unidirectional, but Elluminate allows students to interact with faculty and each other during the session by asking questions, polling, and sharing documents.

Gautsch and a few of her colleagues are currently using Elluminate to teach blended-learning courses; part face-to-face, part online. When students log into Elluminate, they enter a "room" with their professor and fellow classmates. "To keep 25-30 students engaged online at the same time is a challenge in managing energy and engagement," said Gautsch.

Gautsch found that preparing small group activities not only keeps students engaged, but it can also create the opportunity for deeper learning.

During her online sessions, Gautsch often sets up breakout rooms in Elluminate where groups analyze a problem and come to consensus on a solution. As the instructor, she can navigate between the main Elluminate

environment and the breakout rooms to see how discussions are progressing. In the breakout rooms students can use a whiteboard or share applications with their group. Then she brings all the students back into the main room where they discuss what each group did.

"The key is that they collaborate with a specific goal and deliverable," noted Gautsch.

As part of GSBM’s Blended Learning initiative there are a dozen GSBM faculty members teaching in various modalities including online with Elluminate and asynchronously with a wide

array of other learning technologies. Some sessions are conducted multi-site. These classes meet at different campuses such as Irvine and West LA and use high definition videoconferencing and Elluminate to see and share materials with classmates who are meeting on other campuses.

"As the need for face-to-face classroom alternatives rise, tools like Elluminate are helping to support a valuable need at Pepperdine University," said Gautsch.

Elluminate is available to all Pepperdine University faculty members. To learn more or attend a workshop, visit the Technology and Learning website at http://services.pepperdine.edu/techlearn/.

Instructor Susan Gautsch speaks about using Elluminate, a web conferencing system, to teach and interact with business school students at Pepperdine University.

Elluminate allows students to interact

with faculty during the session by asking

questions, polling, and sharing documents.

Type to enter text

In addition to the advancements made in technology and learning, there are several notable accomplishments for the 2008-2009 fiscal year. Service and support have not only increased, but IT introduced smarter, more efficient technologies and services that brought sizable savings and value to the University and its employees.

NCOMPUTING - VIRTUAL COMPUTING AT PEPPERDINE

Facing budget reductions, Information Technology conducted a pilot study to explore virtual computing as a solution to reduce computer costs and power usage. Virtual computing, the replacement of desktop computers with virtual machines, allows multiple users to share one computer (Windows PC), but maintain the functionality and speed as if each user has their own computer. In actuality, each user has a monitor, keyboard, and mouse, all of which are connected to a virtual host computer.

The pilot study for this project was conducted from August 2008 to August 2009. During the pilot, 108 NComputing units were installed in the main student computer lab and in second-floor kiosk on the West Los Angeles campus, as well as in the International Studies and Languages (ISL) computer lab and Sand Bar Café on the Malibu Campus. Software installed on the NComputing units ranges from Microsoft Office 2007 to the statistical program SPSS 16.0.

There is no central computer refresh plan in place at Pepperdine, however, Information Technology’s current recommendation for institutional purchases is the Dell OptiPlex 755 Mini Tower with the 1908FP Monitor, which sells for approximately $1,000. Given this

approximate cost per unit, the implementation savings for 108 NComputing units is $106,653. The annual amount of energy saved by running 108 units is $2,570.

The pilot study showed that a computer running Windows XP could comfortably support 6 users, and a computer running Windows Server 2003 can comfortably support up to 30 users. Student surveys showed that an NComputing unit using Windows Server 2003, which gave students the same Windows XP "look and feel," provided the best computing experience in computer labs and public computing environments.

Pepperdine University is currently using NComputing's L230 in lab environments and the X550 in office cubicle settings. The host machine specifications range from CPU 2.0- 2.4 GHZ, 2-4 GB of RAM, and 80- 360

Notable Accomplishments

Information Technology’s 12-month pilot study proved that virtual computing is more cost and energy efficient than running personal computers without

sacrificing performance.

GB hard drives. IT staff discovered that the L230 is best suited for using Microsoft Office applications and browsing the Internet. The built-in microphone and stereo-out port effectively support the audio/visual needs of the language lab, and the USB port allows students to save their work to a flash drive.

The 12-month study proved that virtual computing is more cost and energy efficient than running personal computers without sacrificing performance. Director of instructional technology, Thomas Hoover, notes that not all labs can be virtualized, however, based on the positive results of the pilot study, IT will use virtual computing to save the University purchasing and administrative costs wherever possible. IT staff is currently working with all five Pepperdine schools and departments to implement virtual computing in their areas.

NOLIJ - IMAGING PLATFORM FOR ELECTRONIC FILES

In October 2008, a new University-wide imaging platform called Nolij (pronounced “knowledge”) replaced the former system, Stellent, at Pepperdine University. Nolij stores electronic images of important documents such as student applications, grades, and tuition information. Using Nolij, these documents are electronically filed, easily retrieved, and preserved.

The transition from Stellent to Nolij saves the University approximately $65,000 per year in annual fees and offers increased functionality and compatibility with existing systems such as PeopleSoft. Users are able to pull and push data into PeopleSoft from within Nolij, creating more efficient and valuable timesaving procedures.

ImplementationDuring the transition to Nolij, over 5.5 million pages and their attached meta data from Stellent were cleaned, combined into full documents, and associated with students, faculty, or staff via their campus wide identification (CWID) numbers. Also, students who were previously indexed by their social security number are now indexed by their CWID, mitigating potential information security risks for the University.

Notably, 55,000 legacy transcripts, dating back to some of the University’s earliest years, were transferred from the Registrar’s archive on the mainframe into Nolij. In addition, over 100,000 microfiche documents were migrated from DVDs into Nolij in order to preserve historic student records.

With the newly added material and the creation of full documents from individually filed pages, Nolij currently contains 3.5 million secure, searchable documents that can be accessed according to set departmental permissions at a moment’s notice. All of the documents and data in Nolij are backed up several times per day on Pepperdine servers, as well as remote servers.

FinanceFor the Finance Department, Nolij offered a sizeable boost to time and productivity. Jeffrey Garza, manager of finance system technology, estimates that the change in business procedures because of Nolij has given the staff 30 percent more time. Staff is no longer losing eight hours per week filing checks, or spending significant time looking for paper documents that were misfiled. Garza noted that a major benefit to using Nolij is that it is almost impossible to misfile a document. All documents are read by the scanner and automatically indexed according to a vendor identification number.

Prior to the implementation of Nolij, Finance scanned approximately 1,000 pages per month. That number has increased to 10-15,000 pages per month and is bound to increase again as the Finance Department begins to scan additional types of documents over the coming year.

AdmissionsThe Seaver Admissions Department has also benefited from the implementation of Nolij by automating the student application checklist. When applicants apply to Pepperdine University, an application checklist is created. Nolij stores the documents that applicants submit and routinely

Nolij stores electronic images of important documents such as student

applications, grades, and tuition information and can be electronically filed, easily retrieved, and preserved.

checks to determine if the application is complete. When the application is complete, Nolij will route it to the appropriate admissions counselor. Then, without leaving the document management system, the counselor can process and add notes to the application. This kind of comprehensive functionality was not available with Stellent and has allowed the Seaver Admissions Department to process applications in a more efficient and timely manner.

Human ResourcesThe Center for Human Resources has just begun to use Nolij to store position descriptions and employee management documents. Carla Anderson-Kohn, associate director of compensation and employment, said that Nolij has been very useful for storing and retrieving nearly 1,300 position descriptions, for which the Center often receives requests. The Center is currently making plans to begin entering all employee data from this point forward into Nolij, and over time, to scan all paper files in the Center’s office.

ANYTIME SUPPORT HELP DESK

In October 2008, the Pepperdine Help Desk was outsourced to SunGard Higher Education to better serve the needs of the Pepperdine community in the U.S. and around the world. With so many students enrolled in graduate-level evening courses and traveling abroad, the new 24/7 operating hours offered much needed technical service support to the Pepperdine community.  According to Jerry Hoover, director of anytime support for Pepperdine IT, there are multiple agents responsible for answering Pepperdine calls. When a Pepperdine constituent calls the Help Desk, renamed the “Anytime Support Desk,” it is evident to the call center that it is a Pepperdine caller because of the phone line on which the call enters the system. In the first 12 months of operation, SunGard answered Pepperdine calls in 55 seconds on average, an improvement over the average of 89 seconds it took for the old Help Desk when it was hosted at Pepperdine. When a call comes in, SunGard verifies the caller’s name and contact information so that a ticket can be created to track the call and the issue.

Following the call, the caller is sent a detailed email acknowledging that the issue has been resolved or reassigned to local IT staff. In the first 12 months, SunGard resolved 77 percent of the issues on the first call compared to 53 percent that were resolved on the first call by the old Help Desk when it was hosted at Pepperdine. IT continues to work closely with SunGard to improve the quality of each call.

ANYTIME STORAGE XYTHOS

HTTP://STORAGE.PEPPERDINE.EDU

In summer 2009, Pepperdine IT released Anywhere Storage, an application that offers one gigabyte of personal, sharable online storage space for Pepperdine faculty, students, and staff.

Xythos, the technology behind Anywhere Storage, makes it possible to securely access and share files from anywhere. Because users access Anywhere Storage via their web browser, it is not necessary to connect to the University’s virtual private network (VPN) to access documents. In addition, a ticket can be created to share files with users who do not have a Pepperdine network account.

Everyday users of Anywhere Storage also have the option to create a virtual Xythos folder on their desktop. The folder allows users save or drag-and-drop files into the folder and have them automatically appear in their Anywhere Storage account online.

MONTHLY NEWS FROM INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY

To learn more about Pepperdine IT’s projects and initiatives as they happen, visit the IT website to read the monthly report from the vice

provost and chief information officer. Reports are available at http://services.pepperdine.edu/it/about/status-reports.htm

Pepperdine University Information Services & Technology24255 Pacific Coast HighwayMalibu, California 90263-4173

T 310-506-4173F 310-506-4353http://services.pepperdine.edu/it