Faculty and Academic Staff Handbook
19th Edition, 2008
Chapter VIII - Academic Standards, Procedures and Policies
8.9 Information Technology
Information Technology Services provides the campus community with information
technology to support effective teaching, learning, and administrative functions. A
summary of services is provided below; check the web page,
http://its.uwrf.edu/
for
ongoing updates.
8.9.1 Organization and Staffing
Information technology services at UW River Falls campus are organized into two
primary groups. The Information Technology Services (ITS) department provides IT
support for the main campus while the Student Affairs IT group provides IT support for
the Student Affairs administrative offices and the residence hall students. Beyond these
two primary support areas, several administrative and academic departments have staff
within their areas that provide support exclusively to their area. These include Library
Automation, Career Services, Facilities Management and the College of Education and
Professional Studies Educational Technology Center.
ITS is under the direction of the campus Chief Information Officer. The CIO reports to
the Vice Chancellor for Administration and Finance. There are 28 full-time technical
staff within ITS and 1.5 FTE of Program Assistants. Student Affairs IT is under the
direction of a manager who reports to the Director of Auxiliary Budgets and Contracts.
This Director reports to the Associate Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs who, in turn,
reports to the Vice Chancellor for Administration and Finance. There are 5 technical
staff, including the manager, and one program assistant.
Both ITS and Student Affairs IT utilize a substantial number of student workers to
augment their workforce.
8.9.2 Information Technology Services
8.9.2.1 Network Services
Network Services is responsible for the management of the campus network and the
services and servers provided to utilize it. Supported services include shared file and print
services, web services, email, and centralized databases.
8.9.2.2 Computer Support Services
Computer Support Services provides hardware and software support to instructional
computer labs and Technology Enhanced Classrooms (TECs), providing a stable
computing environment for instruction and student projects. Computer Support Services
supports students, faculty and staff in the effective use of hardware, software, network
and information services to achieve their academic and professional goals. The HelpDesk
student workers and student technicians work in conjunction with fulltime staff to
provide phone, email and in-person assistance. Computer Support Services also conducts
various workshops on topics such as email, calendar, file management, web development,
Desire2Learn, and “How To” for TECs.
8.9.2.3 Information Systems
Information Systems is charged with providing all aspects of analysis, design,
programming, implementation, database administration, operations and information
system software support for campus information systems. One of their primary
responsibilities is maintaining, upgrading and enhancing the Oracle/PeopleSoft student
information system known locally as eSIS.
8.9.2.4 Electronic Repair
Electronic repair is charged with design, installation, maintenance and support of the
physical infrastructure pertaining to the electronic transportation of information within
and connected to the UW-River Falls campus. Electronic Repair is responsible for the
physical installation and maintenance of telephone and data wiring as well as telephonerelated
equipment. The unit also maintains audio-visual equipment of all types on
campus, including classroom equipment.
8.9.2.5 Television Services
Television Services supports distance learning classrooms, satellite downlinks, two cable
channels, event production, equipment checkout, duplication services, editing, and repairs
of equipment. The unit also provides support to academic programs that utilize the
television studio as a teaching facility.
8.9.3 Student Affairs IT
Student Affairs includes student life programming, residential living, health and
counseling services, multicultural affairs, conference services, involvement center,
student life facilities, budgets, contracts, day care, intramurals, field house and ice arena.
Student Affairs is the liaison with contractors such as the bookstore, food service
operations, vending, laundry and the Kansas City Chiefs summer camp. A majority of the
funding for this IT operation comes from user fees and revenue generated within the
dining, housing and student center operations; some areas are GPR supported.
8.9.3.1 Student Affairs Administration
Student Affairs IT staff support the software and web development needs of the
department, developing in-house software and integrating third-party applications. The
staff also supports the enterprise management system, Supermarket, used to manage
residential and food services, the card office and door access systems.
8.9.3.2 FredNet
FredNet (a morph of the mascot Freddy Falcon and ResNet) is tasked with supporting the
2,450 students living on campus. FredNet provides 100 Mb Ethernet service to each
student, television service offering 30 channels including a movie channel managed by
the department, and telephone services. FredNet also provides technical assistance with
computers, telephones and television equipment owned by students through in-room
support. Small computer labs are provided in each residence hall. FredNet provides a
help desk function to assist residence hall students with campus wide applications such as
e-mail, web, student file storage and online course learning. (Note: Because residence
hall fees support FredNet’s operations, services do not extend to students living off
campus; students living off campus are supported by Information Technology Services
exclusively.)
FredNet also supports the desktop and telephone needs of the approximately 400 student,
paraprofessional, and professional staff members who work in Student Affairs.
8.9.4 Other Technology Functions
8.9.4.1 Technology Leadership Cadre
The TLC is a student group which provides instruction in use of technology for both
faculty and students. The group is managed through the College of Education and
Professional Studies.
8.9.4.2 Library
The Library is a large consumer of and depends heavily on IT services. ITS manages the
Library’s open computer labs on the main floor and in the Library instruction lab on the
upper level of the Library and assists with managing the proxy server that allows offcampus
access to the many Library electronic resources.
8.9.4.3 Departmental Systems
In addition to the areas listed above, various other administrative and academic
departments have special-purpose information systems that they have acquired or written
to support their specific area. These include Interfase.com (Career Services), Facilities
Management, Recruitment Plus (Enrollment Services), Donor 2 (Alumni/Foundation),
Fundware (Alumni/Foundation), CaseIT (Biology), Broker (Ag. Economics),
PeopleWare (Outreach), Accounting (Perkins Loan – ECSI), Ad Astra classroom
scheduling system (Enrollment Services), PowerPark parking ticket system (Parking),
and Decision Support Systems (College of Business and Economics).
8.9.5 Technology Environment
8.9.5.1 Network Environment
The campus network is Ethernet based, utilizing single-mode and multi-mode fiber optic
cabling between all central campus buildings enabling LAN speeds of up to 1-Gigabit of
bandwidth. All offices and classrooms have hard-wired network connections.
Residence hall rooms are all hard-wired with a “port per pillow” deployment in the nine
double loaded corridor buildings. In the newly constructed George R. Field South Fork
Suites, there are approximately three ports per pillow considering the two ports per
bedroom, one port in the living room, and one in the kitchen. In addition, there are ports
in lounges. As of the 2007-08 academic year, all campus academic buildings and
residence halls have wireless access.
The network backbone equipment is primarily based upon Cisco switches with a Cisco
6509 Core. Internet connectivity is currently obtained via a membership to the WiscNet
consortium through a connection capable of OC3 speeds.
8.9.5.2 Server Environment
Microsoft Windows and Sun Solaris are the two primary network operating systems that
are used on campus servers. There are older servers running Linux, but those are being
phased out in favor of Sun Solaris servers. Servers are split across 4 computer rooms in 3
buildings.
8.9.5.3 Desktop Environment
All faculty and those staff considered knowledge workers have desktop computers
assigned to them that are replaced on a 5-year cycle. There is a four-year replacement
cycle for staff in Student Affairs. There are approximately 1,100 desktop computers in
use by employees and student employees. Seventy-five percent of these are Windows
based and 25% are Macintosh based. All have high-speed network access.
8.9.5.4 Instructional Technology Environment
There are 40 computer labs containing 649 computers for general student use and
classroom instruction. Additionally, there are 51 technology enhanced classrooms with
computers, projectors, network access, and document cameras which are available to
faculty for instructional purposes. A course management system, Desire2Learn, is also
available for all faculty and is hosted centrally by UW System through the utility
Learn@UW.
8.9.5.5 Applications Environment
The primary application supported by the central ITS department is the eSIS student
information system based on Oracle/PeopleSoft ERP software. The eSIS application is
resident on the River Falls campus. Additionally, UW System provides access to a shared
financial system based on PeopleSoft and located in Madison with plans to implement
centralized PeopleSoft HR/Payroll and Procurement modules which will also be located
in Madison.
ITS also supports the underlying applications that the University relies upon daily,
including: file and print services (for staff and student storage and management of
documents), Web (internal and external publication of information), directory services
(LDAP) account management and phone book, e-mail and calendar, databases used for
helpdesk management, parking, admissions, and alumni functions.
